Re: Web Authoring Software for Photo Sites

In article <436dd3f8$0$24518$892e7fe2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Derek Fountain <nomail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes
David Littlewood wrote:
I have for some time been contemplating putting together a web site with some photo albums showing travel, photomicrography and miscellaneous images. I have never written a web site before, and wondered what program was considered the best to use for this. I have no particular interest in learning HTML coding, I just want to put together a linked collection of say 4-5 albums with thumbnails linked to larger jpgs to display.
Any thoughts would be welcome. I have Frontpage 2000 and Dreamweaver 4 - I know, both a little old - shows how long I have been putting it off! To me, neither seem particularly intuitive to use.

How do you intend to get these things on the 'net? Do you have a server? Probably not, given the phrasing of your question. Do you plan to purchase some hosting from a services company? Or are you hoping to utilitise the N-megabytes of free web space your ISP gives you?

My broadband ISP provider includes 20Mb of web space in the package, so I figured I may as well use it. I really have no intention of running my own web server - sounds hard work!

It matters because the more automation you require, the more advanced hosting service you need. Managing a website with even a few dozen images requires some technological assistance - having to write another 25 HTML pages by hand when you want to put another set of images up is a pain, and it's enough of a pain to prevent you doing it.

As you correctly surmise, a tool like Dreamweaver or Frontpage will help a lot. You produce a template of your photo page, then create a new page from that template for each new photo - it's a drag and frop exercise. Unfortunately you need to learn the tool, and you're right, they're not as easy as you might think. I've been coding HTML for years and once took 2 solid weeks to try to learn Dreamweaver. I failed - it's a dog's breakfast of an application - but that was undoubtedly down to my short comings, since an awful lot of websites do get written with it. I had more success with Frontpage, even to the point of getting my computer-illiterate other half to produce her own website with it (http://www.scratters.com/tina/purepilates/). That's because it's more basic, the downside of which is that Frontpage websites look just that - Frontpage websites.

Yes, I thought the templates looked "very early 1990's Powerpoint" sort of thing.

Another option would be to use a custom written program to produce the website for you. This free one is hugely popular and could quite possibly be what you need:

http://gallery.menalto.com/

The issue there is that you need a particular setup on your webserver - PHP with safe_mode off. You also need a database for the latest version.

Then again, I have friend who uses this:

http://www.breezesys.com/index.htm

Which produces simple, basic HTML pages. I've never seen it being used, but he seems happy enough with it (http://www.esses.co.uk/, the front page of his website is his own work).

Which all brings me back to my original point. If it's your server, PHP and a DB are no problem - look into Gallery et al. If you're buying some hosting space it shouldn't be a problem as long as the hosting provider can match those requirements (and most will, I would have thought). If you're using your ISP's free web space, you'll probably have to deliver nothing but the HTML pages, which most likely means Frontpage or Dreamweaver. Frontpage 2000 will do what you want, and in my experience is the easier to use. But the Breezesys product would probably be easier still, and they have a trial to download, so maybe start there?

Thanks for these thoughts. Pete. I'm currently investigating NetObjects Fusion 7 and JAlbum, as recommended by other responders, but I'll certainly keep this advice archived in case I need it.

Regards,

David
--
David Littlewood
.

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