What do we want in the next Tribe of Judah web site?

Tek7

Tek7

CGA President, Tribe of Judah Founder & President
Staff member
Ever since SirThom resigned from his Tribe of Judah staff positions (including Lead Web Developer), staff members have been discussing what to do with the Tribe of Judah web site.

We've been able to take our time discussing the issue since most active members use in-game chat or forums to interact with other members. Still, a web site is a very important resource for any gaming group and we want to make the most of it.

Toward that end, we're looking at several different CMS (content management system) packages.

But before we decide on a CMS package, we need to figure out: What do we, as a group, want in our next web site?

Staff members have discussed technical requirements, licensing, and other concerns, but now I want to throw it open to members to discuss what you all want in the next ToJ web site.

So let's get this discussion going. Post your thoughts, questions, and suggestions.
 
It needs to be easy to update.

It needs to be modular.

Any integration it can have with vBulletin would be awesome.

It needs to be easy to manage if the original creator leaves/gets busy with other stuff.

It needs to be skinned easily.

It needs to be cheap/free.

It needs to be secure.
 
That...pretty much sums up what I was going to post--with one exception: The site needs to offer the ability to add sub-sites, for chapter/guild web sites (like the recently updated Unreal Tournament Series Chapter web site).
 
Bakey said:
It needs to be easy to update.
It needs to be modular.
It needs to be easy to manage if the original creator leaves/gets busy with other stuff.
It needs to be skinned easily.
It needs to be cheap/free.
It needs to be secure.
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We are looking less at technical requirements and more at end product inspiration.

ie, what is needed <- preferably with pretty image mockups of what you envision.

Bakey said:
Any integration it can have with vBulletin would be awesome.
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We might be able to do something like a simple RSS listing (which could be ported over with minimal hassle). Interdependency (like membership, etc) is too hackish as vBull doesn't support OpenID or OAuth and would require something like an open SQL connection or another form of abomination.
 
My old clan moved away from Joomla after a bot invasion on a supposedly members-only section of the site.

Drupal seems pretty cool though.
 
the biggest mistake most sites make is they forget to keep up on updates...joomla's actually quite secure in it's default state..:)
 
In terms of frontend for the site, not really sure what we can put on there.

In terms of browsing as toj members, what would be the best features on the page. I would say at this point in time my only access to toj.cc is to do admin duties and to get into forums.,.

1. News feeds on game updates (and any other updates)
2. Live server info with a bit more of a flashy front
3. integration with VOTD, perhaps a dedicated RSS feed

Other than that, the website is only as active as the chapters, we need people to start doing stuff and using the website to promote it. All chapter leaders have access to the news, calendar etc features but they dont ever get used.

And of course there are the backend features that would be useful, but we already all know about those.
 
How about IRC integration? So when I am browsing the site I can see who is online in our IRC channels and choose from the site to login\chat with them. And on that note how about adding our TS server to that list as well?
 
Elihu said:
How about IRC integration? So when I am browsing the site I can see who is online in our IRC channels and choose from the site to login\chat with them. And on that note how about adding our TS server to that list as well?
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This will likely require an IRC bot. It's doable, but clunky.
 
What about a different built-in chat that would use the toj.cc login to show who is online.
 
vibrokatana said:
web based chats are banned by many hosts as they consume tons of resources.
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We could just use Mibbit:
If you run a website or a blog, you'll want to build a community of people who keep on coming back. Mibbit can help by providing chat features on your pages connecting people who visit your site. It's as easy as copying a few lines into your page.

Perhaps you already have a Java or Flash based chat app which isn't working for you. Mibbit can be up and running in minutes.
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Hescominsoon said:
the biggest mistake most sites make is they forget to keep up on updates...joomla's actually quite secure in it's default state..:)
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Nothing is absolutely secure. All it takes is one commit not being looked at thoroughly to bring havoc. It doesn't help at all that most new programmers (particularly for PHP, ughh) don't learn to properly parameterize/escape their queries to prevent injection. Once you start adding in 3rd party modules you increase your risk and bring in the issue of forward compatibility. Where will the site be in 5 years? In that time PHP 6 will come out and 5 will begin to loose prevalence. At some point it will be in the same position as PHP<=4 is today.
 
i never said absolutely secure did i? joomla has issues just like everything else does..but out of the box there's few exploits..unlike php-nuke and others. If long term viability is the biggest concern then it's drupal..with joomla a close second.
 
Drupal or Joomla would be my suggestions for a CMS as well. I used Drupal for a while and it is extremely powerful, but not very difficult to use.
 
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