Archiving to the Glory of God March 6, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Libraries, Uncategorized.1 comment so far
If your church doesn’t have an archive and records program, or if it has one that needs improving, please take a look at the resources listed in this post on my other blog, NeoArch. As you can see, I am much more active over there, but it usually has very little to do with what’s going on over here. But, today it does.
Church Libraries February 24, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Libraries, Uncategorized.2 comments
Does your church have a library? Mine does. Does your church have a fully functional online catalog? Mine doesn’t. Do you want one for your library? Yeah, me too. I am investigating a couple of possibilities right now for what we could use. A couple of projects look really promising. If you want to investigate them for your library, check out OpenBiblio, PhpMyLibrary, Emilda, and Koha. These are all fully functional OPACs. They may be a little much for what you want. I think they allow for cataloging, circulation, and an online catalog. If you these functions are overkill and you just want to list your books, consider signing up for an account with LibraryThing. We may yet go in this direction, but LibraryThing lacks circulation functions. It’s cheap, fun, and a great program, but it lacks circ functions. Anyway, it’s something to think about. I will try to post more as I evaluate some of these programs.
If anyone has any experience in this area, please let me know. I would love to know if other churches have tried to tackle a web OPAC project, or if they have ruled one out. Just leave us all a comment. That’s what they’re there for.
Recording Sermons Podcasts With Stuff You Already Have in Your Kitchen Cabinet February 5, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Audio / Podcasting, Uncategorized.17 comments
Well, not quite…but I do want to address how to make podcasts of sermons with stuff that you probably already have. Really, if you have a computer, you can probably do all this without spending any money whatsoever.
I plan on doing a series here on ChurchWeb on how you can podcast your church’s sermons. In this installment, I want to explain how you can record your church’s sermons for $0 with equipment you probably already have. To record your sermons for podcasting, you need four things. (more…)
Dynamic and Static Websites February 2, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Uncategorized.5 comments
When thinking of building a website for your church, you have a major decision to make. You must decide whether you want a static or dynamic site. This may also mean that you need to realize that there are different types of websites. When you are cruising around on the internet, you will run into two different types of websites, static and dynamic. (more…)
Top 10 Reasons Your Church Should Have A Website January 29, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Building a Website, Uncategorized.3 comments
If you are reading this page, you probably do not need to be convinced to have a church website, but maybe someone in your church does, so with apologies to David Letterman, here goes. (more…)
Patience January 29, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Uncategorized.add a comment
For those wanting to use this site, please have patience. I am developing the content for the site. Hopefully, features such as the web glossary will be up soon. If there is a specific subject (podcasting, servers, etc.) that you are curious about, please request in a comment. I will be glad to try to get to it quickly.
So You Want A Church Website? January 26, 2006
Posted by churchweb in Uncategorized.5 comments
So you want a website for your church but you are not sure where to start? Hopefully, you are at the right place to find some helpful suggestions and answers to help you in the process. First, let me give you a little background about me, and why you should listen to me. I am not a pastor. I do not work (for pay) in a church. I am a deacon at my church, and I have been working on the website at our church for almost a year. When I started the process, our church had no website. We wanted one because our church is located in a rural area on the outskirts of Louisville, Kentucky. We hoped it would help potential visitors find our church. We thought it would allow our visitors to know more about our church. We wanted to supply our members with resources such as blogs, articles, links, and audio downloads that would be useful to them. We wanted to do all this for very little money because the church is not very large.
Now all of these goals seemed pretty lofty, and I had no experience building websites. But I was willing to do a little research to learn how websites work and how I could build one. I don’t have a degree in computer science. I am not a genius. I don’t have a house filled with computers that I constantly tinker with. I am just a normal guy who was just slightly curious and did a good bit of reading. I have learned alot over the last year, and I would like to share these things with you so that hopefully you can get your church website up with less pain that I had.
I want you to know that if you know enough to find this site, you can probably build a functional, useful, and possibly beautiful website for your church. And most importantly, you can do it well for a small amount of money (less than $10 per month). So, I hope you enjoy the journey. If you have any particular topics you would like me to address, please leave a comment. I will try to take requests (Skynyrd fans, please refrain from typing “Freebird” in all caps).
