A friend of mine called me to see if I could help update the website of a band he manages, since “the guy” who usually did it was not texting him back lately and they had a single drop scheduled for the next day. Luckily my friend at least had a username and password.
I Googled the band name, used “dig” and “Whois” to ID the host, and logged in. Shared hosting, Cpanel, a browser-based file manager… suddenly I was taken back to being 20 years younger.
I pulled down index.html, put a copy back as index-backup.html, made some changes, put that file back up as index-temp.html and sent my friend the link. We got on a call and worked through some tweaks, and when it was ready I deleted index.html, renamed index-temp to just index, and it was live. Old-school deployment.
And to be clear, this is a real band: it’s their full-time job, multiple albums, they’ve played all the late night shows and an NPR Tiny Desk concert, etc. But really, they don’t need anything more than a couple of flat files that get updated every few months.
SahAssar•9mo ago
> But really, they don’t need anything more than a couple of flat files that get updated every few months.
And someone who helps them do it, who knows the setup (or in your case knows enough to figure it out).
This is the reason I decline when friends/family ask that I "make them a site" unless it's absolutely static forever (hint: it never is) and only needs to be online for a limited time (hint: it's always longer than they said).
Instead I'll direct them to squarespace or similar and if they need help to get started I'll help out, but they are in the driver seat. Or they could pay a web agency if it's for an actual business.
musicale•9mo ago
As GP notes, retro web workflow isn't terrible for simple sites. Editing static html seems like something that anyone can learn, and html editors still seem to exist (including the editing mode built into most browsers.) Then you just need to find a hosting provider (maybe github, or neocities, or wherever.)
For more complicated web sites something like squarespace makes a lot of sense if they can manage technical complexity (web frameworks), business issues (payment systems), and the constant security patch treadmill.
It's a shame that self-hosting isn't viable for non-experts, due to management complexity and constant security issues.
I do understand the appeal of just using discord though.
SahAssar•9mo ago
> Editing static html seems like something that anyone can learn, and html editors still seem to exist (including the editing mode built into most browsers.) Then you just need to find a hosting provider (maybe github, or neocities, or wherever.)
Anyone could learn it, sure, but very few people will unless it's out of interest or it's part of their job. A restaurateur should not and will not learn HTML to put up their menu. The closest they will come is to export a word doc into HTML and put it on their site via a windows mapped FTP/WebDAV.
Look, I like self-hosting as much as (almost) anyone. I run my own DNS, email, git, etc. I hate telling people to use something like squarespace/wordpress/wix/whatever for a simple site.
It's just that if someone needs a site and wants a reasonable chance of not needing to think much about for 3-ish years and be able to update the opening times for christmas 2026 without relying on the goodwill of others I don't know what the option is besides paying a lot more to a web agency (Or falling back to just having a facebook page which is worse).
musicale•9mo ago
> The closest they will come is to export a word doc into HTML and put it on their site via a windows mapped FTP/WebDAV.
That's not a bad workflow. It's too bad that Microsoft didn't continue something like FrontPage or SharePoint Designer.
SahAssar•9mo ago
Sure (which is why I included it as an example of an alternative to learning HTML), with a few caveats. The problems with it are that the HTML output is usually very bad, it'll probably not be well parsed by google or others (for SEO, integration with maps and opening hours) and it will almost definitely not be usable on mobile.
The second two of those are pretty important for local restaurants.
A proper local WYSIWYG, well made, with integrations to accounts on traditional shared hosting would be a viable option for many WP/squarespace/similar sites. I just don't know of any that actually are well made.
My start in this industry was copying CSS zen garden, modifying in dreamweaver and uploading to a shared FTP host, which is not that different.
perilunar•9mo ago
"isn't terrible" = simple and easy. Too many people overcomplicate things.
FTP + hand editing the HTML is perfectly fine for simple sites.
snowwrestler•9mo ago
Anyone who asks me to build them a site gets Squarespace, for sure. We put in their credit card number and they have full access; I just pick the template, get the domain name set up, show them how it works, etc.
We have even started replacing Wordpress sites with Squarespace at work. We tested out Wix, Webflow, Wordpress.com, etc. but Squarespace seems to have the best combo of features, design, price, and ease of use.
subpixel•9mo ago
Wow flashback to anxiously replacing files with Fetch.
snowwrestler•9mo ago
I Googled the band name, used “dig” and “Whois” to ID the host, and logged in. Shared hosting, Cpanel, a browser-based file manager… suddenly I was taken back to being 20 years younger.
I pulled down index.html, put a copy back as index-backup.html, made some changes, put that file back up as index-temp.html and sent my friend the link. We got on a call and worked through some tweaks, and when it was ready I deleted index.html, renamed index-temp to just index, and it was live. Old-school deployment.
And to be clear, this is a real band: it’s their full-time job, multiple albums, they’ve played all the late night shows and an NPR Tiny Desk concert, etc. But really, they don’t need anything more than a couple of flat files that get updated every few months.
SahAssar•9mo ago
And someone who helps them do it, who knows the setup (or in your case knows enough to figure it out).
This is the reason I decline when friends/family ask that I "make them a site" unless it's absolutely static forever (hint: it never is) and only needs to be online for a limited time (hint: it's always longer than they said).
Instead I'll direct them to squarespace or similar and if they need help to get started I'll help out, but they are in the driver seat. Or they could pay a web agency if it's for an actual business.
musicale•9mo ago
For more complicated web sites something like squarespace makes a lot of sense if they can manage technical complexity (web frameworks), business issues (payment systems), and the constant security patch treadmill.
It's a shame that self-hosting isn't viable for non-experts, due to management complexity and constant security issues.
I do understand the appeal of just using discord though.
SahAssar•9mo ago
Anyone could learn it, sure, but very few people will unless it's out of interest or it's part of their job. A restaurateur should not and will not learn HTML to put up their menu. The closest they will come is to export a word doc into HTML and put it on their site via a windows mapped FTP/WebDAV.
Look, I like self-hosting as much as (almost) anyone. I run my own DNS, email, git, etc. I hate telling people to use something like squarespace/wordpress/wix/whatever for a simple site.
It's just that if someone needs a site and wants a reasonable chance of not needing to think much about for 3-ish years and be able to update the opening times for christmas 2026 without relying on the goodwill of others I don't know what the option is besides paying a lot more to a web agency (Or falling back to just having a facebook page which is worse).
musicale•9mo ago
That's not a bad workflow. It's too bad that Microsoft didn't continue something like FrontPage or SharePoint Designer.
SahAssar•9mo ago
The second two of those are pretty important for local restaurants.
A proper local WYSIWYG, well made, with integrations to accounts on traditional shared hosting would be a viable option for many WP/squarespace/similar sites. I just don't know of any that actually are well made.
My start in this industry was copying CSS zen garden, modifying in dreamweaver and uploading to a shared FTP host, which is not that different.
perilunar•9mo ago
FTP + hand editing the HTML is perfectly fine for simple sites.
snowwrestler•9mo ago
We have even started replacing Wordpress sites with Squarespace at work. We tested out Wix, Webflow, Wordpress.com, etc. but Squarespace seems to have the best combo of features, design, price, and ease of use.
subpixel•9mo ago