Easy web authoring software for a band? Easy Design and Updates are the priorities

Question

My band needs to put together a website. What's a good piece of software for managing updates? I don't want my bandmates to have to go in and edit code to update the front page with a new show, or to add images, videos, etc.

Answer 1

What you want is some kind of Content Management System. There are several very good commercial options available that come bundled with hosting, look in to Squarespace. Most web hosting providers will also offer something like SimpleScripts or Fantastico that will make it very easy to set up an open-source content management system. WordPress is probably the best of these, it's very polished software out-of-the-box and has a huge userbase. There are a LOT of options for CMS out there, you might want to look over a few (look up Joomla, Drupal, and Silverstripe).

Answer 2

I would stay away from Joomla (a bit clunky/dated) and Drupal (probably too complex for a simple band site). Wordpress is fantastic for simple sites, if you're comfortable installing it.

http://www.weebly.com/ is great for getting started with little-to-no html/css experience, while still allowing a fairly customized site.

Answer 3

Mac products are generally pretty good and "band friendly". Check this out. I haven't tried it, however. .

Answer 4

The Joomla CMS is well worth a look, especially because it has an 'events' plugin for bands to manage a gig/event list. You could design a Web template quite quickly or use/adopt one of the many free ones, and user updating of news articles is painfully simple.

Joomla: http://www.joomla.org/

Event List:

"EventList is just that what the name would lead you to expect. It's not a calendar but an easy way to manage and present your Events for your group, company or community. EventList offers a lot features and possibilities which makes your work easier, like the Venue database, Picture resizing and much more. But also for your site visitors EventList has some additional features to offer, like a simple registration system, map service links, or the submission of new events and venues from the frontend as well as frontend editing. "

http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/calendars-a-events/events/events-management/99

Here's a village hall Web site I put together in Joomla in less than a day - it uses Jevents (not EventList) for the calendar and has a simple-to-use pictures plugin:

http://www.walbertonvillagehall.org/

PS: I am not looking for business - I did the web site for free as the family is involved in the running of the hall.