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@ -4,87 +4,10 @@ date = 2020-02-01T18:54:46Z
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title = "Marc Leopold Photography"
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description = ""
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slug = ""
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tags = ["October CMS", "Vue"]
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tags = []
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categories = ["Portfolio"]
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featured_image = "/images/leopold/large-1.jpg"
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externalLink = ""
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series = []
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+++
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**Marc Leopold** is an apocryphal photographer and visual artist based in Chicago, USA.
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Having previously only having a dated, imaginary website to showcase his work, he recently decided that he was in need of a more modern, up to date portfolio site.
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## The Front End
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The front end of this project, I decided to use [Vue.js](https:/etcvuejs.org).
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Site is mainly to consist of content in the form of images.
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The main task of a user is expected to be the browsing and viewing of these images.
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A **Single Page Application** give the best user experience.
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No need to do full page reloads, when we only need to update the on-screen images.
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Can dynamically update page components to create a fast responsive site.
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## The Back End
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For the backend I decided to use [October](https://octobercms.com/), a Content Management System, based on the [Laravel](https://laravel.com/) framework, which is a popular, open source, PHP based framework.
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The major requirements of a backend for this type of project is simply to store and organise images.
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It would be possible to create a fully bespoke image based CMS to handle these requirements.
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However, this would involve a considerable amount of work and a lot of considerations, such as security best practices, browser compatibility, testing of code, etc.
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Fortunately, there are already a number of libraries and frameworks available that have already solved these issues, been tried and tested with real world use by many users, and are in active development.
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Using one of these shortens development time considerably. We are able to build upon and extend functionality rather than reimplementing these features from scratch.
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So for a relatively basic CMS, in which there are no particularly special requirements, it makes perfect sense to make use of a pre-existing platform.
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In this case, I used **October** for a number for reasons.
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Performant - isn't bloated with unneeded functionality. It instead provides a
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base in which features and functionality may be added if required. This makes it
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faster than some alternatives, such as WordPress for example, which can suffer
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from having a large amount of features included as a base. Also has useful
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default features such as minification of CSS and JavaScript. The templating
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engine (TWIG) generates static HTML.
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Developer oriented - is targeted towards developers. High quality documentation
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and a clean and modern codebase makes it easy to extend and add functionality.
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Plugins are entirely separate - have own database and namespaces preventing
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conflicts between them. The templating system and text file based website
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structure allows for separation of data and presentation and gives easy version
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control management.
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There is a large developer community. This means a large number of plugins and
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themes provided by the community. Not as many as WordPress but many of the
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WordPress plugins can be considered to be poor quality, particularly among the
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free ones. It can also be difficult to extend WordPress plugins.
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Secure when compared to alternatives like WordPress. Only one file that can be
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accessed - `index.php`. There is a more rigorous approval process for plugins and
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themes.
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Administrative interface customisation. This is very useful for a site that will
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involve a lot of users with the ability to manage their accounts.
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These reasons are why I consider a platform like October to be better for
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building a backend CMS than, for example WordPress - it is easier to customise
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and add the required functionality without the inherent bloat.
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Having said that, it may sound like WordPress just isn't very good when compared
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to something like October. This, however, just isn't true. WordPress is very
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good at what it actually is - a platform that allows users, who may have limited technical
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ability, to publish a website. For this it is very successful, after all it
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powers XX% of the world's websites. However, it is also a victim of its own
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success. It is a very high profile target with a lot of effort expended in
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finding exploits and vulnerabilities. That, combined with its start as solely a
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blogging platform, with CMS features bolted on over time, can make leaner, more
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focused alternatives more appealing to developers.
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## The Design
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Wanted to focus on the images.
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Wanted striking, interesting images on the home page to create interest.
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Wanted colour scheme to be dark and monochromatic.
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This is so that I can use full colour on those images and elements that I want to attract attention to and not have user be distracted by other elements that aren't the focus of the page.
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## The Deployment
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Hosted on a Virtual Private Server using Docker.
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TODO
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