When we first decided to list arts and crafts shows for free the thought was to list each show one at a time using information from promoters and the hundreds of fliers we get in the mail.
BUT… it soon became clear this was not going to work. With so many shows, and so many options, we felt it would be better to allow promoters to list their own shows.
In order to make the site function “automatically” we needed a script to do the work. A script is like a program that works in the background and does all the filing and display.
We went to the web and looked at many commercial scripts that keep track of events and dates. While there were a few that seemed to do most of what we wanted, there really was no single one that would do everything we wanted. If we were going to get what we needed we would need to build the script our self.
For anyone who has never done PHP but may be interested, here is the clearinghouse for information. http://www.php.net/
At any rate there was a steep learning curve and we needed help. We ran an ad on Craigs’s List for a programmer to write the code. A local coder answered and delivered what was to become the genesis of the site. While this first version would keep track of shows, there was no user interface and the forms were not complete or displayed the way we wanted. But he offered the code free and we certainly appreciated the help.
The next step for us was to learn more about what was going on with the code so that we could tweek it and make it function as we needed so we picked up a “idiots guide” to PHP and MySQL. Simply put MySQL is the database that holds the show info and PHP is the program that sends it there and then calls it back up when a user request the information.
The book was a lot of help and really allowed us to learn how to make changes to the script. Along the way we also availed ourselves to online PHP forums where others answer technical questions about php scripts. The basics of PHP are really logical and easy to learn more complex functions take more study and time to work out. Even a misplaced comma will cause a script to not function and it is not always easy to find the mistake.
Having a PHP script built from the bottom up can be an expensive time consuming process but we had a starting point, we just needed some help. While spending time at the forums we came into contact with a coder who would help us with the more technical aspects of the script, a a fee we could afford.
That was almost a year ago, and now, with slow but positive progress we are just about where we want to be with the script.
Users can safely and securely login to the site, list shows, and edit shows. If the user has more than one show they are given a list of all the shows and they can choose which show to edit.
Visitors can find shows by state, city, zip code, show name and more. They are presented a long list of details such as show time, dates, charges, in fact there are more than 27 to display information. In addition there are maps to the location and custom weather for each venue.
We now feel the site is ready for prime time and we will begin the process of contacting promoters and urging them to list sites.