All American Pilot Car Services – a Project for Dad

0BBoyd • 15th Feb 2008 • Projects

This project is for my father’s company All American Pilot Car Services and is a labor of love and learning. I am using Mimbo 2.2 here as a base to build the design off of. I can’t really do better than Mr. Hoyt has done with the back end coding.

Once complete it will feature a mobile/WEP interface for both front and back ends, downloadable forms and certifications, google maps enabled posts and other useful items, and a customized back end that can be accessed via WEP. I plan to use WordPress as a CMS for this site and make use of several plugins, possibly hacked, to achieve a site that can be managed from the road and will serve as a virtual storefront for my father’s business. I’ll put together a post or two detailing my Mimbo and plugin hacks once complete.

The logo for this site was developed using my father’s idea. I often use istockphoto.com or contract to other designers for graphics work because I lack experience and good software. Dad saw an image at istockphoto he really wanted to have altered; and I contacted Please Login or Register to see the link. asking for a custom graphic to no avail- no reply at all in over a month. Rather than wait, I forged ahead and made my own version of what Dad wanted. Considering it was made using a version of Photoshop older than my car, and my lack of graphics experience, I’m fairly pleased with the result, but will probably re-visit it when I’ve gained some more knowledge. It inspired me to take some PS classes, at any rate.

I am using this  project as an opportunity to become more familiar with the GoogleMaps API and it’s possibilities, giving Dad or any of his drivers the ability to moblog with a map of their travels, and to give users extended mapping functionality, as well as using the API in the backend for statistical mapping.

More as the project progresses…