Tough decisions for a newbie

You might find this helpful as well: http://bobsguides.com/porting-your-site-to-modx.html

Thanks Bob! That was excellent. I will try that later on and see how I get along. This way I should be able to bring my current site into ModX. Great way to learn.

I have set up a new web site for learning modx. I want to make sure I fully understand what I will be doing with ModX before going live with my new site.

http://www.mcran.com/modxlearn

Hi,

My view is this:

If you want a custom, unique look to your site then picking an of the shelf template is not the way to go. If you really don’t care then modifying an existing template is OK. You can use most of the template and change the banner image to make it more "you."

If you want the site to be all "you" and and not look like a template that may have been used countless times. This means working with the markup (page code) and the CSS. Adding a CMS to an existing html and CSS project can create more confusion.

I always find it easier to build a basic page/design system with static pages first. Creating clean minimal markup really helps. Building a good CSS file that handles ALL of the presentation is a very useful skill. In fact CSS is the most useful skill in all of web design/creation in my book. If you can get your basic Home page done and looking good with clean static XHTML file using and external CSS file then you are well on your way with incorporating it as your MODx template. Get into the habit of making sure your code validates with the W3c html validator. You do not have to build the whole site as static pages, just the main page sections. You can use dummy text and content to test that it all renders correctly.

I have zero experience with portal systems like Radidweaver but I would be careful with the extra code that such a system might add to your markup. You do not want to import any of this into your MODx template. Its better to strip it all down as lean, clean code first. This may sound like more work but it can be a big time saver in the long run...

I would like to start my site from scratch in ModX but I don’t want to get into too much coding. I agree that CSS is so powerful. My Radio page on my web site was done with CSS and a Rapidweaver plugin. I love the look and feel of that page.

Randy
www.mcran.com

There is simply a ton of code to render that site as is.

Using clean XHTML would reduce that amount greatly and make all the work when moving forward easier.

Sounds interesting. What’s involved? Keep in mind that I am willing to start over again if need be. In the end, if possible I would like to make my site a flash free site because I have to consider iPhone users and other users who can’t view flash. So, bottom line, for me is to keep everything as simple and lean as possible.

I now realize with the comments from some in this thread that it looks like my current site is well... to say the least, bloated, in need of trimming down. Sounds good to me.

Yes.

I looked at that code and its just awful. Lots of unwanted stuff with inline styles. I think the Rapidweaver system is generating it. Fine for Radpidweaver but I would not pour that into any CMS system.

But look at the page you have: that is a very simple straightforward page design really. I would split the content area into two columns to add versatility.

Moving down the page you have a banner, main navigation, content area and a footer. Presenting that markup can be done with very few lines of code. Getting all those repetitive inline styles out of the markup and using a linked stylesheet (CSS) will help you see what you are doing and make adapting it into your MODx template much easier.

Keep in mind that all this markup, css, template, MODx stuff is the "geaky" stuff. The presentation and design of your site is the "artsy" aspect of it. A successful site needs both performed well to be affective.

A wonderful example of what you can do with a simple HTML structure to hold the content, and a CSS file to style the page, can be found here
http://www.csszengarden.com/

The different looks are all done with the CSS alone; the HTML and content text cannot be changed.
http://www.mezzoblue.com/zengarden/alldesigns/

I would certainly not recommend such extreme CSS modifications for all layouts; it is usually easy enough to get an HTML layout that closely matches the structure you want to use, then the CSS merely adds the "eye candy". I have a few templates up on my site; you can log in to the Manger as guest user to see the templates themselves.

Susan,

I really like your approach and advice! I was thinking that if I can get a hold of a simple template with basic clean HTML, I can start with that. I could create my five pages, put the content I want on each page and then tweak the template later to the way I want it to look. My main concern is not so much the look of my site (I actually want it clean and very simple), my main concern is how to organize all the content I have. That is basically what I am after. Makes sense?

If you look at my current site,

- the Home page, all I have are five pictures. When you click on a picture, text appears below. I like this effect (hope I can do something similar in ModX)

- The In Transition Archives page uses flash (I would like to try a non flash alternative) plus a Rapidweaver plugin for the alphabetical part. I can ditch that if need be and go with something simpler (maybe a page for each letter and then just have a listing of the audio snippets for each letter? Maybe something like this?

<a href=’http://www.mcran.com/assets/itsnippets/bakerchetheadline.mp3’ >Baker Chet- Headline</a>

- The interviews page could use the same as above, just anchor tags to the files on my hosting server.

- Same with the Links page

- Maybe for the Radio page, (even though it looks nice and organized and I would prefer something like this), this page is code heavy. I could have a separate page for the Playlists using Anchor tags, and then a separate page or pages using anchor tags for the shows?

One of my goals with this new approach was to have a web site that I could easily modify from any location so that I am not tied down to using my Mac running Rapidweaver. There are occasions when I do my radio show at the station that I have to go into my web site and make some changes. Can’t do this at the moment because I don’t have that option.

I hope this clears things up a bit of what I am trying to do and thanks again Susan for pointing me to simple options!

Randy
www.mcran.com