Hi, all -
Let me provide a quick intro, too. Y'all probably all know me as the Inner
Mountain Outfitters (IMO) guy.
I've been associated with caves.org nearly from the beginning. I was
solicited (actually, 'begged' is probably more apt) by Josh Abdulla (the
original webmaster who created the site) to host IMO on caves.org. I knew
nothing about html, but Josh convinced me I could do it, and helped me
along. So I had an intimate association with a succession of webmasters
for nearly a decade, until, after one of the more prolonged of many outages
that had me irate after a month of lost business, the BOG decided it no
longer wished to have the responsibility of hosting businesses that
demanded dependable up-time, even though business clients were paying
for the entire site..
But that close association gave me an appreciation for how important Web
site maintenance is, and that it's too big a job for just one person. We had
burned out about 5 webmasters in less than 10 years.
When I retired from IMO in 2005, Josh Bailey had just taken over as IT
Chair, and had only one helper, whom I'll call Doug, who took care of FTP
and e-mail accounts. Well, Doug just faded away and Josh was struggling
all alone. Not wanting to see yet another webmaster burn out in 18 months,
I volunteered to be the new Doug and man the Help Desk, so that Josh
could be freed up for the behind the scenes work. That turned out to be
fortuitous, as we soon had another server crash, and Josh really was in it
neck-deep.
Despite my doing all I could (which wasn't, and still isn't much), Josh burned
out after 18 months, too, and Darrell was 'hired' as the new IT Chair. Due
entirely to his steady hand, caves.org is now in the best shape it has ever
been, though there is still a great deal that could and should be done. We
have divvied up the workload, with me being shoved forward as the
'webmaster' in charge of all content, and Darrell remaining the 'man behind
the curtain' doing server upkeep.
Due to work and family commitments, Darrell now needs to step back a bit,
and will remain on the committee, but needs someone else to be in charge.
>>From my perspective, we need to increase the size of the committee, so
that the burden on each member is less, and encourage more
specialization. We need a Chair who is conversant in all aspects of site
operations and is a delegator; we also need folks who can handle all types
of scripting, have solid graphics design abilities, and who are dependably
available when needed. I hope that all who are responding to this casting
call for an IT Chair will also be willing to stay on, if not selected for that
position, in some some capacity that's in their comfort zone.
For my own part (since this is ostensibly an introdution!), I'll be happy to
revert back to being 'Doug' and just doing the scut work of FTP and e-mail,
and maintenance of some core pages, as that's all the meager abilities I
bring to the table. My resume includes being a self- taught html page-
maintainer who relies mostly on WYSIWYG software ((DW CS3) but can do
a little hand-coding. Oh, and I guess I'm the de facto site historian. I really
want this site to represent the NSS and caving well.
With that, I'll revert back to lurking, as the decisions being made here are
not my responsibility. I'm happy to remain on the committee, and equally
happy to learn whatever anyone will teach me that needs to be done. I very
much look forward to working with ALL of you!
Alex
--
Alex Sproul
NSS 8086RL/FE
NSS Webmaster
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