[Market-farming] website development

David Heininger david at blackmesaranchonline.com
Fri Feb 1 19:42:14 EST 2008


         Brigette-
         
         We design and maintain our own web site and a few others for
family/friends/farming colleagues.
         We use Microsoft FrontPage 2003 for all the work.  "Real" web
designers hate this program because it writes complex, "ugly" and unwieldy
code. We like it because it is WSYWYG (What you see is what you get) so
working in it can be a lot like working in any word processing or publishing
program. You will not have to learn a programming language (although
FrontPage does have the option of working directly in HTML if you want) and
a lot of the familiar MS Office short cuts and commands are there too. I
don't think this program is being made anymore but it is still widely
available new and used from $50-$200. Microsoft still offers online support,
patches, templates, clipart etc for it.
         FrontPage ain't perfect by any stretch but it is fairly easy and
intuitive to use and if you use one of their included templates you can
literally have a page up and running in an hour.  One downside is you have
to choose a web hosting company who offers "FrontPage extension" for full
functionality.  Most hosts do offer these extensions (at least they did when
we last shopped a few years ago).
         We use Khimaira for our all our web hosting (http://khimaira.com/
). They are a small Virginia-based company who specializes in farm and
farm-related sites.  They are very reliable and you can personally discuss
questions/problems with the owner Linda via email.  They have just been
outstanding for all our needs and offer a number of different packages
(http://khimaira.com/hostingprint.htm ) plus dedicated email addresses, free
domain registration, secure shopping cart and online ordering capabilities
too. Starting packages (w/out shopping cart etc.) begin at about $100/year.
(Geez, I sound like a commercial, but I'm just a satisfied customer).
         
         Hope this helps.  Good luck!
         
         David Heininger
         Black Mesa Ranch
         Farmstead Artisan Goat Cheeses
         "The Flavor of the White Mountains"
         www.BlackMesaRanchOnline.com
         
         Date: Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:21:34 -0500
         From: Brigette Leach <avalonfarmshomegrown at earthlink.net>
         Subject: [Market-farming] website development
         
         <snip> Are any of you willing 
         to share with the list who/what you used to design it, and if you
did 
         the work yourself, advice for the rest of us? Who do you use to
host the 
         site and what kind of fees are you paying? Who did you register
domain 
         names with and for what kind of fees?<snip>
         
         Brigette Leach
         Avalon Farms Homegrown
         Share of the Farm
         www.avalonfarmshomegrown.com 
         





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