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Best method for a dead simple web site?
TalksToPCs:
I'm sorry, late to the game, I know, but WordPress is not dead simple.
Us techies may not realize it, but WordPress is relatively complex.
I've fiddled with lots of tools, and by far the simplest for computer illiterates is a web-based tool like Weebly and - my preferred option - Jimdo. Both have basic free options so you can try most of the features without paying anything.
I've helped create my girlfriend a site for her art project and she maintains it mostly without my help. She is a computer-illiterate artist, too.
(The links are non-affiliate, BTW.)
mahesh2k:
I found weebly and wetpaint more complex than wordpress.
I personally think tumblr is the most simple when it comes to website and blogging.
dr_andus:
Another vote for Wordpress (.com, not .org) for this purpose. Besides the benefits already mentioned, Wordpress sites also tend to rank highly in Google searches.
You get a lot of space for free, and the payment to get rid of the ads and add your own domain name are reasonable.
wraith808:
I personally think tumblr is the most simple when it comes to website and blogging.
-mahesh2k (May 28, 2013, 05:12 AM)
--- End quote ---
The one thing to keep in mind with tumblr, is that it's full of porn. Why does that affect you? If you don't have a custom URL, you'll be blocked some places just because you have a tumblr address.
app103:
Any blogging platform that is supported by Windows Live Writer that you can set up and configure for her (Wordpress (self hosted), Wordpress.com, Blogger, etc.)
It a lot easier than dealing with built in web based post editors and especially fantastic for inserting images.
Lot of options for resizing, borders, positioning, linking, and whether it links to full size or something else, and whether it opens in a new window, watermarking, etc. You can even set up defaults for her so it does exactly what she wants when she drops an image into a post. On the first post, just set everything on an image and click to make those setting the default.
It feels just like typing right onto your blog page (theme aware), And it supports drag & drop of images, right from Explorer. And when she is finished and has the page just how she wants it and clicks the publish button, it can even be configured to open the page she just published in the default browser so she can check it (and edit more in WLW and republish it, if necessary)
The only thing it really isn't good for is attaching files for download to posts (zip, exe, pdf, etc.) For that kind of stuff, I recommend dropbox, which one can drop the files into a folder and then right click the file to get the URL to link to, for visitors to download it.
It really is the best desktop blog editor that exists, though...so easy to use, and amazing that it's free. It's also the best way to prevent beginners and non-techies from getting themselves into trouble. ;)
If she has plans on doing this for a long time and being serious about it, I recommend self hosted Wordpress. You get more control, can do things you can't do on wordpress.com (like use javascript, more theme options, put ads on your site, run a shop complete with shopping cart and payment gateways, etc), But most important, you can have a copy of the database and can move your site to another host much easier. If you go with wordpress.com or Blogger, there is a certain amount of lock-in that occurs, even if you use your own domain name with it. You'll never get a copy of that database for moving or restoring your site, if anything happens to it, or if you run out of the allowed storage space.
If you decide to go with self hosted wordpress and need some help setting it up and configuring it, let me know and I'll help you. (I am in the process of getting tomos set up with a wordpress powered portfolio site on free hosting, free domain name, etc., and it would be trivial for me to do the same for you, too)
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