Archive for WYSIWYG
How Content Management Systems affect Web Designers
Posted by: | CommentsContent Management Systems (CMS) are growing extensively around the internet. They allow a vast amount of storage with the addition of tremendous functionality and customization. CMS is the next step in separating design from structure. The system began with cascading style sheets (CSS) and advanced further as a result of XML. In the years ahead billions of dollars are expected to be spent on the implementation of CMS into businesses.
Excellent Customization
A CMS are available in small or large and simple or complicated depending on business need. The price runs from very expensive (in the millions) to free with open-source CMS. Regardless, they are all based on the idea that content management allows web designers to focus on design. In the meantime, subject professionals built in a completely separate environment. The server then acquires the content, inserts it into a template and transfers it to the user.
CMS Workflow
The typical content management workflow by a web design consists of a designer creating something in whatever environment they feel comfortable with. Once the wrinkles are ironed out, it is sent to the server. If there are issues, notes are sent back in the content management environment. Concurrently, on the content side, the same process occurs. In the end, there are strict controls to prevent issues and ensure it goes to the server.
Web Designers and Content Experts
Designers are given the freedom to specialize within the content management environment. As content professionals add websites in a WYSIWYG platform, designers do what they do best: design. Content experts can add the content in a simplified manner, not using FrontPage or other website creation programs.
The good news for designers is content management systems remove most of the non-design tasks found in the standard process. Designers spend their time building templates building templates for various parts of the website. Due to the template-based environment of a CMS, changes can be made and seen by end-users almost instantly. All changes go through the typical workflow process and end in a publishing.
Content Management Systems were built to make everyone’s lives easier. Designers and content experts now have the ability to focus on their specialization and not have to concern themselves with non-value added tasks. This increases productivity while releasing various websites in a timely fashion. As content management systems become easier to use, the result will be an improved experience by the end user.
Making Your Own Custom Joomla CMS Theme
Posted by: | CommentsContent management systems have become so much more than they were originally intended to be. In the beginning these content management systems were only designed to help webmasters upload and organize content on their website. However as time passed new features were added until the CMS has reached the point where it is today – complete convenience in a backend interface. Now content management systems are used to completely change the look and feel of a site instantly, without even changing the actual content of the site. The CMS has made it possible to create a site with absolutely no programming or webmaster experience. Entire site layouts can be changed using what are known as themes – interactive customizable site templates.
Joomla CMS Themes
The Joomla CMS is one of the most popular in the world, alongside WordPress. This content management system is known for it’s simplicity and robust features. Although using predesigned templates in a content management system is extremely simple, unfortunately the process of building such a template is not always so simple. To build a Joomla template from scratch you need to have extensive knowledge in CSS, HYML, and PHP. It can take a very long time to learn all of these skills and then use them on a professional level. So how do you go about getting your own custom Joomla theme made?
Outsourcing to Rent-a-Coder
One of the options you have in regards to having your custom Joomla template made is outsourcing. Many people seem to have the idea that all outsourcing is extremely expensive, especially website creation. However the truth is there are many freelance workers out there that are more than willing to help you with your projects for a very nominal fee.
Using Software to Create Your Theme
When it comes to CMS theme creation there is only one software worth mentioning – Artisteer. Artisteer let’s you build your own custom CMS themes using a simple drag and drop interface WYSIWYG style. The program is one-of-a-kind and is used by webmasters around the world to bring a custom look and feel to their sites. The beauty of Artisteer is that it can create themes for several different CMS platforms, including WordPress, Joomla and Blogger. With Artisteer you can easily customize every aspect of your website’s theme without knowing a single bit of coding or programming knowledge.
Conclusion
The above two methods should help you get started with your won custom Joomla CMS theme. Keep in mind that the above theme creation methods can be used separately or combined. For example, you could hire an Artisteer expert to help you design your theme within Artisteer. You could also hire a programmer to add even more custom changes to your custom Artisteer theme, such as specific functions and flash media content.
Can I Use a CMS to Make a Website With No Experience?
Posted by: | CommentsCreating websites from scratch is not particularly easy, especially if you have no experience doing so. However, as each day passes more tools developed to help the novice webmaster create dynamic and visually pleasing sites with ease. Some of the tools developed promise to help even the most inexperienced user create an online empire without having to know anytime about coding or programming. This leads a lot of new webmasters to set out on a journey in which they expect to start today and have three sites built by tomorrow. Is it possible? Sure, but don’t expect your websites to look like anything more than a few basic pages strung together.
The main tools used to automated the process of building and maintaining website are CMS (Content Management Systems). Content Management systems are used to update content, organize websites, upload templates and maintain the overall appearance of a website.
How Can Templates Help Me?
If you’re trying to create a website with no experience then you’re going to want to use templates. Templates are basically predesigned web pages that you can use to get a web page up and running in a matter of minutes. Using a CMS like WordPress, you’ll be able to upload a template and populate it with content in very little time. You can even change templates quickly and easily, without changing the content of your site.
Can I Publish Content Without Experience?
The answer to this question depends entirely upon particular content management system you are using. However, it should be noted that most content management systems do not let you use a WYSIWYG (What You See is What You Get) text editor. In other words, don’t expect to be using a text editor that looks like Microsoft Word while publishing your content to the web. Unless of course you can use certain plugins to amend the content management system. One instance where this is possible would be if you used WordPress and the WP Super Edit plugin.
Why Use WordPress?
WordPress originally started as a blogging template, however it has evolved into the most commonly used website creation platform on the planet. There are hundreds if not thousands of plugins for WordPress that will let you do just about anything you can imagine with your website with minimal programming and coding experience. In fact, you don’t need any experience at all unless you want to bring your website to the next level using custom graphics. Using WordPress you can publish content and even automatically populate your site with content without having any experience in internet technology. If there is something you can’t figure out, you can just go to the WordPress forums and ask some professionals who will gladly assist you in virtually any topic within a couple of hours.
Conclusion
The answer to the main question “Can I use a CMS to create a website with no experience?” – is definitely a resounding yes. Using the tools and information available on the internet today, virtually anyone can create their own website with no experience whatsoever.
CMS Made Simple Content Management System
Posted by: | CommentsA man who gave up working in his father’s metal shop to building a good, solid content management system, Ted Kulp has been actively developing and tweaking CMS Made Simple for over five years. Since its early beginnings, CMS Made Simple has grown from one man to a team of over ten developers who’s passion shows in their commitment to this product. While not showing as a top open source CMS program contender, this piece of software has a lot to offer and is slowly growing in popularity.
Features
CMS Made Simple offers quite a few features. SEO friendly URLs is at the top of the list and is a refreshing change from the standard CMS URLs that require a bit of fancy programming or modification to work with the major search engines.
There are a number of integrated features making this product an excellent choice – help, file manager with upload capabilities and an audit log. User and group management are included as well as a group-based permission system.
CMS Made Simple allows for a unique web site design with the ability to change templates with ease. The included admin panel is not only available in English but supports many other languages as well. The program also boasts several extra features available with add-on modules – WYSIWYG, polls, blogging and calendar add-ons are just a few offered.
Support
The CMS Made Simple web site offers several avenues for support should the need arise. Full documentation is available online as well as an FAQ, user forum, mailing list and an IRC chat channel. If this isn’t enough, the company also offers a direct e-mail connection to a developer to have support issues handled when all other support routes fail to garner a user the answer they need.
The development side of this company’s web site allows users to report bugs and request features – a nice addition for regular uses of this CMS program. This area also shows current releases and a roadmap to future developments of the software.
Beyond software
Going beyond simply producing and offering a CMS solution, CMS Made Simple also offers professional services for developers needing more assistance or something more than just what the program offers. Among these services are support contracts purchased on a per-site basis, software development to help with solutions outside the standard program and the ability to contract one of the company’s developers for large projects.
Testimonials
As with any open source CMS program that may not be as popular as the biggies on the market, knowing that the product is stable and used by others is important. The CMS Made Simple web site lists out many satisfied customers with complete testimonials regarding the product. This web page shows the product is easy to use and is well-liked by many web professionals and business owners.
Final Thoughts
It definitely isn’t one of the more well-known open source content management systems out on the web but it is slowly growing in popularity. CMS Made Simple is exactly that – an easy to use open source content management system. This CMS program is worth checking out.