“Good Old Static HTML Sites Aren’t Dead Yet. Should They Be?” plus 1 more - Speckyboy Design Magazine Feed |
| Good Old Static HTML Sites Aren’t Dead Yet. Should They Be? Posted: 22 Feb 2012 12:28 AM PST Static HTML sites look so last century that sometimes you might be wondering if they don’t belong to the past. There is no doubt that dynamic, database-driven sites, offer more and they make static HTML sites look like a poor relative but are static sites to be extinct? Historically, static sites were first and for some years they were the main way to create a site. Content Management Systems (CMS) appeared a couple of years later, mainly as an easier and faster way to have online presence. CMS were meant mainly for blogs but because of all their numerous advantages they soon overtook and began to be used for any kind of site. I am not saying this is wrong but sometimes all you need is a small static HTML site rather than a CMS-powered monster. I sometimes have such arguments with clients who always want a CMS, while a good old static HTML site is exactly what they need. In a sense, it is like a bike vs a car dilemma – for near distances in the city, a bike is much better than a car but if you plan to go outside the city on the highway, you do need a car. Why a CMS Is the Better OptionIf you compare a static site and a CMS in terms of abilities, it is more than obvious which of the two is the winner. However, in some other aspects, the comparison isn’t in favor of CMS. Basically, here are three things in which CMS do excel static sites:
The Case for Static HTML Sites
Despite all the nice things about CMS in the previous section, there is quite a lot of place for good old static HTML sites. For instance, they are a great solution for a small site – company and personal because: A static site is easier to maintain. Unlike content updates, when it comes to maintenance, a static site is easier to maintain. If site maintenance will be done by the client not by the developer/designer, and the client doesn’t have the skills to maintain a dynamic site, then this issue is a deal breaker. In fact, very often with static sites you have no maintenance at all – no patches and updates to install regularly, the database won’t crash (because there isn’t a database at all), no need to migrate to a new version of the CMS, when one is released and deal with potential incompatibilities, etc. When I recall some cases of CMS updates that went wrong and took hell of a time (and a couple of sleepless nights) to fix, I think many people will appreciate this advantage of good old static sites.
The list of advantages of static old HTML sites might not be a long one but they are enough to keep static sites alive. Of course, static sites might be losing in numbers but they will always be needed and it is too early to proclaim them dead. Three Questions to Help You Answer Which Way to GoIt is not uncommon to have clients who come to you with the decision what they need – a static site or a CMS but if you are the one to guide them to the choice, here are three simple questions to have in mind:
If the answer to any of these questions is positive, then this site is a good candidate for a CMS. If the answer isn’t clear yet, mostly because the client doesn’t know his or her future content needs, you can go the CMS way, because almost any CMS can be used to build a static site, too, if it turns out a static site is what the client really needs. Of course, this might sound stupid at first – since you are using an CMS anyway, why build a static site but there are cases when this is the the safest route. I myself adhere to the KISS principle and when in doubt I frequently choose a static site with the option to migrate it to a CMS a couple of months/years later, if we really need it but I do admit in many other cases the CMS option is better. Anyway, when you have the design in HTML and CSS and the content properly formatted, importing this into a CMS isn’t much work. It might sound an overkill to use a CMS to build a static site but if you strongly believe that in a couple of months your client will have a lot of content, you might check which CMS are considered best for a static site. You know, sometimes clients are unpredictable (or simply unaware of their real needs) and this means we need to look for creative solutions to their problems in order to keep them happy and solve their real problem. I must admit that before I learned about this reason to use a CMS, I always wondered why on Earth some designers use a CMS when a good old HTML site is more adequate. I thought that they might be doing it because they were lazy because it was easier to throw a quick and dirty CMS template, or were doing it for the money, but after I had clients who simply didn’t know how their business would fare and if they would need to expand the content of their site, it occurred to me that sometimes you simply can’t know what your future needs will be. In one case, the client did plan to expand his business but the economic situation prevented him from doing so and quite obviously his plans for more product sections and more content in general had to be revised. Fortunately, we had decided that for the time being we would use a static site and when time comes, he would tell me in advance and I would migrate the site to WordPress. Unfortunately, this time never came but business is like that – unpredictable. How about you? Do you frequently design simple HTML sites or have you gone CMS-only? You might also like…Should You Keep Your Website Open Source? →
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| Introducing Warp – An Open-Source Theme Framework for WordPress & Joomla Posted: 21 Feb 2012 09:00 AM PST Each time you develop a theme you’ll have to deal with the same, repetitive tasks. E.g. you need a certain folder structure to organize your PHP, CSS and JavaScript files or you rely on features like layouts, compression and caching. Because you don’t want to start from scratch, coding all these features over and over again, you are better off using a theme framework. It provides you with a file and folder structure and offers a rich tool set for solving common tasks. That will give you the spare time to really focus on the fun parts of your theme design. Theme frameworks are developed by using best practices to provide you with a solid foundation for your individual theme. With a framework you will usually get a basic HTML template, a base CSS and a JavaScript library. They are also packed with various features like cross-browser compatiblity, search-engine friendly semantic markup, flexible grid layout, asset caching and compression and mobile theme support. There is a whole bunch of theme frameworks out there – one of them is Warp, the framework from YOOtheme that has just been released as open source. Warp is a lightweight theme framework designed for developers and focusing on simplicity and usability. How does the Warp theme framework differ from others?One of Warp’s key features is its cross-platform compatibility. By design it works with different CMS systems like Joomla or WordPress and can even be extended to support others. Warp has a clean separation between the individual theme and the framework. It is contained in a single folder that is located in your theme’s directory. Applying updates or patches to the framework is easily done, because all the generic framework code can be updated independently from the theme code. Warp also covers all aspects in theme development and uses the latest web technologies: Valid HTML5 markup, an up-to-date CSS framework and additional tools using the latest jQuery version. That enables you to build robust and future-proof websites. What about the features and user friendliness?The Warp framework comes with a nice and unobtrusive administration user interface for the theme configuration. It integrates nicely in the Joomla and WordPress administration while supporting every framework feature on both platforms. Choose from different style settings and various layout options like the overall theme and sidebar widths, different multi column layouts and many grid options to place modules and widgets. All these settings can be applied to single pages which means every page of your website can have its own style and layout – all managed easily from the theme administration. Warp covers all kinds of features like a mobile theme, child theme support, mega drop down menus, built in Ajaxed search and much more. You can make use of all these features but you don’t have to. Only select those tools that you actually need. This modular concept of Warp prevents your code from being bloated with unused scripts. CSS and JavaScript files are combined, minified, cached and compressed on the fly. HTTP requests are reduced using Data URIs for images. All this makes Warp very fast. You can find a comprehensive description of all the features on the Warp website. Who’s behind Warp and is it ready to use?Warp is actively being developed by full time developers from YOOtheme, a premium theme and extension provider for WordPress and Joomla. New features are added all the time and bugfixes are provided quickly. The Warp framework and its Master theme are free and distributed under the popular open source GPL license. This Master theme is optimized and streamlined to serve as a blueprint to build your very own custom themes. How to get started?The Master theme including the latest Warp theme framework is available as a free download on the Warp framework website. Start right away by downloading the theme package for Joomla or WordPress. The easiest way to get everything up and running is to download a demo package that includes either Joomla or WordPress with prepared demo content, the Master theme and the Warp framework. Just download the package, run the installation like you would do with a plain Joomla or WordPress package and you have a working site. To learn more about Warp’s possibilities, the official documentation is a good point to start. Since Warp has been used for many projects already, there is a huge community over at YOOtheme which helps with common questions and answers. You might also like…CSS Form Templates, Tools & Services →
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