₦airaland Forum

I would make "mi abaga" to stand out more (I find it hard to read).  Other than that, looks good, imho

databoy247:
Slyrox speaketh well. Hear ye him, besides, I already addressed this on post #27

Ymodulus:
No yawa, nothing spoil. Remember, this won't end in a week so once you are done with your exams, and you pass them with flying colors (I will demand a copy of your transcript ), you can come in where you fit in at that point.

Good luck to you on your exams and thanks for showing interest.

It saves the user lots of time. Instead of having to open another page and sending a message, they can simply use that.

If you are as lazy as I am, the first thing I do on a form is look for the non-mandatory fields and not fill those.

Advice:
Though you may consider it optional, don't tell the user.  Remove the "you may enter" text.

Can you please walk me through how you achieved this? I don't understand how you could submit a blank form seeing that the register button doesn't show until all fields are done. That is a not good bug at all o.

I simply clicked the submit button  

I honestly tried avoiding this. When it comes to images, I completely suck at putting up something aesthetically pleasing. I believe that, given my sense of art, I'll mess up the site if I were to plaster my idea of images on it. However, I hope to delegate that to someone else someday.

You couldn't have said the bolded portion any better.  You might think it is spending money but trust me, based on experience, in the long run, you will not only be saving money, but you will have happier clients, if you hand over what you can't do to those who can do it.

Some folks like to be anonymous. Since it is a feedback, I do not necessarily have to have their information.

Then why have the form?  You might as well just drop a number and specify an email address and let the chips fall where they may.

Ymodulus:
This won't be ending any time soon. Good luck on your exams. Once you are done (and pass with flying colors of course. I will check your results ), just jump in where you fit in.

Thanks for your interest.

instinct, thanks for your questions/concerns.

I will partially answer what you have mentioned, only because as I stated earlier, initial phase is to gather all those interested. Trust me, these issues have been thought out and will be addressed. For instance, my initial thinking regards your questions is to assign 1 or more people to each section of the site (government, about, whatever). This way once the original template has been designed and the code architecture agreed upon (header, footer, etc), all the person/people need to do is populate with content. This will reduce possibility of one person over writing each other's code. Again, just a thought, since you asked.

Good questions though. Let's wait till at least Monday. More to come by then, Lord willing.

You don't need to do it but I'd say it's a nice "to have".

Ever since I started registering my site maps with it, and combined with google analytics, I have noticed that sites I do get spidered, indexed and ranked in half the time it would take for that to happen naturally.

In terms of other benefits, it has other tools on there that I haven't used but I think are beneficial. Like checking how many sites link to yours, how many pages on your site have been indexed, whether or not your site has suffered an iframe injection, etc.

@Fayimora
How we go forget you now? That is why (as promised), I created a brand new thread (which omni will sticky) as opposed to continuing on that other thread. It would have been hard to find

@instinctng
Since the aim would be to (hopefully) hand over the site to the government, I was thinking there is no need per se, to register another "nigeria" domain. This might also double as those guys not seeing us as a threat but as partners. Let's hold off on the domain stuff for now. There will be plenty of time for this and others. Let's rather focus on those who are "ready to serve". Though this will be ongoing, I intend to end round 1 of volunteer solicitiation, based on demand so far, by September 18, 2011.

Thanks

What do u do when u wake up in d morning not knowing where your next meal comes from? "Self-Employed" and no daddy or mummy to help you out? Some of us are lucky to turn down a 30k site, but so many of us will lose an arm to get a 20k job.

As sad as it is to admit, I have to agree with the above. It is quite unfortunate that due to the lack of leadership in our country, unemployment is so high. In some ways, I think we should even thank these guys for charging 30K. At least e better pass kidnapping and boko haramism, no b so?

omo:
Done: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-756293.0.html#msg9151894

1) I submitted a blank registration form and got, "thanks for registering"
2) The site could use some pictures
3) On feedback form, y r u saying I "may leave empty" the name and email fields? Then what's the point of the form?

Oya, let's remove this shame: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-759968.0.html

Orikinla,  how about your revenue? How much is facebook giving you out of that?

@instinct,

One look at that canada site and i am like, "no wonder the naija site sucks". The apple doesn't always fall too far from the tree, does it

Sure. Next time though, always list your caveats so we know to avoid them

Without veering too much off course, I think the main issue is with us as Nigerians and titles - the minute we learn something, we brand ourselves a "guru".  Someone like me, with over 15+ years experience, I still refer to myself as a beginner. I majored in software engineering yet I never attach the title "engineer" to my name, unlike some other (Nigerian) colleagues.

I have said it before that I have worked with a guy who had a degree in history.  The guy was bar none, better than I was and probably still is.  As someone else has eluded to, it isn't how you get the knowledge but how well you use it.  It's like saying, I have a hammer and I want to construct a house.  Just because you know how to knock a nail into some piece of wood, it doesn't qualify you as a master carpenter.

sisqo:
As stated in my OP, there is no "good enough" or "bad enough" with this project. Worse case, you can collect content and populate pages with it

Thanks for showing interest.

1) Registration form isn't validating phone numbers properly

2) After I register, I can't do anything until I fill out my profile

3) On profile page, i attempted to submit a blank form and got rejected, which is good. The bad part is that the submit button disappeared and I couldn't submit my completed form

4) Terms and Conditions uses different fonts

5) I logged back in to submit my profile, filled out the form completely but got the error, "Can't save your profile at the moment". I also noticed some blue text at the top left of the page saying, "warning(512)"

6) When I click link in #5, I get 2 more links, "code" and "context", as I click each, I get blank space that pushes the website down. When I do a "select all" of the text, I see a lot of array stuff printing out, one of which is:
$data = array(
"img_file" => array(
"name" => "contact.JPG",
"type" => "image/jpeg",
"tmp_name" => "/tmp/phpeijF4T",
"error" => 0,
"size" => 21013
)
)

Interesting observation of nigeria.gov.ng, now that it is back up:

So I am poking around, in search of ideas for: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-759968.0.html

I then click on "news" and I notice that the layout has changed and in fact looks much better. I then look at the logo and notice, "nigeriafirst.org", I then say "okay, wen that one happen now" and look at the url and notice: http://www.statehouse.gov.ng/ . To make matters even more "interesting", www.nigeriafirst.org actually exists and has the same content as the state house site, and no, neither redirects to the other.

Now I am totally perplexed but that is by the way. My questions:

1) How many of you are aware of http://www.statehouse.gov.ng/
2) How many of you are aware of nigeriafirst.org
3) What in the world is happening to our dear country's online presence?

Sure tubiz, I would rather go straight to the source myself.

Thanks for volunteering. Let me give this till Monday or so, before I announce the next moves

@omni:
Did you work during the last census?

@clemencro:
I appreciate your fervor and passion for this project. I will however, if you don't mind, ask you to hold off on the design for now. Let's at least wait till we can all agree on requirements, biko. I hope you understand

@omni:
Would you mind being our secretary and put clemencro's name down as one of the front end coders? Thanks

Hmm, a combination of these things:
1) Keep keeping on praying that God directs discerning clients your way

2) Have another side job so that you are not relying on a single stream of income

3) "If you can't beat them, join them" - only this time you do one better by, for example, automating your process so that the time you spend is such that it justifies the low cost (in other words, better templates)

As I have mentioned on here before, there was (emphasis on "was" a company 5 minutes drive from me that offered websites for $99. I called the company to get a feel but they never picked up the phone, neither did they return my calls. I googled them and saw the "sites" they did and wasn't surprised. No more than a year after I saw the sign post, I no longer see the company at that location. Of course, many conclusions can be drawn from this but I choose to believe that chief among those reasons is because the prices were too low to justify the overhead costs of running the business and the fact that his "sites" were nothing to write home about.

We just have to keep hanging in man. Sooner or later, clients in Nigeria will see the light

Well, I will tend to disagree with you. Pricing is influenced by many factors, many of which I have listed on various other threads.

Remember, using open source is one thing and adapting it to the taste of the client (as opposed to, for instance, using some template) is another.

I almost immediately turn away cms projects because I always would deliver custom solutions and they are a pain to get right though the clients don't understand what is involved (in a way, I can't really blame them). That is my preference though. I have done no more than 3 of such sites over the last 6 years and I charged a lot for them.

Hopefully you get my point.

Everything's fair in love and war. . .
Competition is good. It keeps you half awake. Not to mention that it encourages innovation and hopefully results in a better product.

I am in full support of open source.

1) In light of the fact that the layout and architecture of aforementioned site is not good and could be better
2) In light of the fact that aforementioned site was recently hacked
3) In light of the fact that a google search for "nigeria" doesn't place aforementioned site in at least the top 3 on page 1 of the SERPs

I hereby request all interested web designers/developers to join me on a pro bono project to help revamp Nigeria's image online. This site isn't meant to rival what is out there but to (hopefully) replace it in its entirety.

What's in it for you?
Definitely not money (at least not upfront or via "hook up" with the government). If this is what tickles your fancy, don't bother showing interest. What's in it for you should be the pride in knowing that you have helped expose your country, in a positive light, online. If money comes after that, consider that a by product.

Approach
I am estimating at least 20 individuals to get involved here. I actually requested this last year or so but it fell on deaf ears. So I am trying again. I am also estimating a project timeline of no more than 3 months (sure, we can do it in 4 days but we should be aiming for a site that is built right the first time).

The plan is to attack this on all fronts: Design, Code (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, whatever back end language we use (most likely PHP)), Architecture, SEO.

Once site is complete, we hope to present it to "someone" in "some department" and/or to the various media outlets. If it isn't picked up, so be it. At least we get to go to bed at night knowing that we actually did something positive. Who knows? It might even encourage similar initiatives worldwide.

Where do I fit in?
I will most likely serve in a Project Management capacity. Sure, I can get my hands dirty too but I am looking for a way "to give back" as I have been doing this for a while

Next steps
1) The current site indicates that it is managed by the Office of the SSA on ICT. If you or anyone you know happens to know who is in charge there, alert them to this thread as it will be updated quite frequently (assuming the interest is there)

2) Start thinking of what you can bring to the table. I won't be conducting interviews per se and everyone will be learning here. Just be honest, with respect to your skill set, that's all. If you want to serve in a learning role, that's fine by me.

3) Soon, I will be posting a "plan of attack" on this thread so stay tuned.

4) I will only proceed if there is enough interest (which should be indicated on this thread).

It's about time Nigeria be shown that it could be better and that we have the people capable of making it better, who aren't driven by immediate monetary gain.

Thanks for your time.

@dual:
no b joke o. I am a big rusty when it comes to the latest naija slangs
@slyrox:
Merci bien

@temitopsy:
Summary:
1) Contact page menu item is a broken link

2) I think you should reconsider the photos you have on your "about" page.  The "wanted" one in particular might actually cost you business, IMHO

3) The site looks more like a blog than a site that is advertising what you do

4) Services on home page should probably not even be mentioned.  I mean, the average Joe cares less about what technologies you use. Dude just wants a website

5) The brown globe in your company name should probably be changed to blue: Looking at it with my eyes, it looks as if the company name consists of 2 parts, "temi" and "psy"

Good luck!

slyrox, you sef

I get this in firefox (the only browser I use, unless I am testing):

Network Error (dns_unresolved_hostname)

Your requested host "www.temitopsy.comn" could not be resolved by DNS.

Very well then.

I hope the government hook up works for you because I know what your main problem will be - keeping the site current and maintenance. Both cost time and money and you, as an individual, no matter how saintly you are, can only go but so far with your volunteerism. I speak from experience

Good luck!

IMHO, the days of cashing in from squatted domains are over. Nowadays, with so many (perhaps better) domain names and extensions, people have become wiser to this, thanks and no thanks to $10 annual renewal fees

@dual:

We have at-al-at-all-na-him-bad-pass "designers" everywhere.

Please define the bolded portion

@slyrox et al:
Thanks. If I ever get the time, my future plans include going around the country (rather, boko haram-free areas ) to talk to various web designers/developers so they know a thing or 2 about becoming better professionals.