Bob Dey: A private tangle with web design

For colleagues who had taken bets on when, not if, I would throw my computer out the window in frustration, it was hard to believe I was off to become a superboffin in cyberspace.

But in December 1999 it happened, and about 2 am on the day our family left on an overseas holiday before the new business venture got serious, the website was live.

It was enough of an achievement to send myself a congratulatory e-mail. Unfortunately, the e-mail omitted details on how this miracle was achieved.

Plenty of amateurs have set up web pages, so that should have been no big deal, but I was trying to do more - create a subscription-based news site containing a multitude of pages, with online payments, give it a professional look, setting up categories that would establish a library of information, constantly updated and illustrated, and all done by one person.

The planning had begun months earlier with an attempt at understanding the web's language, html. My family came home one day with a book on the subject from the Usborne Computer Guides series, called Building Your Own Web Site.

Between that and Microsoft's Frontpage, my understanding of a totally new world began to grow. The designs came out late at night - the user was now designer and creator.

The html study was short-lived: it was obvious that course would take a century that I didn't have to spare. Nevertheless, the pointers became useful later when I found that as content provider I could easily dictate some changes of appearance in what became formatted pages.

It was also useful to understand something of the language when dealing with image codes and how to fix things after hours.

Theoretically, Microsoft Frontpage would take care of all my needs. Its systems eliminated the need for untrained amateurs to understand html, and a layout method such as frames for inserting material seemed perfect.

Some time down the track, my wife mentioned the inconvenient fact that not all computers will read frames in the way you present them.

Meanwhile, I was having trouble getting a consistent template. The margins would wander.

Trying to keep things simple, I had an amateur-looking site that would not fare well in a commercial world. But online it went, while I was still puzzling over how to create what seemed a very straightforward link to Genex Technology's secure online site for credit card transactions (www.mission.co.nz/).

On my way to the airport, I got a call from Genex director Bill Haggerty in Christchurch telling me there were a few hieroglyphics on my pages. No great trouble, he said, I should be able to fix it when I reached Singapore. After waiting to reach our Indian Ocean beach destination, I found another lesson in waiting: one-way e-mail.

Only when it was too late did someone mention that you have to change various settings to send and receive e-mail when you've set up an overseas connection.

That original introductory version of The Bob Dey Property Report (www.datalink.co.nz/hosts/bobdey) still sits on a few search engines - MSN has it at No 2 on its list under the full title search.

That seems to be because for a short period the site was hosted by Xtra. I wondered about Xtra the day I sent in details for setting up and hosting the site. They had gone back in time and could accept only a fax. Naturally, they spelled the surname incorrectly, an error that remained in one file for most of the year.

Come February, the small issue of setting up a link to Genex for the credit card transactions was impassable. I needed a host. I had to provide transaction security, and the site needed a more professional look.

One week into March last year all those things were in place, courtesy of Websmart in Parnell, developer of the new look and site host (www.websmart.co.nz/).

Since then the words have flowed in. Digital photographs were going to the host for imaging and coding, leaving me to slot in code. Last month, an upgrade allowed me to insert images directly. As that happened, with the accompanying requirement for instant Photoshop software knowledge, the camera decided to have a hernia - fixed by the introduction of a PC card in place of the troublesome serial cable.

Even though the PC gets overloaded at times, it hasn't been out the window yet. Maybe that Superboffin title will come my way yet.

BOOKMARKS

LOCATION, LOCATION: Realenz and PropertyPage

Real estate websites still have a way to go to meet reasonable standards of customer-friendliness. The Real Estate Institute's upgraded site, Realenz, starts you off with a map and promotes properties rather than agencies, with more options in the selection process than PropertyPage NZ.

PropertyPage has been set up by six of the big residential agencies, with varying strengths in other categories of real estate. The blue and orange on the homepage gives a blurred image and you would have to wonder why they want to make it so hard to choose an area to land your mouse on.

Maybe they think it's appropriate for people used to a century of reading 6-point classifieds in the newspaper.

Detail on individual properties for sale is frequently minimal, wasting the potential of this resource and giving customers questionable service.

The suburbs list on both sites is inadequate, especially for out-of-towners unfamiliar with the territory, who get no city map to help them. What, for example, is the difference between central and city-fringe in Auckland?

Central seems to take in a swath of suburbs north and west of downtown Auckland, and Mt Eden seems to fit into both categories.

Advisory: More information needed.

MOST ENVIRONMENTAL: rma-net

I thought people who followed the affairs of the Environment Court knew every syllable of every case, but Denis Nugent of rma.net has upgraded his site to incorporate the Verity search engine, which can jog the human memory and make up for fallible human recall.

The search engine requires fewer details to give more refined and detailed searches.

Mr Nugent has also upgraded his service for subscribers, offering a system to tie site usage to users for firms and councils wanting to track spending and allocate costs.

For non-subscribers who get rma.net's weekly e-mail, the site has introduced the opportunity to download individual decisions at $13.33 a decision plus a $5 monthly fee.

The website has a database of all Environment Court decisions, and High Court and Court of Appeal decisions relevant to environmental law.

Advisory: Law of the land at your fingertips

Links:

Realenz

PropertyPage

www.rma.net.nz

* Bob Dey publishes The Bob Dey Property Report (www.propbd.co.nz). He can be contacted at propbd@xtra.co.nz

* Peter Sinclair is on leave.