A long overdue next installment
Many moons have passed since my last blog entry. The story ended then with how I got roped into doing this website. It continues now with how it has progressed.
The first thing I had to do was set up loads of software on my local machine and spend ages wondering why it didn't work. I got onto Dr. Google who helped a lot! The good doctor also showed me where to find lots of online tutorials, helpful forums, technical documentation and, for sanity, classical guitar music videos on You Tube.
After much trial and error, getting onto Dr Google and plaintive pleas to Heathcliffe for help, I managed to knock together something to show Jenny. She was typically enthusiastic and effusive in her praise and told me how far off the mark it was. Neither was it very pretty.
Much more trial and error and show ingJenny, receiving effusive praise and requests for change. Rinse and repeat ad nauseum (possibly ad infinitum!). Funny thing about talking to people who want something. When you give them what they ask, they're very grateful (actually, in my experience, only Jenny is grateful) and then they ask for lots of changes to what you've done and for other additional stuff. And it still wasn't very pretty!
I then put the website online as a test using a hosting service I use for other stuff. This was a temporary measure so that Jenny could get access to do proper testing and start creating real content. That's when she started to figure out what she actually wanted it to do!! More rinsing and repeating and Googling!
We focused on getting it to do what Jenny wanted it to do (minus the bits which I said we couldn't or shouldn't do) rather than worrying too much about how it looked. Then I had to spent a lot more time communing with Dr Google as making things pretty wasn't in my skillset. I set about trying to make it share the look and feel of the appcios.info website.
Meanwhile Jenny asked for more stuff....
Long story short, it's functionally there and looks prettier so we're ready to move onto the next stage. I'm currently working on ensuring it will be as secure as possible and am researching a permanent home for it on the tinterweb so we can properly go live.
The golf course is beckoning! Meanwhile Jenny is asking for more stuff....
Comments
In response . . .
I've certainly given Mark a mammoth task to perform on our behalf. And actually, I think he may have quite enjoyed it at times - when he hasn't been climbing the walls in frustration. He has managed to remain entirely good-humoured throughout - a really remarkable achievement, in the circumstances! And he has agreed to continue to maintain the Site for us, at a fee that would be regarded as derisory by his colleague techies.
Mark's endless tolerance in dealing with my demands is matched by his boundless patience in trying to get his head around what APPCIOS needs, and building the Site to fit. And on top of that, he has spent hours teaching me to understand a little of what he's doing,.
In the process he has translated into layman's terms: the potential and the limitations of Drupal - the Web application framework we're using; the tech-speak that describes the process; and - most importantly - the rigorous logic that underlies each tweak of the coding.
His hard work has paid off - and not just in creating a wonderfully flexible and attractive Community Site. He's also got me to appreciate something (a very little) about the world of digitalisation. I'm far from up to speed: not yet fluent in tech-speak, clumsy about design concepts, and often very slow to follow the logical underpinning. But yes, he's got me enthusiastic about our Site and what we can do with it, and I continue to feel overwhelmed with gratitude for what he is doing for us.
It's now up to us all to show appreciation of his efforts by our use of what he has created.
Tony Burch and I are holding a series of tours to introduce APPCIOS members to the Site, so that you can all get an insight into Mark's work, and learn how to bring it to life with posts, comments and Special Interest Groups.
Do contact me if you want to book a place on one of our tours, or discuss ways of being involved. Just send me an email at jenny.sprince@appcios.info