Another Visa website, what do you think?
Mar 19th 2004, 5:26 am
#32
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Nov 2003
Location: Bandera, Texas - Medellin, Colombia
Posts: 550
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
This is already a feature of visajourney - a list of the embassies with information on what forms are needed, how to contact them, interview process etc. They need more people to supply info on the embassies so you may want to check it out.
Originally posted by Buendia
Please let me know if there's any way I can help!
Great idea!
Maybe include a search box for specific embassies, so there could be items related to each embassy - interview, if DCF is possible, stuff like that.
Maybe also a search for local USCIS offices, too.
Please let me know if there's any way I can help!
Great idea!
Maybe include a search box for specific embassies, so there could be items related to each embassy - interview, if DCF is possible, stuff like that.
Maybe also a search for local USCIS offices, too.
Mar 19th 2004, 5:27 am
#33
SUPER CRUNCHY BALCONY COW
Joined: Jul 2003
Posts: 9,476
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
What about more info after the I-129 is approved? Some people have everything clear until the paperwork hits the embassies
Mar 19th 2004, 5:39 am
#34
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 368
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
I will say that the only risk here is that we risk as a community diluting the information and run the risk of maintainability. From a time spent working in it perspective, I spend at least 15-20 hours a week of my personal time on the site. I understand that it is possible to spread the work, which I am trying to do, but in the end it is still a lot of work.
If you want to pull everything in one place I would be willing to partner up and work something out. It would be good to find another person willing to work towards the technical development. I would only ask that your hard work be long term not short..
If you would want to add-on or grow on the current things out there, let me know. I would be happy to allow you to take control and grow new areas of VisaJourney if you want to. I have very similar ideas to you, and it would be wasteful for us to duplicate work. The community would benefit as a whole if we can find a way, like you said, to bring this all under one roof.
As for as a CMS... I considered PhpNuke for awhile and may change the main layout over to it at some point. Most everything at vj is dynamic but there is always room to grow!
PM me with any Q's and I welcome feedback on this idea.
-Steve
(VisaJourney)
(on the note of syncing up with usenet, be warned that the tough part is that you cannot easily moderate what comes in / out from there. If someone posts on usenet it is very difficult to keep it off your site. aka, spam, trolls with a vengence, etc).
If you want to pull everything in one place I would be willing to partner up and work something out. It would be good to find another person willing to work towards the technical development. I would only ask that your hard work be long term not short.
.If you would want to add-on or grow on the current things out there, let me know. I would be happy to allow you to take control and grow new areas of VisaJourney if you want to. I have very similar ideas to you, and it would be wasteful for us to duplicate work. The community would benefit as a whole if we can find a way, like you said, to bring this all under one roof.
As for as a CMS... I considered PhpNuke for awhile and may change the main layout over to it at some point. Most everything at vj is dynamic but there is always room to grow!
PM me with any Q's and I welcome feedback on this idea.
-Steve
(VisaJourney)
(on the note of syncing up with usenet, be warned that the tough part is that you cannot easily moderate what comes in / out from there. If someone posts on usenet it is very difficult to keep it off your site. aka, spam, trolls with a vengence, etc).
Last edited by Steve2003; Mar 19th 2004 at 5:43 am.
Mar 19th 2004, 5:42 am
#35
Forum Regular
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 93
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Here are some links we've used through our visa journey. Please keep in mind though what Rete said - it's been 5+ years and many are not current. Also, check into getting permission, etc. Hope these may help and good luck to ya!
USCIS: http://uscis.gov/graphics/index.htm
Alt.visa.us.marriage-based Newsgroup: http://britishexpats.com/forum/
K1 FAQ: http://www.k1faq.com/
Visa Journey: http://www.visajourney.com/
Marriage-based Visa Sites Project: http://www.marriagebasedvisas.org/
Kamya Experiences: http://www.kamya.com/misc/
Mysterious Sealed Brown Envelope: http://www.k1faq.com/faq_index.htm
Port of Entry Rolling List: http://www.k1poelist.com/
K1 K3 Visa Timelines: http://k1k3.com./index.php
Service Center Processing Times: http://members.aol.com/MDUdall/sctimes.htm
Marriage-Based Visa Homepages: http://www.k1homepages.com/
K1 Ring of Gold: http://i.webring.com/hub?ring=immigration
Other useful links we used but no longer available:
Alvena's web site
Jonathan's web site
USCIS: http://uscis.gov/graphics/index.htm
Alt.visa.us.marriage-based Newsgroup: http://britishexpats.com/forum/
K1 FAQ: http://www.k1faq.com/
Visa Journey: http://www.visajourney.com/
Marriage-based Visa Sites Project: http://www.marriagebasedvisas.org/
Kamya Experiences: http://www.kamya.com/misc/
Mysterious Sealed Brown Envelope: http://www.k1faq.com/faq_index.htm
Port of Entry Rolling List: http://www.k1poelist.com/
K1 K3 Visa Timelines: http://k1k3.com./index.php
Service Center Processing Times: http://members.aol.com/MDUdall/sctimes.htm
Marriage-Based Visa Homepages: http://www.k1homepages.com/
K1 Ring of Gold: http://i.webring.com/hub?ring=immigration
Other useful links we used but no longer available:
Alvena's web site
Jonathan's web site
Mar 19th 2004, 7:00 am
#36
Concierge
Joined: Apr 2001
Posts: 46,462
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by vinnic
Jonathan's web site
Jonathan's web site
Jonathan's site is still very much available. It is private, password and registration needed to access, but it is still there. I found the link a few months ago for JEff
Mar 19th 2004, 8:12 am
#37
Living in Milwaukee, USA!
Thread Starter
Joined: Jul 2003
Location: Milwaukee, WI (formally England/Australia)
Posts: 899
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by Steve2003
I will say that the only risk here is that we risk as a community diluting the information and run the risk of maintainability. From a time spent working in it perspective, I spend at least 15-20 hours a week of my personal time on the site. I understand that it is possible to spread the work, which I am trying to do, but in the end it is still a lot of work.
If you want to pull everything in one place I would be willing to partner up and work something out. It would be good to find another person willing to work towards the technical development. I would only ask that your hard work be long term not short..
If you would want to add-on or grow on the current things out there, let me know. I would be happy to allow you to take control and grow new areas of VisaJourney if you want to. I have very similar ideas to you, and it would be wasteful for us to duplicate work. The community would benefit as a whole if we can find a way, like you said, to bring this all under one roof.
As for as a CMS... I considered PhpNuke for awhile and may change the main layout over to it at some point. Most everything at vj is dynamic but there is always room to grow!
PM me with any Q's and I welcome feedback on this idea.
-Steve
(VisaJourney)
(on the note of syncing up with usenet, be warned that the tough part is that you cannot easily moderate what comes in / out from there. If someone posts on usenet it is very difficult to keep it off your site. aka, spam, trolls with a vengence, etc).
I will say that the only risk here is that we risk as a community diluting the information and run the risk of maintainability. From a time spent working in it perspective, I spend at least 15-20 hours a week of my personal time on the site. I understand that it is possible to spread the work, which I am trying to do, but in the end it is still a lot of work.
If you want to pull everything in one place I would be willing to partner up and work something out. It would be good to find another person willing to work towards the technical development. I would only ask that your hard work be long term not short.
.If you would want to add-on or grow on the current things out there, let me know. I would be happy to allow you to take control and grow new areas of VisaJourney if you want to. I have very similar ideas to you, and it would be wasteful for us to duplicate work. The community would benefit as a whole if we can find a way, like you said, to bring this all under one roof.
As for as a CMS... I considered PhpNuke for awhile and may change the main layout over to it at some point. Most everything at vj is dynamic but there is always room to grow!
PM me with any Q's and I welcome feedback on this idea.
-Steve
(VisaJourney)
(on the note of syncing up with usenet, be warned that the tough part is that you cannot easily moderate what comes in / out from there. If someone posts on usenet it is very difficult to keep it off your site. aka, spam, trolls with a vengence, etc).
Its great to hear from you, and see your enthusiam.
All I want to do is create a site with the features I know the communitys needs. I work in application development, and part of my job is being innovative and coming up with new features / functions to aid people. So I can see so many things that would benefit this community, and yes i'm impatient and when I have a spare Saturday i'd like to be able to use it to help out.
Perhaps me setting up my own site isn't the answer, and helping you enhance Visajourney is. I really do love that site, and want to help to improve it.
On the geek side here, I was thinking of running my site on an a base design of the ASP.NET Dotnetnuke portal design:
http://www.dotnetnuke.com
It's free and open source and has some amazing features. I've already deployed it for a number of clients, and the amount of standard functionality and add-ons availabe mean its really scalable. Due to the amount of traffic it would generate i think MS SQL Server would be best database option.
In terms of the forums I wanted to use, Microsoft have backed the development of an open source ASP.NET discussion forum. The first release was very average, but version 2.0 looks amazing and has some great features:
http://forums.asp.net/Forums/
Maybe we can team up and incorporate the features i'd like to see into visajourney. I don't want to reinvent the wheel here, just help out the community and hand control to long term community members control of these websites. The technology is there, so when i see some site that was last updated December 2001 it frustates me.
I don't want to poach information either. All information that I used would be with the author's permission only, and perhap's they would welcome an easy way for them to update and maintain it through an easy to use content management system.
Steve I will be in touch.
James
Last edited by mcjimbo; Mar 19th 2004 at 8:24 am.
Mar 19th 2004, 8:22 am
#38
Living in Milwaukee, USA!
Thread Starter
Joined: Jul 2003
Location: Milwaukee, WI (formally England/Australia)
Posts: 899
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by vinnic
Here are some links we've used through our visa journey. Please keep in mind though what Rete said - it's been 5+ years and many are not current. Also, check into getting permission, etc. Hope these may help and good luck to ya!
USCIS: http://uscis.gov/graphics/index.htm
Alt.visa.us.marriage-based Newsgroup: http://britishexpats.com/forum/
K1 FAQ: http://www.k1faq.com/
Visa Journey: http://www.visajourney.com/
Marriage-based Visa Sites Project: http://www.marriagebasedvisas.org/
Kamya Experiences: http://www.kamya.com/misc/
Mysterious Sealed Brown Envelope: http://www.k1faq.com/faq_index.htm
Port of Entry Rolling List: http://www.k1poelist.com/
K1 K3 Visa Timelines: http://k1k3.com./index.php
Service Center Processing Times: http://members.aol.com/MDUdall/sctimes.htm
Marriage-Based Visa Homepages: http://www.k1homepages.com/
K1 Ring of Gold: http://i.webring.com/hub?ring=immigration
Other useful links we used but no longer available:
Alvena's web site
Jonathan's web site
Here are some links we've used through our visa journey. Please keep in mind though what Rete said - it's been 5+ years and many are not current. Also, check into getting permission, etc. Hope these may help and good luck to ya!
USCIS: http://uscis.gov/graphics/index.htm
Alt.visa.us.marriage-based Newsgroup: http://britishexpats.com/forum/
K1 FAQ: http://www.k1faq.com/
Visa Journey: http://www.visajourney.com/
Marriage-based Visa Sites Project: http://www.marriagebasedvisas.org/
Kamya Experiences: http://www.kamya.com/misc/
Mysterious Sealed Brown Envelope: http://www.k1faq.com/faq_index.htm
Port of Entry Rolling List: http://www.k1poelist.com/
K1 K3 Visa Timelines: http://k1k3.com./index.php
Service Center Processing Times: http://members.aol.com/MDUdall/sctimes.htm
Marriage-Based Visa Homepages: http://www.k1homepages.com/
K1 Ring of Gold: http://i.webring.com/hub?ring=immigration
Other useful links we used but no longer available:
Alvena's web site
Jonathan's web site
James
Mar 19th 2004, 8:31 am
#39
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 368
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Sounds good. I'll talk to you soon about it. You have my #, lets touch base and get something going. I totally agree that setting up an infrastructure is a great thing to do. If we do that, we can hand over control to moderators / admins of each section.
Originally posted by mcjimbo
Steve,
Its great to hear from you, and see your enthusiam.
All I want to do is create a site with the features I know the communitys needs. I work in application development, and part of my job is being innovative and coming up with new features / functions to aid people. So I can see so many things that would benefit this community, and yes i'm impatient and when I have a spare Saturday i'd like to be able to use it to help out.
Perhaps me setting up my own site isn't the answer, and helping you enhance Visajourney is. I really do love that site, and want to help to improve it.
On the geek side here, I was thinking of running my site on an a base design of the ASP.NET Dotnetnuke portal design:
http://www.dotnetnuke.com
It's free and open source and has some amazing features. I've already deployed it for a number of clients, and the amount of standard functionality and add-ons availabe mean its really scalable. Due to the amount of traffic it would generate i think MS SQL Server would be best database option.
In terms of the forums I wanted to use, Microsoft have backed the development of an open source ASP.NET discussion forum. The first release was very average, but version 2.0 looks amazing and has some great features:
http://forums.asp.net/Forums/
Maybe we can team up and incorporate the features i'd like to see into visajourney. I don't want to reinvent the wheel here, just help out the community and hand control to long term community members control of these websites. The technology is there, so when i see some site that was last updated December 2001 it frustates me.
I don't want to poach information either. All information that I used would be with the author's permission only, and perhap's they would welcome an easy way for them to update and maintain it through an easy to use content management system.
Steve I will be in touch.
James
Steve,
Its great to hear from you, and see your enthusiam.
All I want to do is create a site with the features I know the communitys needs. I work in application development, and part of my job is being innovative and coming up with new features / functions to aid people. So I can see so many things that would benefit this community, and yes i'm impatient and when I have a spare Saturday i'd like to be able to use it to help out.
Perhaps me setting up my own site isn't the answer, and helping you enhance Visajourney is. I really do love that site, and want to help to improve it.
On the geek side here, I was thinking of running my site on an a base design of the ASP.NET Dotnetnuke portal design:
http://www.dotnetnuke.com
It's free and open source and has some amazing features. I've already deployed it for a number of clients, and the amount of standard functionality and add-ons availabe mean its really scalable. Due to the amount of traffic it would generate i think MS SQL Server would be best database option.
In terms of the forums I wanted to use, Microsoft have backed the development of an open source ASP.NET discussion forum. The first release was very average, but version 2.0 looks amazing and has some great features:
http://forums.asp.net/Forums/
Maybe we can team up and incorporate the features i'd like to see into visajourney. I don't want to reinvent the wheel here, just help out the community and hand control to long term community members control of these websites. The technology is there, so when i see some site that was last updated December 2001 it frustates me.
I don't want to poach information either. All information that I used would be with the author's permission only, and perhap's they would welcome an easy way for them to update and maintain it through an easy to use content management system.
Steve I will be in touch.
James
Mar 19th 2004, 8:38 am
#40
Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 68,280
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Thats sound a great solution to mcjimbo enthusiasm and a very nice offer from Steve...I suspect his claim 15-20 hours a week on it is a hell of an under-estimate..Can I say one thing when you talk about changing systems ..which is great for you techies but most important it has be be VERY user friendly...Which these high tech system are not always so..
Mar 19th 2004, 9:59 am
#41
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 368
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by ray6
Thats sound a great solution to mcjimbo enthusiasm and a very nice offer from Steve...I suspect his claim 15-20 hours a week on it is a hell of an under-estimate..Can I say one thing when you talk about changing systems ..which is great for you techies but most important it has be be VERY user friendly...Which these high tech system are not always so..
Thats sound a great solution to mcjimbo enthusiasm and a very nice offer from Steve...I suspect his claim 15-20 hours a week on it is a hell of an under-estimate..Can I say one thing when you talk about changing systems ..which is great for you techies but most important it has be be VERY user friendly...Which these high tech system are not always so..
Mar 19th 2004, 10:21 am
#42
Banned
Joined: Sep 2002
Location: United States
Posts: 3,825
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by mcjimbo
So for instance if there was a legal advise section on this site I could hand over management of content and structure for that section over to say M**t U***l or F*******inla or whoever.
So for instance if there was a legal advise section on this site I could hand over management of content and structure for that section over to say M**t U***l or F*******inla or whoever.
And if you do put something together and use the work of others, than you must cite your source of information on your page. To not cite your source is Plagiarism, which is basically the theft of the reputation of the person who actually came up with that information (passing off someone else's work as your own is not cool, but seems to be a common thing on the net).
Last edited by Matthew Udall; Mar 19th 2004 at 10:35 am.
Mar 19th 2004, 10:51 am
#43
Forum Regular
Joined: May 2003
Location: Denver, CO
Posts: 232
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by mcjimbo
Due to the amount of traffic it would generate i think MS SQL Server would be best database option.
Due to the amount of traffic it would generate i think MS SQL Server would be best database option.
Your enthusiasm is admirable...I see this as a very time consuming endeavour...and I wish you best of luck if you decide to continue.
Now, for my 2 cents...what edition of SQL Server are you planning to implement? If you're looking at the free solution (MSDE), please keep in mind its limitations (25 concurrent users for the web site (if I remember correctly), and lack of any graphic management tools. However, you may use your (full-blown) SQL client from another computer to register your MSDE instance and make your SQL management a breeze...
Otherwise, using SQL Server sounds like a good idea. You may also want to look into MySQL.
And then, of course, there's always Oracle (sorry, couldn't resist).
Anyways, let me know if you have any database related questions.
Good luck!
Mar 19th 2004, 9:09 pm
#44
Living in Milwaukee, USA!
Thread Starter
Joined: Jul 2003
Location: Milwaukee, WI (formally England/Australia)
Posts: 899
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by Rete
Jonathan's site is still very much available. It is private, password and registration needed to access, but it is still there. I found the link a few months ago for JEff
Jonathan's site is still very much available. It is private, password and registration needed to access, but it is still there. I found the link a few months ago for JEff
Mar 19th 2004, 9:20 pm
#45
Living in Milwaukee, USA!
Thread Starter
Joined: Jul 2003
Location: Milwaukee, WI (formally England/Australia)
Posts: 899
Re: Another Visa website, what do you think?
Originally posted by Matthew Udall
I wouldn't touch that job with a 10 foot pole. I'm not their attorney, and I sure as hell would not want to be placed in that position of authority (just like I would never agree to be a moderator of a site such as this news group). Yes, legal advice should be issued by an attorney, but I'm not their attorney nor would I want to have my name on something (as an overseer) that facilitates the rendering of legal advice by others who are not licensed to do so.
And if you do put something together and use the work of others, than you must cite your source of information on your page. To not cite your source is Plagiarism, which is basically the theft of the reputation of the person who actually came up with that information (passing off someone else's work as your own is not cool, but seems to be a common thing on the net).
I wouldn't touch that job with a 10 foot pole. I'm not their attorney, and I sure as hell would not want to be placed in that position of authority (just like I would never agree to be a moderator of a site such as this news group). Yes, legal advice should be issued by an attorney, but I'm not their attorney nor would I want to have my name on something (as an overseer) that facilitates the rendering of legal advice by others who are not licensed to do so.
And if you do put something together and use the work of others, than you must cite your source of information on your page. To not cite your source is Plagiarism, which is basically the theft of the reputation of the person who actually came up with that information (passing off someone else's work as your own is not cool, but seems to be a common thing on the net).
Glad to see your enthusiam......
I only used my legal advise section as an example, and it probably was a bad one. The legal section I invisaged wasn't going to be a Q and A type thing, more information, like your website written by attorneys who know there stuff. Also access to managing the content for certain section would be restricted by user, so no one would edit your content. The other thing is everyone contributing would get a plug, which may send work your way.
Another feature I was thinking is an immigration lawyer recommendation facility that community members refer certain attorneys. Anyway they are all just thoughts and ideas, nothing more at this stage. I'm posting them here to gauge a response.
It's also great to see that you and Rete think the worse of me when it comes to gathering content for this website. Damn and here I was thinking all I would need to do copy and paste all the information, thanks for bringing copyright issues to my attention!
I'm going to discuss my idea's more with Steve at Visajourney and see if we can put something together and enhance that site more. Thanks for those who gave positive advice, idea's and information, gauging from the majority of those types of post it seems the community is interested in a portal "one stop shop" website that that offers all the services and features that a number do at the moment.
As i said I just want to create or help to create a site that we can all contribute to.
James
