News & Comments
News & Comments
| 10 March 2010
Recently I completed the upgrade of the Kingston Home Builders' Association website to a Joomla based site. I was so impressed with the organization and their ethics, that I decided to join the association as well. To assist members with their web needs, I offer the following promotion, which I will leave open for as long as I am a member:
If you engage TheSignWorx
| 09 August 2009
I like to think of myself as the Best Web Designer in Canada for a number of reasons. Although there is no official organizational body that I know of that would bestow this title, I have claimed it for my own for a number of reasons:
- I created the title, so I claimed it.
- I wanted to get my Google Phrase rank to the #1 position for the phrase “Best Web Designer in Canada”, as an experiment in phrase ranking.
- I feel that I exemplify the following 7 areas of criteria I have identified that would make a designer, the Best Web Designer in Canada:
- Value for money. The websites I build are professional quality at a price that is affordable by most individuals, businesses and large corporations.
- Maintainability of the site. The sites I build can be maintained by anyone that is familiar with using a word processor.
- Website expandability. The Content Management System (CMS) I employ includes an extension framework, that allows expansion through an ever growing resource library, maintained and developed by thousands of programmers around the world.
- Core functionality sustainability. Through working with Joomla over the last 4 years, I have come to understand and appreciate how to customize it to do what a client wants, without affecting the core program files. This ensures that my clients will be able to upgrade their site to take advantage of security and extension improvements in the future. This is not possible where the core programs have been hacked to provide a desired functionality.
- Changeability. Joomla employs a template base system which allows easy changes to the overall look and feel of a site without the need to reprogram any pages. In addition, Joomla uses various extensions to provide item placement within the site. The ability to change these items does not require programming knowledge, and so may be maintained by site owners.
- Core understanding. As a programmer, my initial feeling about customizing a Joomla site was to go into the code and rewrite it to do what I wanted. This is the worst way to customize a site, as I have learned through trial and error. Today I understand the how’s and whys of configuring a Joomla site so as to maintain core and extension integrity for future upgrades.
- Creativity. I must admit that I do not know how to create the best looking graphics, flash or movies. This I have found to be the case also with all of my clients. As a result I have learned to creatively produce similar website glitz, so that I can show my clients and they can too. If your budget provides for high cost graphics work, then you could incorporate that too into a Joomla site I build for you. If your budget or tastes do not run that way, similar effects can be created through implementing the correct extensions.
I may not be the Best Web Designer in Canada, but I make very good websites, and I will continue to strive to be listed first name you see when you search my phrase:
| 17 August 2007
Getting visitors involved in your site is a great way to develop returning visitors, and a unique way to build content. Getting your visitors involved has come to be referred to as Building a Community, wherein you foster communications between yourself and your visitors, and between your visitors.| 17 August 2007
Dynamic in website lingo doesn’t mean images, animations and graphics jumping off the screen at you, although it can include this. Dynamic means content that changes, the more often the better.| 17 August 2007
Adding features to you site, either initially or after your site is live doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive! Within the framework I have developed, I can easily add components that add functionality to your site. Each component costs $250 to install and configure. Customization or custom component programming costs $30 per hour (3 hour minimum).
These components can include:
| 17 August 2007
Having a dynamic site, which utilizes databases for content and member administration doesn’t have to be expensive. I have developed a CMS framework that allows me to customize a site to my clients needs, quickly and economically.
