Expertise : Production

We have extensive experience in website production techniques, in particular batch and dynamic production. Most websites will require a combination of both, in order to achieve the required functionality while helping to keep costs down.

We can determine the optimal balance of production techniques for your website.

Batch Production

We use a batch production process for most of the websites that we build, developing MillScript specifically for this purpose. Batch production offers several benefits:

• Template driven production
• Multiple websites can be produced using the same design, but with different content
• Changes to design can be easily applied across entire website
• Websites can be produced in multiple languages
• Reduced server load per visitor (leading to less complicated server configuration)

A good example of the benefits of batch production is a hotel chain that would like to produce a website for each hotel, in the same design but with customised content.

Batch production does work before a visitor comes to your website, rather than when they visit. Our solutions maximise the benefit that can be gained from pre-generating pages, but sometimes work must be done each time a visitor views a page. This is where dynamic production comes into play.

Dynamic Production

Producing pages dynamically forms an important part of many websites. Dynamic functionality can be introduced with scripting in the browser (client side), or on the server (server side). Some examples of dynamic solutions include:

• Booking engines
• Shopping baskets
• Content management systems
• Blogs
• Wikis

Client side scripting is useful for improving a visitor's experience. Client side scripting can be in a variety of languages, most commonly JavaScript (ECMAScript) or Flash. We can help you negotiate the difficulties with client side scripting, e.g. browsers may not support required features or a visitor may have deliberately disabled scripting support for security reasons.

Server side scripting is more useful for customising a website for different visitors. Server side scripting can involve a much wider variety of languages, such as PHP, JSP, ASP, Java, Java Servlets, Perl, Python, Ruby, MillScript, etc. The primary drawback of server side scripting is increased load on the server, and this is where our batch production techniques come into play. As traffic to your website increases, more powerful and more complicated server configurations are required.

The choice of client versus server side scripting depends on your target audience and what you are trying to achieve. In practice, the answer is a balanced use of both technologies as appropriate. You can use client side scripting to enhance a user interface, when browsers support the appropriate technologies. You can use server side scripting to control access to data that is required for proper operation of your website, such as data that cannot be accessed from the client side.