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Website review and advice, please


LenaCa

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Hello everyone. First, I'd like to introduce myself real quick, and then I have two questions.

 

I'm getting a web design certificate from a local college, but it's so narrow in scope. While on my last class, I feel like I need someone to sit me down and show me what to do. I also tried a couple of books on my own. I find I'm not that technical, while I do enjoy playing around with this stuff. My last class is Java, PHP and Flash and I'm supposed to finish up my Java midterm this week, and then on to PHP next week. I mostly learned to use Dreamweaver, learning some CSS on my own.

 

My question is where do I go next? Do I find myself a mentor and if so, how? I wished so many times I knew someone who has been through this stuff and would show me how to do certain things..I somehow didn't find that in my classes. For example, I feel like my Dreamweaver class just covered the software and my Graphic Design class covered design, but it was hard to put them together.

 

My second question concerns this website I made for a friend: w ww.celestine center.com/ Any comments are, of course, welcome. It's the most basic version of it, that we wanted to launch quickly, and my intention has always been creating a more appealing design for it. Now, it was right before having my second baby and I got really busy with him. My friend wants to be able to update her website on her own and I want her to do so too. She is very nontechnical. So I started thinking just a couple of days ago about using CMS, maybe Wordpress or Joomla. I have no experience, but I feel like from what I read that would be a good choice for her.

 

So my second question is do you recommend any particular CMS? Seems like Wordpress would be the simplest one for her to edit, but I'm a bit afraid I won't be able to customize the look of it the way she wants? She and I both like very feminine circular design, if you know what I mean. Just look at her logo. I also don't want overcommercialized look for her. Could I do that in Wordpress?

 

I appreciate any input, thanks!

 

P.S. Just read the thread about spam and added spaces in website address

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Going to college for a degree is good, but for a certificate, you would be better studying the material yourself. To find a mentor, I would find your local web design companies and talk with them and see if they can help. My boss is my mentor, he is so great at what he does and I can go to him for help and he will walk me through it so it clicks. I'm a self taught programmer and I'm studying for Microsoft Certifications. Dreamweaver is a great tool to make websites, it's fast and very helpful. I'm no Graphic Designer so I can't help you much with getting it working with Dreamweaver, all I know is that our design team uses Photoshop and then slices the layout for html and that's what we use.

 

As for the second question, that's not a bad site at all, I like the clean colors and rounded colors. Keep up the good work! I would say go with Wordpress, fitting your design into a custom template wouldn't be hard at all. Whether you choose Joomla or Wordpress, you're going to have to edit the template to match her site.

 

If you need help with getting the site layout into Wordpress, let me know and I'll help the best I can.

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My question is where do I go next?

 

Up to you really. What do you want to achieve by doing this course? If it's a career, then you could apply for a Junior position in a web design company. I've done a university degree on computing and then joined a company as a junior, and I found that I haven't learned much in the Uni doing the theories, just the basics, however almost everything I do now I have learned on the job. So what I'm trying to say really is that you need to do lots of practicals, and keep practicing. Keep making websites and you'll know how to do things in your own way that works the best for you. There's no certain "step by step" when it comes to web design/coding, everyone has their own way of doing things, and same results can be achieved by employing many different techniques.

 

That website is nice, clean code and simple structure. 100 times better than my first website :lol: (I had rotating gifs etc .. and whatnot).

 

In terms of CMS, if you're comfortable with PHP Includes, then Wordpress Theming is not that bad, but it's still quite tricky. There's header.php and footer.php which are included on every page, but the middle part changes depending on what kind of page you're viewing, so there's archive.php, post.php, page.php etc which all need to be styled with correct HTML structure. And those files have lots of Php coding in them, which you need to know what they are doing, where the loop starts and ends etc. But for a simple design it might not be bad, just try take apart an existing theme, play around with individual includes and try to customise it. In terms of Usability, Wordpress is probably the best choice as it's very easy to use and maintain for a non-technical person.

 

Joomla's theming is also very very easy, loads easier than Wordpress, as you only need 1 page - index.php and 1 Stylesheet, and you don't need to mess about with php loops etc. There's bits of php if...then...else but they're quite easy to understand. However in terms of usability - Joomla's not very good. It's very hard for a non-technical person to use Joomla's admin area, my clients really do struggle grasping the concept of Joomla administration, the whole create an Article -> create Menu item-> assign Modules to the menu item etc.

 

So if you're comfortable with Wordpress's theming, then I'd recommend Wordpress.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Best of luck.

Edited by BeeDev
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Going to college for a degree is good, but for a certificate, you would be better studying the material yourself.

Kyle, I certainly agree that a college degree would be much better. I'm considering doing that as well, when I find the right opportunity. It's just that this certificate was $35 per semester (with financial aid) and the only university to go for a degree would be hour and a half away, so not yet practical for me, with two small kiddos.

 

To find a mentor, I would find your local web design companies and talk with them and see if they can help.

 

Kyle, thanks for confirming this for me. I thought about doing this as well, just figuring out the right way to approach someone to ask for mentoring help. You are lucky to have your boss and good luck with your studies :)

 

I will take up on your offer for help for sure. Thank you!

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Up to you really. What do you want to achieve by doing this course? If it's a career, then you could apply for a Junior position in a web design company. I've done a university degree on computing and then joined a company as a junior, and I found that I haven't learned much in the Uni doing the theories, just the basics, however almost everything I do now I have learned on the job. So what I'm trying to say really is that you need to do lots of practicals, and keep practicing. Keep making websites and you'll know how to do things in your own way that works the best for you. There's no certain "step by step" when it comes to web design/coding, everyone has their own way of doing things, and same results can be achieved by employing many different techniques.

 

Yes, that's very true. I guess my question was how do I go about best developing my skills? It's true, there are lots of directions to go from here. I think I'll concentrate on a few projects I have in front of me now and also go see if I can find some local help to keep learning this stuff. Then I'll look around and see if I can find options for a degree either in computers or graphic design. I have a feeling I would prefer to go the graphic design route, but I would certainly love more technical knowledge too, although my java class makes my head spin.

 

Thanks for your take on Wordpress and Joomla. I think I will go with Wordpress for my friend to make it as simple as possible, although I would prefer a more simple project with Wordpress for a start, instead of trying to create my own theme. I'll be learning PHP next, so that'll probably help with that.

 

Thank you two for helping me think through this. Sometimes I think I think too much and would benefit better by working on projects :P

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Just curious, when you say "combining Dreamweaver and Graphical Design" are you referring to taking a design you made from a concept to a web page? If so, then I can help you understand the basics and how to lay it all out if needed. I can help with mastering CSS and Javascript as well, just in case. Also, when you go to learn PHP, I can help guide you and help you learn. That's not my primary programming language but I know it pretty well.

 

Like I said, if you need help with anything just ask, I'll try to help the best I can. You seam eager to learn, which is a great thing since you're not going the "Yahoo! Answers" route.

 

Good luck with your projects and school!

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Just curious, when you say "combining Dreamweaver and Graphical Design" are you referring to taking a design you made from a concept to a web page? If so, then I can help you understand the basics and how to lay it all out if needed. I can help with mastering CSS and Javascript as well, just in case. Also, when you go to learn PHP, I can help guide you and help you learn. That's not my primary programming language but I know it pretty well.

 

Like I said, if you need help with anything just ask, I'll try to help the best I can. You seam eager to learn, which is a great thing since you're not going the "Yahoo! Answers" route.

 

Good luck with your projects and school!

 

Actually, I was saying that rather than a smooth educational experience, it was several different disjoined classes. In Graphic Design class, we didn't cover web site design, just basic design concepts, which was totally cool on its own, of course. Then in Dreamweaver, we covered how to build pages, but it was all technical software stuff, not actually making nice looking websites. In HTML class, we covered (I must say really outdated) HTML, although I studied more current CSS practices on my own, but our class was taught by a math teacher. I guess what I mean is I wish there was an in-between class, where we would have an actual experienced web designer, showing us how to take a project from beginning to end. For example, in my Dreamweaver class, it would be nice to cover some of the design aspects of it too. I did Photoshop class, but it really was very non specific intro to Photoshop, not in any way applying it to the Web. In short they took a few classes and called them Web Design Certificate.

 

You are very kind, thank you!

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Wow, there's so much that they should of taught you in those classes. Sounds like they left out all the relevant lessons.

 

Yes, Kyle, I really hope that for the sake of future web development, there will be actual web development and web design people teaching classes. In reality as it is right now, you can only expect so much from a community college though...I'm sure university is a little different, at least in some aspects. Can you imagine if someone will good web skills would actually sit down and develop a curriculum for a degree or a certificate?? That would be awesome.

 

Does anyone know of good education programs? Are online classes or certifications any good?

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I wished so many times I knew someone who has been through this stuff and would show me how to do certain things..I somehow didn't find that in my classes. For example, I feel like my Dreamweaver class just covered the software and my Graphic Design class covered design, but it was hard to put them together.

In general, I've found that is how most classes go, both at the community college and university level (though I'm sure it depends on where you go and who teaches the classes.) The challenge with teaching web design/coding classes is that the web changes so quickly that the courses have to change nearly every year in order to keep up. Because of that, I've found that classes tend to be better for understanding general principles and sometimes teaches out of date methods. (Or teaches things that are technically valid -- for example, tables -- but don't explain that there may be better ways to do the same thing.)

 

There is definitely a gap between "design" classes and "coding" classes, which to be honest, you may not be able to get resolved in college/university unless you have a specific class that covers both.

 

I'd suggest picking up what you can from classes, but realize that you'll probably need to go elsewhere and experiment on your own to learn some of this stuff. There are lots of resources online for learning this stuff -- both from KillerSites and elsewhere.

 

http://www.killervideostore.com/

http://www.killersites.com/university

 

membership.thinkvitamin.com/

Lynda.com

Nettuts/ Nettuts premium / Nettuts marketplace (tutorials sold individually)

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http://www.killervideostore.com/

http://www.killersites.com/university

 

membership.thinkvitamin.com/

Lynda.com

Nettuts/ Nettuts premium / Nettuts marketplace (tutorials sold individually)

 

Thank you for those recommendations. I almost posted a separate thread about web design education, before I saw this. So do you recommend getting a college degree as well? Is there anything to certificates and getting certified? Is there some kind of common certification system?

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As someone who has yet to graduate college (though I'm getting close) I'm not sure how much I can comment. I would encourage a college degree but not specifically for web design due to the fact that the web is changing so quickly. By the time you graduate, half of what you were taught may be outdated. If you're more interested in the coding side of web design, I'd look into a computer science degree. If you're more interested in the design aspect, then look at a graphic design degree. Or perhaps do a major in one, and a minor in the other? Use school to learn the foundational concepts (design fundamentals, coding patterns, etc.), and then do personal development via video tutorials/personal projects/etc to keep up on the web design specifics.

 

I'm not sure what to say about certificates, though I'd go for a college degree personally. Realistically though, employers care more about your portfolio and your skill levels (in my experience) than any specific degree or certificate. If you're talented, you'll find or make your own opportunities.

 

I do think that, looking long-term, not having a college degree may limit your earning potential. This assumes, of course, that you want to work for an employer rather than freelance or starting your own business.

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