There's not much that I don't do when it comes to building websites! I create the pretty front end bits that everybody sees, the really clever backend bits that nobody knows are there, as well as the powerful behind the scenes tools that only the website owner and staff see.
I also take care of the hosting and management of domain names and everything else that needs to be done to keep your project up and running.
What you see in the browser is a result of HTML and CSS working together to create something spiffy. This is what the website visitor is looking at.
ASP is the language that runs many large websites behind the scenes. It does the data crunching and is what allows interactivity between the user and the website. If you want to be able to collect information, or take orders, you'll need ASP. The database is what holds everything that you collect - information on your users, orders and anything you feel the need to record.
Every web project I'm involved in uses my own homegrown Content Management System (CMS). This allows everyone involved to update the website in the future without needing any special knowledge, or having to pay a web designer to do it for them. It even involves permission levels, allowing employees to be given access to certain parts of the website without having the ability to meddle with the whole thing!
If you can work a word processor like MS Word or Apple Pages, you can use my CMS system!
I also take care of the hosting for most (although not all) of the projects I work on. This is what allows people to see your website when they type your address into their browser. No matter how good your website is, without good quality hosting it'll mean nothing!
And then there's all the other little things that coding monkeys like myself use to make web projects work seamlessly. There's a little jQuery, which adds some bells and whistles to the user interface. There's Photoshop to make some of the pretty graphics, and then there's a handful of other little bits and pieces that go together to make the whole.
I work a little differently to most web professionals out there. Once upon a time I used to do web work full time, all day every day. That's where I built up my skills and learnt the trade. However, doing the same thing day in day out rapidly becomes quite boring indeed. So, now I work a little differently.
I work nearly full time in Peterborough Libraries, and do the web work in the rest of my time. This means that I can pick and choose which projects I take on, making sure I get the interesting stuff! What makes a project interesting can vary - it might be the technical skills required, it could be the subject matter is something that I'm passionate about, or it could be that I'm being paid in chocolate.
Doing the web work part time also means that I don't need to say yes to every job that comes along. In fact, I probably turn down more web work than I take on.
If I work on a project with you, you know it's because I'm fully on board with what you're doing. It's not because I'm chasing the paycheque. In fact, I often charge much less than I could (and very occasionally even work for free!), and usually for a fixed per project fee rather than a per hour rate.
I'll be just as invested in the project as you are!
Here's a few of my recent projects. I take on work that sounds interesting either in the technical sense or because the subject matter is something I'm interested in.
Hopp Rider Training needed a completely new website and event management system building from scratch. Customers can book onto public and private invitation only events and pay for their bookings online. When an event is coming up, HRT staff needed the paperwork and joining packs for each attendee to be generated automatically, flagging up anyone who hadn't yet paid.
Staff at HRT also needed a way to update the website without any web skills, so I added a custom built point and click content management system.
Visit: www.hoppridertraining.co.uk
The BMF is the largest motorcyclists rights groups in the UK. The mostly volunteer run organisation has somewhere in excess of 80,000 members, is a member of government advisory groups and puts on the largest outdoor motorcycle show in Europe every year.
The BMF Shows website was in drastic need of a make over. The entire site was converted to my own homegrown content management system, allowing BMF staff to update the website quickly and easily. A permissions system that restricts the ability to edit certain pages allowed different parts of the website to be given to different departments to deal with.
Visit: www.thebmfshow.co.uk
It's true, I do have a life outside of creating awesome web projects. Here's a little of what rocks my socks.
I have a love of Motorcycling and like nothing better than spending a day messing about on a bike. I'm an instructor on Cadwell Park track days with Hopp Rider Training and also instruct on their Advanced Machine Control courses. For all this I ride my trusty little Thunderkitten (A Yamaha YZF600 R Thundercat).
I mostly climb indoors on artificial bouldering walls, given that I live in one of the flattest parts of England, but occasionally I get out onto some real life rocks in the Peak District.
When I do get outside I use ropes and harnesses, as I tend to find that my ambition often outstrips my talent somewhat.
Working in a library, I spend a lot of time around books. I get to see some of the absolute rubbish that manages to get published, and find myself thinking 'even I could do better than that!'. So that's my big personal project this year - to write a novel and see if I can get it published.
If you've got something interesting you'd like to discuss, just get in contact. Use the form below, or the details opposite.
Traditional e-mail works best, but you can also find me in a few other places.
A note about Skype: To avoid spam calls, I only accept Skype calls from people I've had some sort of contact with before - So drop me an e-mail first!
When I'm web developing, I work from home. Almost everything I do, I do on my iMac. Occasionally, you might see me using the iPad if I'm out on location.
I think the space you work in has a big effect on the quality and quantity of work produced. My mind likes things to be clean and ordered, and that's how I like my workspace. I've custom built a desktop which covers one entire end of the room, on top of which sits the nice shiny 27" iMac. The keyboard and mouse are both wireless so, other than the obligatory cup of coffee, the desk is clutter free.
Hidden on the underside of the desk is a Beresford DAC which drives the Grado Prestige headphones. This way I can rock out in HiFi quality without annoying the rest of the world.
Coding is the biggest part of the job, so this needs to be something good. All my coding is done by hand, in Coda. By far the best web developer app I've used, regardless of language.
Design mocks and initial concepts are created in Photoshop, which allows me to play with positioning and colours before I get into the coding.
Things helps to keep me organised once I'm deep into a project. Task management becomes an important issue when you get into the larger projects, and nothing does it better than Things.
And when I'm working on those large projects, interacting with a group of people, I use Basecamp to keep everyone in the loop.