Templates

There are many opinions out there on if a template based web site is any good. Well, the answer is or course it is. Buying a template and creating a web site can save thousands of dollars. Looking through the web you will find that there that there are millions of places to find templates to create a new web site.

Now, the real question should be can you create a web site from a template that will ultimately make you money. The answer again, of course, but this is where the average business owner should let a professional do their job. Customizing a template to meet your needs and optimizing it to be search engine friendly can take quite a bit of coding and experience. Anybody can create a web site but the average Joe has no chance verses an experienced web designer of creating a fully functional web site.

A huge myth out there is that a web site needs to be a “custom design” to be worth anything. Every template you find is a “custom design” but you are only getting a bare bones web site that must be filled with your own rich content. Some of the advantages are that the lay out and navigation are done, the template comes loaded with pictures you can use, sometimes you’ll even luck into flash headers or menus.

Just remember that customizing a template will usually cut your web site cost at least in half. Now, on to custom web site designs, here you will find that you have complete control over the look and feel of your new web site. You ultimately have control over everything, but these freedoms do not come cheap. A custom web site can cost anywhere from 1500.00 to 3500.00 so do your research. We have all heard horror stories from a friend about someone paying 3500.00 for web site that is a piece of crap.

So how do you know who to buy from or what to buy? Like I said before, do your research. Creating a custom web site takes a lot of planning and information so be prepared to spend a little time with your designer. When it is all said and done though, with a custom web site design you know that your company or business will have a unique design, fresh and original that no body else has. This is a huge plus considering how many web sites are out there. When considering whether to buy a template or a custom design here are a few key factors to consider.

Budget : What is your budget? How much can you really spend on this new web site Time: How much time do you have to get this project complete? Return on Investment: Depending on which route you take, will the new web site be worth it? Goal: What is the purpose of getting a new web site? Are you only providing information to potential clients or an interactive fully automated on line store?

These are just a couple things to consider but at least you have a couple starting points to decide Template vs Custom Web Site.

About the Author

Andrew Braudway Freelance web designer http://www.agbdesign.com

Share This

Think of your Homepage as the front door of your brick and mortar store. When customers land on your front door you want to entice them to enter and look at all the wonderful merchandise you have on display. Your Homepage ought to accomplish the same result. It should display a presence and if you’re considering using Flash animation or even video, make sure it’s appropriate for your message.

If you’re starting your online business from scratch or if you’re interested in improving your online business, it’s important that your site be well designed. You can hire a designer to obtain that perfect website design. Another option you should consider is website templates. You can choose from a large selection of template designs for whatever fits your business category. Website templates can be the answer for a tight budget.

In today’s competitive internet world you need a well designed website. A good design creates attention that delivers clients. The typical web surfer will evaluate your site in approximately five to eight seconds. That’s why it’s important to give an immediate positive first impression, because the next website is only a click away.

Whether you’re selling digital products or you’re providing merchandise that is shipped direct to your customer’s door, it’s vital that your website flows. Website templates provide a ready made framework that can be customized to fit your needs.

A well designed Website Template is often a great solution, if you’re on a budget. Ask yourself, are you among the many that will know it when you see it, but have trouble visualizing it from scratch? A website template gives your online business a foundation to build upon. After you have found the perfect design, consider customizing your template to fit your business strategy. In order to start the process of customization, you will need some software. If you don’t already have website design software here’s a list of what you’ll need.

WinZip 9+ (Windows); Stuffit Expander 10+ (Mac); Adobe Photoshop CS+; Adobe Dreamweaver (or Microsoft Frontpage 2003, or Microsoft Expression Web); Adobe Flash 8;

Although a great looking website design is an important element, you also will need to consider a back-end support system. In deciding what system to select, consider how you will track Accounting, Customer Relationship Management and Document management. Be sure to give careful consideration to the functionality you will need for your business. Doing your research and making the right selection on a back end system will help you to achieve your business goals.

Whether you’re choosing a website template, or having a professional design the perfect site, make sure you are paying attention to what is best for your customers. Your website design ought to give you a strong web presence.

Make sure updating and revising is part of your website strategy. Your website should be updated regularly depending upon upcoming changes or event. Take advantage of new technology. It can help you to beat your competition and establish your name.

About the Author

Steven Keltsch is an Internet Consultant offering Search Engine Optimization and a member of The Society of Industry Leaders of Standard & Poor’s, Vista Research Inc. For more information go to http://www.templateartist.net

Share This

I am guessing an article on this subject has been posted prior to this one, I should hope a few have! However I hope this will provide a refreshing angle on the subject and branch to some other interesting bits of stuff.

I am sure that anyone who has taken even only a few steps into web development has come across the gigantic force that is Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. Even for the most experienced coders, the most popular browser of this age has always been a prominent foot across the path of our websites technological progression and the possibilities of which the internet is yet to yield. Maybe not crushing ideas, but certainly making it a lot harder to bring these ideas from paper to browser.

However, although IE, wielding its scathing weapon the Microsoft corp. and therefore for-fronting the battle as the windows default has dominated the market; we have weapons which allow us the fight back! I think I’ll cut the metaphors here and get back to business… Well, how can we fight back? And more importantly, what can be done to keep our designs looking slick in the interim… Yeah before the proper browsers take over!

I’ll start with the fighting back. Personally my favorite method would be to utilize a conditional comment and tell people what they should be doing! Something like this…

Realistically I wouldn’t try this method though, probably not the most tactful way when it gets down to it. You could however place a banner showing your support of these less buggy browsers such as firefox. This websites great for this promoting firefox business, very nice banners right here: http://www.spreadfirefox.com/?q=affiliates/homepage

Conditionals are pretty clever little buggers though, for general use they can become quite useful. And you’re not just limited to

. The comments understand other operators as well; you’ve got the NOT operator which is an ‘!’. So “if not IE” would be

In addition to this there are “greater than” = ‘gt’, “greater than or equal to” = ‘gte’, “less then” = ‘lt’ and “less than or equal to” = ‘lte’. These can be used when referring to browser versions, so

could be used to warn users about a feature unavailable to them when browsing your site with IE version 5.0 and below.

But we are not here to help out the Internet explorer users; we’re here to convert them! Doing your bit locally can make all the difference. If you are round at a friends and he/she happens to log on to the internet using IE (boooooo), make it your concern that the very first thing that is done is the downloading of firefox (sorry Opera etc I’m a bit biased to the mighty fox.) Of course if the loging on to the internet part does not occur in the general flow of things it must also be your concern to make sure it does!… “Umm, you mind if I check the train times?” Okay I’m getting a bit carried away here, although very important to the advancement of the human race, you need not devote your life to spreading firefox.

The great progression in the internet and its uses over the last few years has meant that the look and the feel of a site has come under a lot more scrutiny, especially with ever rising amounts of traffic as more and more people connect to the internet. Complicated uses of graphics and CSS mean that when it come to interpretation by different browsers, everything can go wrong. The Browser that is renowned for taking perfect code and screwing with the end results is of course Internet explorer. It is so tempting just to say screw it and ignore the IE users and their browser, but with over 58% still using a version of IE this really isn’t plausible solution.

So okay we’ve got to fix the problem. Where to start?

Well firstly it is a must to make sure your code is valid. Just from an incorrectly written Doctype or wrongly phrased line of css can through internet explorer into all sorts of funny modes where anything can happen. Make sure you get a green light here http://validator.w3.org/ and here http://htmlhelp.com .

Good stuff, that’s one step in the right direction if anything. Now if the problem still exists, what now?

Most of IE’s rendering blips are caused by bugs, which can be worked around with quick alterations or what are called hacks. Chances are your problem has been experienced by people before you and a fix has been fabricated already.

So what’s going wrong? I will list a few of the most common bugs, some which I myself have experienced and a link to some relevant articles explaining in depth the fixes.

My borders have gone crazy! - fix…
http://www.positioniseverything.net

Margins doubled, pushing my content down and generally mucking stuff up - fix…
http://www.positioniseverything.net

Contents there one minute gone the next, the peekaboo bug - fix…
http://www.positioniseverything.net

You may have noticed that all those fixes above are at one website. Basically “Big John” and co of Position is Everything .net have done a fantastic job among some other geniuses out there, so why don’t I just give you guys a link to his site, the chances are you’ll be able to find a fix there… http://www.positioniseverything.net

You’ve now with a bit of time and effort (it sucks doesn’t it, and it really is unnecessary effort!) probably been able to fixed up your site. But what if something still purists, what can you do!? Well here is what I do…

Firstly if you know something which could be causing the inconsistencies in your site when rendered by different browsers, try just experimenting with this particular element of the code. Say the content part of your page is being pushed below your side navigation and you recon that IE is playing with your margin values but it’s not the double margin bug. Just adjusting the values of margins can bring results. This is a good time to introduce an excellent piece of free software called CssVista. If you know css well it can also be an excellent tool when in depth analysing your code when looking for problems. Check it out here
http://litmusapp.com/cssvista/

If you can still find no joy using this experimentation method I’m afraid the best hope is now to do what I really find annoying especially since if browser bugs didn’t exist it probably wouldn’t be necessary. We’re going to have to start again. Now don’t panic we’re not going to redesign your site from scratch, we’re going to make a mock up page of your current design, testing for rendering problems all the way.

Okay, well your average website nowadays is divs inside divs inside divs. So first step is to create you’re outermost div and in your css give it all the position you want and a background-color so that you can see it. Now add the divs that are contained with-in this one and do the same thing, giving them all nice bright colours so you know exactly where they are. Now test it like crazy, anything going wrong so far? Basically keep going like this, until something starts to look weird, then think why it doing this? What have I just done to make it go weird? Google and other free recourses can be come very useful now. Yahoo answers is fantastic for everything so it is always worth a try at http://answers.yahoo.com.

That’s about it really; Give that a try and well, good luck!

So, we’ve had a quick look at how to rid the world of Internet Explorer and how to get by in the time being. I’m not a fan of Microsoft attempt at an internet browser but not really in the league of this guy http://toastytech.com/evil/index.html.

Basically guys have fun and make sure you’re not supporting the IE domination by using it!

Pete Taylour is co-owner of the fast growing ebook site http://www.liqiuidebooks.com the only place to go for your cheap and free ebooks. With strong interests in a huge amount of different music styles Pete and friend are soon to embark on some crazy mix submission site for upcoming DJs across the globe, be sure to keep your eyes peeled for that and make sure you check out Liquid Ebooks at http://www.liquidebooks.com

About the Author

Pete Taylour is co-owner of the fast growing ebook site http://www.liqiuidebooks.com the only place to go for your cheap and free ebooks. With strong interests in a huge amount of different music styles Pete and friend are soon to embark on some crazy mix submission site for upcoming DJs across the globe, be sure to keep your eyes peeled for that and make sure you check out Liquid Ebooks at http://www.liquidebooks.com

Share This

One of the claims made on the templatemonster web page is:

“XML Flash Site templates are equipped with the system that will simplify your work with the Flash website by giving you the opportunity to edit it without having to use the special Flash software for that (you only work with the XML file)”

What their basically saying is that I can get the functionality and simplicity of editing my template’s content from a text editor, and still get to keep the performance and beauty of a premium Flash website.

So I decided to put this to the test, using a free sample XML Flash site, a copy of which I have taken the liberty to make available to you here (Free XML Flash Site Template Tryout). Don’t mention it! Besides as a developer you’re expected to be somewhat comfortable around XML. So if you aren’t, this free XML Flash Site template is just what you need to start getting your hands dirty.

Once I extracted the files I opened the site_flash directory, located the tfile_main.xml file and in just a few key strokes same as I’m doing right now I was literally changing menu items, adding more links, and even editing the content throughout the entire Flash template instantly requiring no prior knowledge of Flash whatsoever (I only worked with the XML file). What I liked best of all is not having to buy some hyphy Flash software in fact I did all my editing in Notepad. I simply edited all my stuff from the text file, changed whatever I wanted, and still kept the efficiency and beauty of Flash totally intact. Seriously, it’s unbelievable!

One neat thing XML Flash Site templates allow me to do is add as many “read-more” pages as I want or, for that matter, any page. Here’s what you do. I wont go into too many details-this is already beyond the scope of this article, and you’re darn smart.

Copy (Ctrl+C) an existing code for a “read-more” button

, find an area where you want the button to be, paste (Ctrl+V) and give it a unique identifier

The same if you were to add a 3rd button you’d change this function to a “2” the 4th would be “3” etc… Mi conprende? Oh yeah! I almost forgot, in addition to that little tidbit you’ll need to copy the existing code for a read-more page and paste (Ctrl+V); then replace the old text with new text and give it title. See? That wasn’t too bad.

The greatest gain for web site owners is they wont have to hire someone each time they have to make a change on their website. XML Flash site templates will let you circumvent the need to modify FLA source files whenever you need to change some text or move some pictures around. And it’s not just for beginners either, just think of the time we’ll save, I cant tell you the number of times I’ve been coding away the hours seemingly making huge progress, when out of nowhere I’ve got one of these “Flash has encountered a problem and needs to close” Dam!

Lastly, here’s the basic information you need to edit XML Flash site templates.

Open the “tfile_main.xml” file in the text editor (e.g. Notepad ++). DO NOT rename this file. Otherwise you’re screwed. Find the text you need and type in your new text. Upload all files to your public_html folder. All files should be placed in one folder. Also there are a number of free XML text editors that offer some really neat features such as color-coded text and section highlighting which can be very helpful. If you would like to find a text editor that provides this feature, try searching Google for a free XML editor or if you like you can contact the Foamers.net Web Team for our recommendations.

Share This