Which Type of Site is for You?

There are several different flavors of website. Each has its merits, its challenges and its costs. We work with all of them. Which one is right for you? Well, it depends on what you want to get done.

• Basic HTML/CSS websites
• Flash websites
• CMS websites (such as this one, dreamhand.net!)

This list, be aware, is a bit of a simplification of what usually goes on, which is that sites often employ a witch's brew of technologies.

Basic HTML/CSS: HTML (hypertext markup language) is the foundation of the 'Net, and has been employed since the beginning; it is the basic language spoken by Web browsers, like Internet Explorer, Safari and Firefox. "Hypertext" is text that can be a gateway to other documents, uh, that's a "link" to you. "Markup" is what editors do to documents to tell the printers how the final thing should look. "Language" refers to the system of markups

OK, that's probably more than you wanted to know. So what can this kind of site do for you? HTML sites are great at showing text and pictures, and providing simple links. Most of the sites on the Internet are in this category. If there is any animation on such a site, it is provided by JavaScript (don't ask) as a rule. It is easy to construct such a site — if you know how to prepare images and write HTML. Thus, such a site is economical, at least at first. The down side is that you either have to learn HTML yourself, or hire someone who knows it any time you want to make a change. HTML sites are easy for search engines, such as Google, to read and report on, and that's a plus.

Flash Websites: Flash is a program that creates interactive animations. Using Flash, a Web developer can create a site that is self-contained (for the most part) and runs as a movie on a single webpage. Meaning that the "several pages" that you see are usually inside a single Flash movie. Every element used in a Flash movie can be animated and can respond to users in a multitude of different ways. You have ultimate control when you make a Flash site. Using its native scripting language,
ActionScript, a Flash site can be coded to do some very amazing things.

Sounds great, right? Why have any other kind of site? Well, as it turns out, there are downsides to Flash sites. The first is that, since banner ads are often created in Flash, frustrated users occasionally block Flash in their browsers. The result is, they go to your site and see pretty much nothing. The second is that, because Flash movies are self-contained, it is hard for search engines to find them. For this reason, unless a site is of a particularly visual nature, developers prefer to use Flash movies for elements on a more standard page, rather than as the page itself. Go to the home page of this site and you will find a Flash demo loaded into a webpage that is not Flash. Because of the skill involved in creating these, expect to pay more for an all-Flash site. And be prepared to pay every time you need a change made.

CMS Websites: CMS stands for Content Management System. In this mysterious and fantastic kind of site, everything you see is delivered to the page by a database. In other words, pages are created dynamically, as the user requests them (!!??!!) with elements stored in databases. Users, too, can be remembered in databases. Do you sign on to an account at a given site? Chances are that it is a CMS, database-driven site. Until recently, database-driven sites were the realm of the big boys, your Googles, your New York Times online, your Amazons, pretty much all big enterprise sites. And they cost like it. We're talking into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. In recent years, groups of CMS enthusiasts woldwide have made this technology available to private citizens and small businesses. They have created systems with names like Joomla!, Drupal,

A CMS site, such as Joomla! actually is composed of two sites: a public "front end" and a "back end" available only with a password. Settings made in the back end run the site the public sees at the front end. Because of this, with much less training than would be required to learn even a simple language like HTML, normal people can manipulate the content on their site. A site owner would log into the administrative back end, create an article, let's say, and "publish" it to the front end. Voila! The article appears on the public site like magic. Sites created with Joomla!, like Dreamhand's, are template-based. What does that mean? It means that the content — you know, the articles, pictures, calendars, etc that are on the site — are separated from the design. In other words, you can plug in a new design, and the content will flow into it from the database. It's hard to place enough exclamation points to that last sentence. Need a site redesign? It can be as easy as loading a template (yes, you still have to create that) and clicking a link to replace your old one with it.

Again, sounds great! And it is. If keeping track of visitors to your site is attractive to you, then CMS is the way to go. The templates these sites work off make them simpler to construct in some ways, but harder in that they are a bit stiff to be creative with. You won't be getting the freewheeling freedom of a Flash site. (Of course, you CAN use Flash elements, as on this site's front page.) Be prepared to pay more up front for a CMS site — but there's a silver lining. You may be able to make many changes yourself, thus saving money down the road.