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Code/framework for building a searchable directory

Posted: Sat Nov 21, 2009 8:08 pm
by Toe
Hi. I am in the initial phase (ie, conceptual design) of building a website which will provide a searchable directory of a particular kind of resources. It will have three main interfaces, for:
  • Providers to enter their resources and specify various features
  • Visitors to search on those features and locate providers
  • Administrator(s) to keep an eye on things
I'm also using this project to better learn PHP, since I learn best by doing something non-trivial. And I'm in no hurry. :)

While it would be very educational to code the entire thing from scratch, I have no objections whatsoever to re-using existing resources. Especially since I do want to publish this and would like to make sure I'm building a secure site.

Can anyone recommend existing open source code or a framework that would be suitable for this project?

Thanks!

Re: Code/framework for building a searchable directory

Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 2:33 pm
by alex.barylski
Drupal or Joomla if you want a prototype up and running fast to test the waters. You could easily build something fairly custom using Drupal and CCK/Views and use it as a prototype. If you need a little more control over the implementation you could use Joomla.

If you have a lot more time and need full control over the application, something like CodeIgnitor, Zend Framework, CakePHP would probaly suit you better.

I cannot offe3r any more advice unless you were very specific to the details/requirements.

Re: Code/framework for building a searchable directory

Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 3:17 pm
by morris520
If you're keen to learn PHP i suggest you start with writing codes yourself.
It will look like using a prototype could speed you up but you can't control things if you don't understand it!

A good example from me was: I was trying to split a string into two lines by simply put a \r\n. But since I chose Jquery prototype to develop, I didn't be away it silently escape \r and \n when the response returned from its AJAX function. It took me 1 hour to find this out but this should take about 2 mins if I chose to use original JS

Hope it will help you to choose a right to start with!