Need a solution!!

Media999

Doing up a website for a friend who owns a salon using a flash template. She wants to be able to edit a section once a week or so with special offers

Obviously a flash template isnt like wordpress were you just login and change whatever you want easily.

All she wants is to edit a few lines in a popup maybe or simple html page. I can then link to this popup or page from the flash template

Something as big as wordpress is way too big.

Have you any solutions?

Goodshape

Have you thought about not using Flash? It's a dreadful solution for any website.

Why not use WordPress for the whole thing? There are thousands of themes, and plugins, available -- most free, others cheap.

Hellm0

Would have to agree with the above OP, flash really is a terrible choice of technology to build your site upon. Best used sparingly for those "flashy" components rather than for a whole design.

BUT, if you need a quick implementation you may consider embedding an iframe in the page which references a paired down HTML file. This file could be edited by your client with minimal training(<br> is a line break etc).

stevenmu

-1 to flash, think of all the hair and beauty clients who'll be using iPads.

Media999

I agree with you 100% about the flash but she wanted the same as another salon site which was flash.

I created the whole bloody site and then she says after its done "how do i login and change the prices and special offers?" !!!!!!!!

She forgot to inform me she used to use some other thing that sounded like a CMS but ive no access to it now. She assumes you can just "login" to any site and edit text easily.

Unless i make it easy she will keep on emailing me and ask me to do it.

Dont think there is an easy solution. She will most likely f**k the site up if i tell her to edit some html. Might seem simple to regulars here but not to a beautician.

edit - forgot to mention i suggested she just post the special offers on Facebook and link to it but apparently " the older clients arent on Facebook"

Think ill just be telling her its not possible. Dont like saying that though

boblong

Media999 wrote: »

All she wants is to edit a few lines in a popup maybe or simple html page. I can then link to this popup or page from the flash template

If you want a quick and dirty solution, change your code to load the "changeable" parts from remote text file(s) (I'd normally suggest XML or JSON files but....). Then just give her FTP access to those files so she can write whatever in them.

Very simple AJAX! http://www.openhosting.co.uk/articles/webdev/5899/

Media999

Cheers for the help. Ill take a look at that last suggestion today.

I think theres a good opportunity here for someone to design something.

A simple wysiwyg box with a login underneath it that can easily be changed, without using something as big as a full CMS.

Maybe a linkback to designers site. Even if the info was stored on the designers site so it wouldnt need a database on the site where it is.

I wouldnt know where to start as im a complete amateur but a good developer could make something good here.

Like an easily changeable "latest tweets" widget or a "contact us" box.

stevenmu

There's a Facebook API as well, I've never used it, but I'm sure you could have a screen in your flash app that would read the latest offers from her Facebook and display them.

Liam Byrne

Tell her there's no point in her having a site because no-one will find her on Google.

Honestly, where people got the idea that Flash was suitable for websites is beyond me.....

Kidchameleon

Well how about putting the special offers in a jpeg / gif and just upload a new jpeg/gif every week.

aidan_walsh

Kidchameleon wrote: »

Well how about putting the special offers in a jpeg / gif and just upload a new jpeg/gif every week.

Thats equally useless.

Kidchameleon

aidan_walsh wrote: »

Thats equally useless.

Sorry but its a solution that would work in the context of things. Your post is useless to the OP. You should only post if you have something to add.

daymobrew

boblong wrote: »

If you want a quick and dirty solution, change your code to load the "changeable" parts from remote text file(s) (I'd normally suggest XML or JSON files but....). Then just give her FTP access to those files so she can write whatever in them.

building on this suggestion, how about using CushyCMS?

Client logs into CushyCMS to change files that you specify. CushyCMS ftps the changes to the live site. It supports XML and is free.

Media999

Ended up having to use Wordpress even though i said i didnt need something that big. had to add a gallery so it swayed my decision.

Had to go for a complete minimalist look with a them called vostock

Took out header, footer and widgets. only displays 1 post and Salon logo on homepage

She can login and change post easily.

Also included a photo gallery thats hidden and linked to from flash site because she sent on about 40 photos after the flash site was finished.

Well aware flash is sh** for SEO. ive told her but shes as stubborn as fu**. Leave her off i say.

aidan_walsh

Kidchameleon wrote: »

Sorry but its a solution that would work in the context of things. Your post is useless to the OP. You should only post if you have something to add.

The topic at hand is the usefulness of Flash, its ease of use, search discoverability and finding a simple way for the OP to be able to update their website. In that context, uploading a jpeg file is as useless as a Flash solution. Actually, probably more so given that there are some ways that you can get Google to "crawl" Flash.

Kidchameleon

aidan_walsh wrote: »

The topic at hand is the usefulness of Flash, its ease of use, search discoverability and finding a simple way for the OP to be able to update their website. In that context, uploading a jpeg file is as useless as a Flash solution. Actually, probably more so given that there are some ways that you can get Google to "crawl" Flash.

^^Yet another useless post for the OP.

Goodshape

Kidchameleon wrote: »

^^Yet another useless post for the OP.

The ironing is delicious.

Reamer Fanny

aidan_walsh wrote: »

The topic at hand is the usefulness of Flash, its ease of use, search discoverability and finding a simple way for the OP to be able to update their website. In that context, uploading a jpeg file is as useless as a Flash solution. Actually, probably more so given that there are some ways that you can get Google to "crawl" Flash.

I'm sure title tags in an image hold some value when it comes to SEO, including a caption near the image would also help.

Liam Byrne

justryan wrote: »

I'm sure title tags in an image hold some value when it comes to SEO, including a caption near the image would also help.

Probably true, considering Google has an image search that returns JPEG files......

......but what would I know; I only specialise in websites for photographers and use this technique all the time, with great results.

Aidan - you might enlighten us on how to get Google to crawl Flash sites......most so-called solutions involve having a non-Flash copy of a site Flash movie.

aidan_walsh

Aidan - you might enlighten us on how to get Google to crawl Flash sites......most so-called solutions involve having a non-Flash copy of a site Flash movie.

Turns out I was misremembering the original announcement by Google on their Flash crawling and thats its automatic (and not very good if the results are any indication).

Now as you say there are non-Flash additions that can be used like sitemaps with structured URLs or individual pages but a pure HTML/CSS solution is obviously favourable any day of the week.

iolo

I've found GetSimple CMS to be a good solution for small sites that need to be editable. It's free and doesn't even need a database (uses XML).

Freddio

You could create an RSS feed,

get the flash to import it into the SWF,

Put a html header over the SWF with a link to the RSS,

publish links to the RSS all over the net and ...

Content Manage a simple php/mysql dataset to make up the RSS.