Using the online free
CSS template available for you:
This is amazing and the one I like to use most. Sometimes a
client demand to have a site accomplished within a very short period of time.
Things get worse when the client also demand the site to be at the highest
quality meaning that the browser
compatibility should be checked, the colour
psychology should be checked, SEO
must be checked and the contents download
speed should be checked. If you are a professional web designer you will
already know that it is almost next to impossible to accomplish that within a
short period of time. Especially in Tanzania clients will be so demanding
without realizing the task they are giving to you. Here comes the solution templatemo.com, I have been using this
site for the past two years now and it has never let me down. Here you will
find hundreds of templates designed and developed by professional following the
W3C standards of web development
meaning that all your customer requirements will be included. All you have to
do is to download the template and another amazing thing most of the recently
templates they include readymade pages you don’t need even to know PHP to link the pages or other server
languages to run the site. The basic requirement is to have the basic knowledge
of HTML and knowing how to use NOTEPAD. The site also gives you
attractive JavaScript Photo galleries
embed to your sites all you have to do is to replace the photos with your
photos by adjusting the size of the photo to fit the sites flames and
manipulating the codes a bit. For those who have passion with Flash CS4 sites they can visit flashmo.com for free flash templates.
The best thing of all there are no watermarks as long as you have the ability
to edit, the site is yours. Remember these sites follows the W3C standards you will never have
browser compatibility issues, SEO problems provided that you put your meta tag correctly and the site
download speed will be marvelous.
Using the pages
available in the blogger templates to create a site
I have received a lot of compliments from technology enthusiasts
and my geek friends about greentech360
most of them asking me how on earth were you able to turn your blog into a
website. I told them it is not a website yet I have to purchase a domain name
lol. But yes believe it is easy provided that you have a background of being a
blogger all you have to do is to know how to create pages in blog and that is the first thing and the other thing is to
know a bit of XML. The reason you
must have a bit knowledge of XML is that if you want to exceed the ten pages which
are provided by blogger or you want to have a template of your own not blogger’s
template you have to know how to download a template and upload it to your site
before starting manipulating it to fit your requirement. It’s easy you can
download your template from
btemplates.com, blogger-templates.blogspot.com, deluxetemplates.net and so
many other blogger templates site out there. Now all you have to do is to go to templates – Edit Html – Upload the XML
file- Locate on your PC were you have downloaded-Select it. Then you are good
to go you crick preview you can see your blog with your new template. The next
stage you will want to edit the link in your templates by changing the default
links on it and directing the links to your blogger pages for example if this
is the original link for DOWLOADS – [http//:www.btemplates/whitetemp/downloads
] inside the (‘’) replace the link with your page
link [http://greentech360.blogspot.com/p/downloads.html]
the /p/
on the link shows that it is a blogger page. Hence you can link up to ten pages
which now make your blog to appear like a site. In the future you can just by a
domain and link it with your blog. Detailed information about this you are
invited to the event Blogging BeyondBasics which will be held at COSTECH this weekend.
Using Google sites
available for free online
Google sites are another amazing way of creating a site
available online. I prefer using Google sites since you can easily utilize all
the tools provided by Google to enhance the quality of your site. Tools like Google map, Google docs, Google translate
Google analytics and all other tool which you can interact with your site.
The Google sites do not require you to have a background of playing with HTML
the only thing you can do is to fill the forms, drag and drop off you go. For
more information and detailed explanation on how to starting design and manage
Google site watch this beautiful videofrom YouTube.
Using Joomla content
management system
For me it is still the best content management system
available out there. The only challenge you will have is during the
installation of the Joomla Files in
the server. I will advise you to download WAMP server since it has been a
greater relief for developers providing MySql
database, Apache server with PHP integration at the same place. Ask
the geeks what was the life of PHP developer before introduction of WAMP server they will tell you only
those who have the guts to touch PHP and have passion with MySQL we ready to be
programmers lol. After installation of WAMP server and putting your Joomla
files in it then you are good to go, if you have a background of editing any
CMS wither is a blog or a site you can easily manipulate this one. For more
about Joomla Installation watch out these videos here and be ready to share
the knowledge lol.
Downloading a free
PSD template available online
For people who just can afford to develop a site without
designing it first this is your place. I learnt this from a very bad
experience. When I was starting to develop websites I started designing them in
Photoshop first then slice them putting layers on the link and putting them in
the browser to test browser compatibility believe it is the pain you don’t want
to experience because most of the time when you finish designing it and testing
in the browser it will work in one of the browsers but it will tear apart in
all other browsers. The solution is easy download a pre designed template with
layers just play with the colours and other thing but don’t try to put the
layers yourself and slice it yourself unless you want to experience what I have
experience I give it to you as a challenge go and try to do it by yourself.
Another problem which you will definitely suffer is the SEO search engine optimization
since your site will be filled with a lot of images by the concept behind how
the search engine works the spiders and crawlers won’t be able to check the words
corresponding to the users request on your sites and lastly the site will be
heavy and take a lot of time to load hence only patient visitors of your site
will stay on it and I don’t need to tell you that it is bad for business. So definitely
you want to start downloading the ready made PSD files. You can download them
from here.
By Jumanne Mtambalike
By Jumanne Mtambalike