Noobie looking to build first site.....feedback on using templates...suggestions in general.

[osgnamah]

Hi All;

I am getting ready to launch a shareware program in the next few weeks
and the last step is going to be creating a website. So the last few
days I've been doing some web surfing in trying to figure out how I am
going to manage to do that in the next few weeks since it will be my
first go at html. Actually that's not true it will be my second go at
it since I did a homepage in the good old days of the lynx browser,
gophering, anonymous ftping and slipknotting....god can't belive
overten years have gone by since I first got on the net and i'm
finally creating a website lol.

Back to the point...My site is going to be a simple site. About five
pages. Home page/Features page/Screen Shots/Download link/registration
page (linking to a registration site)/contact page/FAQ. A standard
shareware site nothing fancy.

Since I really don't need anything complicated I was thinking about
using a simple template from www.templatemonster.com or
www.basictemplates.com or getting it developed by www.qesign.com
(don't click away...after I saw all the spamming these guys do in this
newsgroup and others I've decided against that :)

Can I get some feedback on benefits/cons of using a template. My main
worry in trying to develop a site on my own is that it will not look
professional enough. Templatemonster has a simple one that I could
use. Only drawback is that even though they have the psd file and the
html files, since I don't own photoshop I'll need them to customize it
which runs about 150$'s. Basictemplates on the other hand has a very
basic template based on external style sheets (which some people in
the group don't seem to like too much lol) so I think (not positive)
cusomization should be fairly easy.

Darn this is getting long. Probably lost half of you already and the
other quarter are probably murmuring RTFM lol so to the quarter that
are still reading this any suggestions?

Thnx :)

ps. I'm not sure how much a webdesigner would charge so this might be
too low but if anyone out there was wondering I'd be willing to pay
about 100 to 150$. If that is too low hope it at least made you
chuckle :D

If you were wondering what kind of site I'd like to build..it would be
something similar to this site http://www.eboundary.com

Thnx again.

[Fred Kunst]

Hi Noobie,

have a look at :

http://www.projectseven.com/shop/pviistore.htm

and

http://www.dreamweaverresources.com/templates.htm

Regards,

Fred K

+++++ fk

"osgnamah" <os******@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:23**************************@posting.google.c om...

Hi All;

I am getting ready to launch a shareware program in the next few weeks
and the last step is going to be creating a website. So the last few
days I've been doing some web surfing in trying to figure out how I am
going to manage to do that in the next few weeks since it will be my
first go at html. Actually that's not true it will be my second go at
it since I did a homepage in the good old days of the lynx browser,
gophering, anonymous ftping and slipknotting....god can't belive
overten years have gone by since I first got on the net and i'm
finally creating a website lol.

Back to the point...My site is going to be a simple site. About five
pages. Home page/Features page/Screen Shots/Download link/registration
page (linking to a registration site)/contact page/FAQ. A standard
shareware site nothing fancy.

Since I really don't need anything complicated I was thinking about
using a simple template from www.templatemonster.com or
www.basictemplates.com or getting it developed by www.qesign.com
(don't click away...after I saw all the spamming these guys do in this
newsgroup and others I've decided against that :)

Can I get some feedback on benefits/cons of using a template. My main
worry in trying to develop a site on my own is that it will not look
professional enough. Templatemonster has a simple one that I could
use. Only drawback is that even though they have the psd file and the
html files, since I don't own photoshop I'll need them to customize it
which runs about 150$'s. Basictemplates on the other hand has a very
basic template based on external style sheets (which some people in
the group don't seem to like too much lol) so I think (not positive)
cusomization should be fairly easy.

Darn this is getting long. Probably lost half of you already and the
other quarter are probably murmuring RTFM lol so to the quarter that
are still reading this any suggestions?

Thnx :)

ps. I'm not sure how much a webdesigner would charge so this might be
too low but if anyone out there was wondering I'd be willing to pay
about 100 to 150$. If that is too low hope it at least made you
chuckle :D

If you were wondering what kind of site I'd like to build..it would be
something similar to this site http://www.eboundary.com

Thnx again.

[David Dorward]

osgnamah wrote:

Can I get some feedback on benefits/cons of using a template.
The benefits are that you have less work when it comes to maintaining the
page. There are no drawbacks inherent in using templates... however, if you
are buying (or using a free template) from someone else, then you are
dependent on the quality of what they produce. I've never seen a template
for sale of a quality I'd consider acceptable.
Templatemonster has a simple one that I could
use. Only drawback is that even though they have the psd file and the
THE psd file? That sounds very much like a fixed pixel width layout, which
is something to be avoided.
html files, since I don't own photoshop I'll need them to customize it
GIMP <http://www.gimp.org/> can cope with PSD format IIRC. Its free.
which runs about 150$'s. Basictemplates on the other hand has a very
basic template based on external style sheets (which some people in
the group don't seem to like too much lol) so I think (not positive)
cusomization should be fairly easy.

The people who don't like CSS appear to (usually) fall in to one of two
groups.

(1) Those who think it should look exactly the same in every browser back to
Netscape 3 and no care if it falls apart on less mainstream browsers (like
the JAWS screenreader)

(2) Those who don't want to invest the time learning their way around the
flaws in various (but mainly Microsoft) implementations of the spec.

--
David Dorward http://dorward.me.uk/