Website Building Questions?

[Carbo]

I'm in the process of planning out a new website for a business. Not knowing squat about these things I am also in the process of hiring someone to do this for me. But, the more I try and educate myself about this, the more confusing things seem to get.
For example, I am told the best way to build a site is using something called CSS. Supposedly far superior to using tables. Is this an accurate statement?
How will using CSS affect the look of the site? And future upgrades, changes, maintenance, etc?
Also of concern to me is Search Engine Optimization. How is this affected by the building process?
Finally, someone I have been talking to someone who has been selling me on the advantages of something called Joomla. Anyone know anything about this? Good? Bad? Ugly?
Any advice is appreciated. Thank you.

 

[firewall]

CSS and PHP are a good combo.

Joomla is just a CMS (content management system). There are others and if you do go with a CMS instead of developing it all yourself, do test out other CMSs to get a feel for them and which you find to be easier. Don't just dive into Joomla without looking at others first.

Oh, and Google will be your friend in all of this. 🙂

 

[Rip the Jacker]

I hate Joomla and Mambo... too damn slow and all the templates look the same.
Anyway, all the things you mentioned are sort of connected to make a website.

The foundation of a website is the HTML, which are all the elements such as <div> tags and <img />.

CSS is then used to style the elements and add width, padding, borders, and such.

SEO is just the strategy of using headers and using keywords in your paragraphs and all throughout your page so that robots can list your site higher.

Joomla and Mambo are CMS's, which allow you to easily edit and add pages to an already existing system of templates, etc.

 

[firewall]

I tried both at one time. Suffice to say, I found them too complex and a problem for casual use. They are for management of content, not to be managed by the user extensively!

 

[Carbo]

Joomla is just a CMS (content management system).

Meaning, it allows me as the site admin/owner to make changes and edit the site as needed?

I hate Joomla and Mambo... too damn slow and all the templates look the same.

You mean that sites using Joomla are slow to load? I understand you about the templates. Can I use one of my own from another source? Or does Joomla lock me into their selections?

 

[imported_LoKe]

CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets, not to be confused with Cross Site Scripting (aka XSS, for calrity). It allows you to apply a different style onto different sections of you website without repeating a massive amount of code. Instead of having something like...

<table><tr><td color="#00FF00"><p>Some Text</p></td></tr></table>

You could have...

<div style="color: #00FF00";>Some Text</div>

That's just the beginning. I suggest learning HTML and CSS together, don't bother with XHTML. Once you're familiar with that, move onto learning PHP and SQL, throw a little Javascript in there and you're good.

Originally posted by: Carbo

Joomla is just a CMS (content management system).

Meaning, it allows me as the site admin/owner to make changes and edit the site as needed?

I hate Joomla and Mambo... too damn slow and all the templates look the same.

You mean that sites using Joomla are slow to load? I understand you about the templates. Can I use one of my own from another source? Or does Joomla lock me into their selections?

I've never personally used Joomla, but if it's like any other CMS, it's bloated with a bunch of code that you will probably never use. It has an admin panel with a few dozen options which you probably have no reason to touch. More code = more load time. As for templates...you can use any template made for the CMS.

 

[firewall]

Originally posted by: Carbo

Joomla is just a CMS (content management system).

Meaning, it allows me as the site admin/owner to make changes and edit the site as needed?

Essentially yes. It provides the basic management system, templates, etc. If you think of it as a company, then you are the manager.

I hate Joomla and Mambo... too damn slow and all the templates look the same.

You mean that sites using Joomla are slow to load? I understand you about the templates. Can I use one of my own from another source? Or does Joomla lock me into their selections?

In trying to make the things more easy, the Joomla team has infact, made it too complex for casual use. You might however be interested in it because it would serve a bussiness purpose (if I am not wrong). However, the person managing it will have to put in some dedicated time to learn it first.

You can test these CMSs at the following address:

http://www.opensourcecms.com/

For Joomal specifically, go to:

http://www.opensourcecms.com/index.php?...n=content&task=view&id=2097&Itemid=159

Remember, don't take the comments and reviews as the truth. Test it your self. It is possible that it might fit your needs perfectly.

 

[firewall]

bump

 

[Injury]

Learn HTML before you step into the territory of PHP and CSS.

PHP allows you to add interactivity, user input, and is a great way to manage large sites. PHP can be as simple or complex as you want. If you have a site with a number of pages and decide to entirely change your layout, you can make one file with the layout, then a bunch of other files with the content, and by simply adding a variable in the URL, you can decide which page to load. XML can also do this, and learning XML for this simple function would probably be better. However, XML cannot do interactivity.

CSS is a great way to change elements of a site without re-writing varible on all of your pages. For instance, with straight HTML, you can assign colors by hardcoding them. Say you make the background color of a table "yellow". Now, you make 20 pages for the site and all of them use "yellow", but you decide you'd prefer "blue". Now you have to go through 20 pages and change that one word. If you decide to go back, then you have to change it again... 20 times. If you use CSS... instead of saying "Yellow" or "Blue", you would basically make a variable called "tablecolor" or something, and make an extra file that defines those variables. Now if you want to change the color, you can simply change that one variable, and all the pages will pull the value from that extra file. So you change it only once, and changing it back will only require editing that one file.

 

[Rip the Jacker]

Originally posted by: asadasif
CSS and PHP are a good combo.

Joomla is just a CMS (content management system). There are others and if you do go with a CMS instead of developing it all yourself, do test out other CMSs to get a feel for them and which you find to be easier. Don't just dive into Joomla without looking at others first.

Oh, and Google will be your friend in all of this. 🙂

CSS and PHP aren't a combo...

CSS is necessary for any site.

PHP can be used as the programming language.

They don't make a combo though.. PHP/MYSQL is a combo.

 

[imported_LoKe]

CSS isn't necessary, it's just suggested.

 

[Rip the Jacker]

Originally posted by: LoKe
CSS isn't necessary, it's just suggested.

Eh. I don't see any website nowadays not using CSS, unless its one of those 1 image "not-actual-websites".

 

[imported_LoKe]

Originally posted by: Rip the Jacker

Originally posted by: LoKe
CSS isn't necessary, it's just suggested.

Eh. I don't see any website nowadays not using CSS, unless its one of those 1 image "not-actual-websites".

You can achieve the same effects without CSS, it's just frowned upon. Just because it isn't done, doesn't mean it can't be.

 

[saymyname]

CSS isn't necessary for a small website. Alternatively you could have simply made a template in Dreamweaver and ran with it. CSS is simply an easier way to update your site down the road.

 

[firewall]

Originally posted by: Rip the Jacker
CSS and PHP aren't a combo...

CSS is necessary for any site.

PHP can be used as the programming language.

They don't make a combo though.. PHP/MYSQL is a combo.

Combo, as in using them together.

CSS is not necessary for all sites. Some just use static pages linked together. Not a good approach but it is there.

 

[iamme]

i've used Joomla and whole heartedly recommend it. the backend is very nice and i don't think it's very difficult at all. yes, it goes beyond a simple site that's mostly static content.

here's my site: http://www.pistonsbball.com as you can see, the site isn't slow at all, as some have suggested. i've pretty much abandoned it, while helping out on another sports site. so, unforunately, you can't really see all it has to offer. check out this forum for sites showcaseing Joomla: http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/board,58.0.html