[Phpwm] My New Project

[Phil Beynon]

> Just thought I'd babble on a bit about my new project, as its the largest
> I've embarked on so far, and I'm using the Codeigniter framework to ease
> things a little. Forgive me in advance for waffling. :)
> Its been done many times, but I'm making a flexible structure for
> a website

This sounds very similar to my coeus-computica project.

> for my own use. It consists of:
>
> Front End - Semantic XHTML with a few divs for design flexibilty.
> Back End -
> User Admin, Product Admin, Contact Admin( with mailing functionality ) &
> page content admin.

Don't worry, you will find that list grows and grows..... :-)
Function creep is the main problem with projects of this nature - you have
to lay down a main set of functions then enhancements, then anything else
that comes along gets shortlisted for the next version, otherwise its never
ending!

If you are selling or aiming to sell to the SME market then dont worry
overly about making it run with a definable set of users all with different
rights over different parts of the site, to date none of my customers have
made that a requirement, so its saved up for version 2.

> This will give me the bones of a website package that I can
> tailor to suit a
> customers requirements. It should cover most types of site, from basic
> static to ecommerce sites.

Are you trying to make it as something that just you use or is this for the
customer to administer the site directly?
My personal preference is for the customer to administer the site almost
wholly by themselves, including things like uploading and resizing images or
sets of images. Once the site is up and running then you get a heck of a lot
less disturbance that way. I do quite a few sites for the antiques /
collectables trade of that nature.
One thing you will find is mostly the customers / users are quite happy for
a backend that is functional but not glamorous - they simply aren't so
bothered about pretty icons and page colours compared with intuitive ease of
use.

> In future I may add CSS skins and editable design elements, only
> time will
> tell!

Think about an admin back end which dynamically writes the CSS and allows
positioning of standard page parts via div tags, if you can get most of the
site to lie in essentially one switched page it gives huge flexibility.

> This is because I aim to go freelance, and I need a bit of 'power on the
> hip'. My aims are to make it as expandible and future-proof as
> possible, cos
> I'm sick of rewriting the same stuff :)
>
> A sensible approach don't you agree?

Very sensible, but you will find it does take a lot of time to write,
especially alongside whatever you are doing in the daytime on customers
sites. I dont know what timescale you are looking at but you will find
things easier if you can get a lot of it written in the evenings while you
are still working for someone else and not having to worry about getting
bills paid, doing paperwork etc!

Phil