Thursday, September 2, 2010

Dynamic Web Design


Dynamic web design is an excellent way for users to update their own information. More and more people want the capablility to be able to update their own data without having to depend on a webmaster to do it for them.

The whole entire website does not have to be dynamic. There can be a mixture of static and dynamic web pages within the same website. The deciding factor is how often the data must change, or whether the client would like to control his/her information.

Content Management Systems such as Joomla, Drupal, and WordPress give the same capabilities to the user. You download the free software, but you are responsible for the configuration. This may be the answer for you if you have a large website to set up that you want to control yourself. However, the user must be somewhat saavy in the use of open source software. Some people are not that technically oriented or patient enough to have to surf through forum after forum to get a simple question answered, or to have to put on a new release or apply a patch. Some people find that extremely complicated and time consuming, and I must say, I don’t blame them one bit. It’s not for everyone.

Many web hosts support PHP if you can write your own scripts, but you should make sure before setting up an account with them first, and also what kind of technical support they may offer. I often use HostGator for most of my web hosting needs. In the website I designed that is pictured above, I used PHP and MySql to create powerful queries, database updates, and it has proven to be the center of database design.