FIGURE A


If you're mad for mountain biking, this is the place for you. Roll over picture for a larger image.

For those of you with salt water in your veins, you can check out http://www.madforsailing.com, shown in Figure B.

FIGURE B


If you like to sail, visit this great Domino-based site. Roll over picture for a larger image.

These are the first of a planned eight sites aimed at "active lifestylers." MadforSport wanted its sites to have a consistent, family style. To develop the sites, MadforSport turned to Spider Productions, a Web application development company based in London. I contacted Adam Hoare, Production Director at Spider Productions, to learn more about how they developed the madforsport.com network.

Hoare explained that all the software included in the sites was written in a very short space of time, and it was done in a very modular way. "Each section of the site is essentially a snap-in component," Hoare said. "This has made it easy for us to build the next series of like sites. In fact, we can now set up a full-fledged e-commerce enabled site in about three days."

Each site in the network consists of the following main parts:

• Article publishing system;
• Classified advertising system;
• Online shop;
• Special offers and promotions based on customer buying profiles;
• Events calendar;
• TV listings;
• Extensive resource directories (clubs, shops, etc.);
• Discussion forums;
• Feedback to the publishers;
• Context sensitive online help;
• Online weather reporting system;
• Online newsletter subscription.

Each of these sections comprises one or more modules designed to "snap" into the system as a whole and function autonomously. "This means we can remove or add components as required to roll out new sites in no time at all," Hoare said. He added, "This modularizes the ownership and management of each section of the site so that security and access rights to the modules are managed in a coherent and time effective way."

Hoare's team was careful to design an intuitive user interface in order to enable the non-technical publishing team to publish their articles with the least amount of fuss. "They can publish to their site from the office or from anywhere they can obtain a telephone connection. This is vital to this particular site's success, as much of the writing is done from the actual locations of the outdoor adventure sports and often in difficult conditions."