Instant Website - Must Haves!
17 posts by 7 authors in: Forums > CMS Builder: Plugins & Add-ons
Last Post: March 9, 2011 (RSS)
By roddruce - September 26, 2010 - edited: October 1, 2010
I was intending to build my own templates but now along comes "Instant Website" add on.
I detest the exclamation "WOW" but I have to use it now. "Wow", what an extremely effective and professional way to build a website for those who have little or no web skills but require a professional well constructed website. You have done it with this project.
But there is a problem that you may like to consider. For my prospective clients a major concern would be the design colour (styles) aesthetics.
In <Layout & Design<>Website style> the 5 style options are not usable for most company or business websites. For this reason alone I cannot use Instant Website template just yet.
But if you had several plain colour options ranging from Black down through the greys and up through the main colours you then have a truly professional product that will be ideal for hundreds of instant websites for small business. Your present choice of styles is a little design unfriendly.
If you can see your way clear to add plain style colours or the ability to make colour changes I can see you selling a lot more CMS Builder scripts.
Regards - Rod
Re: [roddruce] Instant Website - Must Have!
By Chris - September 27, 2010
Thanks for the kind words! :)
It's actually fairly easy to add your own styles. I whipped up this simple_black.css style in only a couple minutes by removing all the images from teal.css and changing the colours around. Granted, it's nowhere near as professional or nice as the other templates (it doesn't use any images at all,) but maybe it will help get you started?
To try it out, upload it as common/css/simple_black.css in the same directory as the other styles (e.g. "teal.css"), then login to CMS Builder and go to Admin > Section Editor > General Info (iw_config), modify the Website Style field, and add the line in red to its List Options:
simple_black|Simple Black
green|Green
multi|Multi
red|Red
teal|Teal
wood|WoodSave, then go to your General Info section and change your Website Style to your new option!
I hope this helps! We'll look into the idea of adding more Website Styles. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Chris
Re: [chris] Instant Website - Must Have!
By Codee - September 27, 2010
Re: [chris] Instant Website - Must Have!
How do I go about doing this?
Then next I will purchase "Instant Website" add on to complete my website demonstration.
Rod
Re: [roddruce] Instant Website - Must Have!
By Donna - September 27, 2010
You can grab the upgrade (with documentation for how to actually do it) here:
http://www.interactivetools.com/upgrade/
I hope this helps. :)
--
support@interactivetools.com
Re: [Donna] Instant Website - Must Have!
By roddruce - September 28, 2010 - edited: September 28, 2010
I upgraded CMS Builder to V2.6 and bought Instant Website and all is working properly. The black style sheet Chris created also works perfectly.
However, since the upgrade I have lost my demo settings. I didn't see anything on the upgrade page where to upgrade the demo version.
How can I rectify this?
Rod
Re: [roddruce] Instant Website - Must Have!
By Donna - September 28, 2010
Can you go into more detail about what demo settings you lost? Do you just need to switch it back into demo mode? That's done via the settings.dat.php file in the /data/ directory. See this page for more details:
http://www.interactivetools.com/docs/cmsbuilder/demo_mode.html
Otherwise, if you can let me know exactly what settings you've lost, we can help you sort that out. :)
--
support@interactivetools.com
Re: [Donna] Instant Website - Must Have!
Rod
Re: [chris] Instant Website - Must Have!
By roddruce - September 28, 2010 - edited: September 28, 2010
Design Styles
Is there any reason why I can't design my own style/s and drop these folders into <common<>css<>img> folders? I would make the image pixels the same as you have done in the other styles.
Default Font
Can I change the default font to verdana 11 or 12?
Rod
Re: [roddruce] Instant Website - Must Have!
By Dave - September 28, 2010
Here's a file we're working on for the next version release of Instant Website. We're also work on a few new styles.
This is from "how to create new styles.txt".
HOW TO CREATE NEW STYLES
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is an advanced topic, but for experienced web developers these docs will
show you the basic steps to create a new website style or theme.
1) INSTALL CMS AND TEMPLATE SET
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Firstly, make sure you have the latest version of the CMS installed, and that
you have also already installed the template set.
2) CREATE NEW FOLDER AND FILES
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
First, create a new directory for your new template style.
- Decide on a name for your template style. Be sure to use the same name
everywhere. Use lowercase letters and no spaces.
- Find the /common/ folder in the directory as your template viewer (index.php).
- Copy /templates/common/img/green/ to /templates/common/img/YOUR_STYLE_NAME/
- Rename all the files you copied and replace "green-" with your style name.
- Copy /templates/common/css/green.css to /templates/common/css/YOUR_STYLE_NAME.css
3) MODIFY IMAGES AND CSS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Go through each of the images in the new folder and modify them to match the
new style you are creating. Be sure to maintain the same file extension for
each file (jpg, gif or png)
Next, edit /templates/common/css/YOUR_STYLE_NAME.css and replace "green" with
your new style name.
4) ADDING YOUR STYLE TO THE CMS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Log into the CMS and go to: Admin > Section Editors > General Info
- Modify the field: Website Style
- Go down to "List Options" and add your style to the bottom of the list. Add
your style like this "mystyle|My Style", where the first value is the name of
you style and the second value is what you want the user to see in the CMS.
- Save your changes.
- Now go to: General Info, select your new style, click save and refresh your
website to see your new style.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
end of file
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