Website
This web site is provided by Baildon Parish Council to help them keep in touch with the public and each other. The website, and the facilities it offers, are not to replace other means of communication - other methods of communication are also used but a web site and computer storage of information makes things more readily accessible and manageable - to those with a computer and internet access.
Paul Marfell was instrumental in sorting out the hosting and domain registration.
The web site is an implementation of an Open Source Content Management System called Joomla (joomla.org) it uses a MySQL database and is written in a script language called PHP.
Joomla is quite popular and being Open Source means that anyone can work on improving it. The system manages the content well and provides the user with a user friendly interface for making changes to the content. It is not necessary to have any knowledge of how to control the appearance of things on a web site other than by clicking on option buttons. During editing the content is shown as it will appear in normal use. This means that the people maintaining the content do not need any special computer talent. This avoids the problem of those who want to provide the content not knowing how to work with the web site and those who know how to work with the web site not knowing what content is needed.
The hosting is provided by UH Hosting on their servers in London so it has a good connection for our users who are in the UK.
The domain registration was handled by UH Hosting and things went smoothly once we realised that we would not be allowed to register baildon.gov.uk. The registration of all gov.uk domains has to be submitted to ja.net. There are restrictions on who can register a gov.uk domain so part of the application is to provide the information that shows that you satisfy the requirements. If anyone is interested I can provide the text of what was used in our successful application. We had hoped to be able to register baildon.gov.uk in the same way that Keighley have registered keighly.gov.uk however we were told that if we were a Parish Council then that is what the domain name had to show, either by baildonparishcouncil or baildon-pc. This unfortunately will create additional problems if we decide to change to a Town Council.
After asking several internet users about the name it was decided to register baildonparishcouncil.gov.uk. The reason for this is because of the extensive use of search engines. It might take longer to type baildonparishcouncil.gov.uk but most people use a search engine and if the results show baildonparishcouncil it is clearer than baildon-pc that the site is for the Parish Council.
Once the hosting and domain name were working the Joomla application was installed. From previous discussions it was known what type of information was to be made available and so the initial menu structure was created using the administration functions of Joomla. It is now a matter of getting people to provide content for the site. One of the important uses of the site is to provide access to the agendas and minutes of the meetings of the Parish Council committees. To help with this a Joomla extension called DocMan was installed. This provides a category based system for managing files and controlling how they are presented to the site visitor.
If other Parish Councils want to get a website up and running and have someone who is reasonably computer literate then the project can be managed in-house. Obviously records will need to be kept of what has been done, what has been installed, how things have been changed etc. so that things can be handed over to a successor. This information is related to the installation of the application and is completely separate to the content which with a bit of practice can be managed by anyone who can use a computer.
If you are thinking of doing something like this then feel free to get in touch with the web master of this site.
