Tom and I have been busy rejigging the NativeHQ website of late. We’re still working on some aspects of the content but decided to follow the Cult of Done philosophy and just get it online.
I wanted to blog about how relatively painless this process has been from a system point of view. This is the kind of long-term freedom from pain we like to offer clients of our website development services too.
Since the beginning of NativeHQ around three years ago our website has run on the WordPress system and this is turning out to have been a wise decision. One huge advantage of WordPress is the freedom we get from its open source licence (the WordPress code is licensed under a licence known as GPL). In other words, we are independent of any other company and completely free to change bits of it. We are certainly not locked in to any suppliers, licence costs, ‘bespoke’ systems and so on.
In the case of our own website we kept the core system and the old posts. We mainly needed to work on the cosmetic level of the visual theme: we got rid of the old theme and developed a new theme in keeping with our visual identity.
There are some functional changes as well. For example we wanted each service page to begin with an introduction and have a live portfolio of related projects underneath. If you visit, say, Social media strategy or Multiplatform design, you’ll see what I mean. The list of links in each case is generated automatically from the blog maintained by Tom and me, based on categories.
Again these functional changes are modular – just a matter of patching in a new template or two, not a serious overhaul.
Something is seriously wrong if you have to spend loads of money to overhaul your entire website including the core CMS just to give it a fresh look and emphasis every three or so years. But some website suppliers can force you to do this by making you rely on their bespoke, proprietary systems. As a rough analogy, it wouldn’t make sense to put your body under general anaesthetic and have surgery every time you simply want to change your outfit or make-up.
Rydyn ni wrthi’n datblygu’r ochr Cymraeg o ein gwefan ni. Bydd y cynnwys yn wahanol i’r Saesneg i fanteisio ar y cyfle i siarad am y we Gymraeg a phethau sydd yn addas i ein cymuned sydd yn defnyddio Cymraeg. Gawn ni weld. Mae’r ddwy iaith gyda statws cyfartal ond mae modd gwneud pethau unigryw i’r Gymraeg hefyd er mwyn cryfhau’r gronfa o sgyrsiau sydd ar gael yn yr iaith hon. Mae’n broses dysgu hefyd. Mae mwy nag un ffordd i wneud pethau a dyma’r ffordd rydyn ni’n bwriadu dewis. Fyddan ni ddim eisiau cyfieithu yn uniongyrchol rhwng y ddwy iaith.
Os wyt ti’n chwilfrydig, rydyn ni’n defnyddio ategyn WordPress o’r enw WPML er mwyn rhedeg system ddwyieithog. Mae rhaid gosod tri neu mwy o gyfieithiadau: system graidd WordPress, y thema, y cynnwys ac ambell i ategyn. Dyw WPML ddim yn berffaith ond dw i wedi trio sawl ategyn ac mae’n well na’r gweddill sydd ar gael ar hyn o bryd – yn fy marn i.
Gyda llaw dw i’n casáu ymddiheuriadau am ddiffyg darpariaeth Cymraeg ar wefannau ond nawr dw i’n wneud yr un peth. Cymraeg yw fy ail iaith ac mae’r iaith ysgrifenedig yn her fach i fi felly diolch am fod yn amyneddgar.