Creating Alternative Versions of Your ExpressionEngine website

Erskine Designs’ Jamie Pittock has just posted a technique for creating alternative versions of your ExpressionEngine website without using EE’s Multiple Site Manager add-on:

…we created an alternative version of our site specially optimised for the iPhone but there are multiple use-cases for the technique I’m about to describe. For instance, perhaps you want to offer a ‘lite’ version of your site for people on slow web connections, or maybe multiple versions of the same site using different languages, or even geographic-specific versions of the same site. Think about an international news website with alternative versions where the content becomes country specific by using subdomains.

I’ve used the Multiple Site Manager add-on for several projects and while it certainly adds a lot of flexibility, it can also really make you pull your hair out at times. Pittock’s approach is much simpler, and while it might not work for every project, I can already think of a few of mine where it may apply quite nicely.