A few thoughts from a web noob

[madmanjohn]

Ok first of all let me explain a thing or two so you can understand where I am at right now. I have been a computer builder for about 10 years locked in a pc based world due to the media files I manage. It has only been in the last year that the folks at apple allowed some of our software makers to build within the confines of appledom.

That being said, and as a MS Beta tester, and TECH net junkie, and also as a beta tester for several other media based software companies, my first foray into the web world was Office live small biz. Not bad for the noob but no matter what, everything you create there looks like a MS office publisher flyer and just 1000mb of storage, and not being very app flexible, you are pretty much stuck with a website that looks like "Yard Sale Here", unless you are a code savvy caffine mainlining typeaholic, which I am not. but hey, for 14$ usd a year and a place to hang a phone number it was not bad.

So here I am on day 5 of hostgator and I thought after reading the topic of the main post that i would mouth off a few thoughts at random that have occured to me along the way.

So far i have been overall happy with what i have done and have been very happy with the support chat. I have only had one thing i encountered that did and will not work but is related to the newness of WIN 7 and the compatibility of 64 bit computing, which is another issue, and not the fault of hostgator.

Most of the problems i have had were of my own doing. HOWEVER I would like to make a few suggestions for the other web noobs like me that landed here based on sunny-day-at-work reviews and well versed praise at the ability of being able to get up and running.

1. It would be thoughtful to take into consideration that there are a few firstimers that wind up here that dont know code from carp let alone do not work well without spellcheck, so a new hatchling modifying code could be a danger to all gatorkind. A quick site up wizard would be a plus. Just the ability to post a mere few words like-"this is our new website and its under construction, check back to watch as we reinvent the wheel, invent the new moustrap and save all mankind in the future" would be a help because its a self rewarding and positive confidence booster to see that the money you just spent can have somebody oogling it in a few minutes.

2. When it comes to programs like Joomla, Concrete 5, druwhatever and the others are concerned: A comparison chart would be a handy thing. If one is better at blue widgets and the other is better at purple carp then show us a chart so that we can base our choices on what we are doing with our new webpage and what our plan is. Also rank them but ease of use for the noob or the seasoned croc. And while I am at it, a way to uninstall one you did not like would be a plus cause if you use the quick installer, you can uninstall it however if you use fantastico de luxe there is not one so now I have a joomla version I may not be able to use and no clue how to run it or what to do with it.

3. It would have been nice to find a "system restore" function someplace wth an icon and ok so it costs 15$usd and and can only be done within a week at a time. I would have liked to known this BEFORE i started deleteing my new folder tree in file management. George Washington would of been proud of how fast that tree came down in a mouseclick or two had he known what a mouseclick was.
So to all you Noobs and web-wiz's to be-- once you are in control panel for the first time
-DO A BACKUP IMMEDIATELY before you do ANYTHING else. You may only have for a week since backups run on sunday but then again, you may only need it for a week.


4. Dont hide the BS. The Ad's claim unlimited storage for my package, but in the TOS it says 20gb. What's up with that?

Overall Thanks to some third party wizard i had in my toolbox i have a semi functioning site that has neat pix and some glossy looking tech stuff (ooh-aah) and does not look like a discarded wedding invitation from the 80's and so far I am overall happy with things and swimming with the rtest of the hatchlings in my new webworld. I could go on but I believe I may have exceeded the word limit as it is.

Thus ends my first post--asta-lavista babies

[GatorJoshL]

Good afternoon,

Thank you for the detailed review and suggestions, we try and make everything simple to use and understand that not everyone is as tech savy as our administrators/techs.

You do have unlimited storage! The ToS says that we will not backup more than 20GB. You can use as much space as you would like for your website, it will just stop backing up to our offsite backup servers after 20GB.
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7c.) Backup Limit
Any shared account using more than 20 gigs of disk space will be removed from our off site weekly backup with the exception of Databases continuing to be backed up. All data will continue to be mirrored to a secondary drive which helps protect against data loss in the event of a drive failure.
7c.) Backup Limit
Any shared account using more than 20 gigs of disk space will be removed from our off site weekly backup with the exception of Databases continuing to be backed up. All data will continue to be mirrored to a secondary drive which helps protect against data loss in the event of a drive failure.
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This is a great review, and really appreciate you posting it. I'd like to ask you to send me an email or PM on the forums here if you ever see any issues you think that we should be implementing, or think of some way to make something easier to new comers. We welcome all suggestions and I'd be more than glad to work with you personally.

My Email is joshloe (at ) hostgator.com which I can be reached at 24/7 (usually ..

Again Thank you,

[madmanjohn]

Thanks Josh. I appreciate that.

I have read more in the past few days and the ol' eyes have been at thier limits
so I guess i did'nt catch that was about backups only and just read it wrong.

At the local level we are a small lighting and sound company that does computerized light and sound and video control. The bigger picture is I have built a few machines that have gone to some of the largest events in the USA including some arena's that have hosted some of the largest touring bands and also national playoff games and as we try to implement our custom built hardware with the everchanging software climate the new website and it's changes will be a huge benefit to us. it may not look like much now but we just woke up and are gaining speed rapidly.

Overall this has been a good experience. I have spent 32 years in the broadcast industry at management level before I struck out on my own.

Implementing something new is always a process and this transistion has gone well, even though we are a small specialized company, I am impressed.

(This went much easier than the transition from XP to Vista.)

Before I turned in my credit card number the first thing I did was go to the chat support and ask questions. To me, support speaks louder than any advertising or user review. I need to know someone at the other end is listening even if I am the one that did not see or read or just get it. So the fact that they were willing to even talk to me BEFORE I was a member or customer speaks huge volumes and I personally think more e-companies should follow in that suit as that is one part of the downfall of manufacturing in America. That's what sold your company to me and I write the checks so the buck stops here.

Thanks again. MJS

www.shows1st4u.com

[madmanjohn]

and a few other thoughts in the learning curve before i go--

rewriting your main page root, regardless of software can create more problems that its worth. so if you have a package that will allow you to do so,

for your pages such as calanders, or events, or things that get changed a lot, create subdomain folders that are just one or 2 pages at best.

it is much easier and less complicated just to delete the old page and it's associated files within it's own folder than it is to overwrite the main public html folder. Overwriting can cause issues especially if all you are doing is modifying a link or a mere spellcorrection and its a fast way to corrupt a file.

I learned that one the hard way as i have re done this site 6 times to get it where it's at. Don't laugh, as stated before I dont know code from carp but i can write my signature with a soldering iron---to each their own strongsuit.

Myself, I happened to have web easy professional 8.0 at my disposal and used that and got the results you see. This is my first attempt at doing my own write with third party software and right now the target is at the local level and it's more of a marketing experiment than it is a cash cow.

As time goes and as we get a better grasp on how to market our hardware and where our targets are more changes will be implemented.

the next big hurdles for us is the fansite, and the ftp server for our software downloads for our immediate customers.