Tag Archives: Joomla

Cheshunt, Herts (PRWEB) August 24, 2006

A new book focusing on Joomla! is now available for immediate delivery.

The book, entitled “Building a website using a CMS in 90 minutes,” is published through Management Books 2000 Ltd and is aimed at individuals and companies that are new to CMS and need help and advice understanding the benefits of a CMS (over a static HTML site, perhaps currently designed in-house) and how to implement such a system.

It discusses the process of evaluating the best CMS for one’s needs and then takes the reader through installing and customising it to suit their needs. While the book discusses various systems in the initial chapters, such as XOOP, PHP-Nuke etc, it quickly focuses on Jooma!, taking the user through all of the processes required to build a fully functional, feature-rich site.

The often-missed subject of backing up a site is also covered in-depth. For those looking to migrate an existing static HTML site, there are two chapters dedicated to installing existing available templates or designing your own. Finally, the appendices list useful information such as style sheets and a quick installation and setup guide. The book is available for immediate purchase from: http://www.marketingyour.biz/index.php?option=com_ezstore&Itemid=51&func=detail&id=4

Chapter List:

Introduction

A brief overview of the book and the topics it covers.

1. What is a CMS?

To those that just ‘use’ the Internet and don’t know how websites are constructed, this chapter discusses the differences between a static HTML site and a CMS — flat pages versus dynamically generated ones. There is also a comprehensive list of some of the components people can install into a CMS to add further functionality into a site.

2. Evaluating a CMS system

How do people choose a CMS from the dozens of Open Source ones available? This chapter shows how you can test them all for free and examines the benefits and pitfalls to look out for. It discusses why Joomla! and Mambo were singled out, and the ultimate decision to concentrate this book on Joomla.

3. Installing your CMS

From this point on, the book focuses on the Joomla! CMS, although the theory behind most practices from hereon in is very similar. This takes people through a standard Joomla! installation process and also discusses the type of web host people should be looking for to host their site.

4. Administration section overview

Now that the basic CMS is installed, we take a tour of the Joomla! administration screens.

5. Structuring your content

The most important aspect of a CMS is structuring content into an easy format for storage and navigation. Here readers will learn the importance of sections and categories, the difference between static and general content and follow a walkthrough of creating a solid structure for a site.

6. Adding content

Here we get to the good bits. Adding content to a site is what it’s all about, and adding content to Joomla! is a breeze. We start by creating a page, adding graphics and talking about some of the problems a person may encounter, such as cutting/pasting from MS Word and using the installed WYSIWYG editor to insert images.

7. Security and Access Restrictions

During the content creating process we discussed allocating an access level — it is this hierarchy that we are discussing now, and how a person can use it to allow or restrict access to users and site administrators. If everyone visiting your web site is to have access to everything without registration, and you are the only person that requires access to the back end administration section, then you will not use groups, however it is worthwhile spending the time to understand them.

8. The Media Manager

We discussed adding images to content in chapter 6, but there will also be a need for greater image management as a site grows. Maybe you want to create sub-folders for specific sections or categories and upload graphics to here, so that your main directory does not get too cluttered. Or perhaps you need to delete old or unused images. This chapter explains how Joomla’s built in media manager is used.

9. Installing templates

A Joomla!-powered site can change its overall look and feel within seconds simply selecting another template from the Template Manager. This chapter explains how templates work, how a person can move elements of a site into different positions and how to find and install thousands of different templates.

10. Making your own Joomla! template

If a person has reasonable HTML and CSS skills, it is not too difficult to create his or her own template, separating their site from the millions of other CMS sites out there. This is especially useful if you need to migrate a static HTML site to Joomla! This chapter explains how to use a free tool available for Dreamweaver to quickly insert the code required for Joomla! to drop module and page content into your specified areas.

11. Optimising your site for search engines

Historically, CMS’s were notoriously difficult for search engines to categorise. Not any more. This chapter explains the problems previously faced by CMS users, how they have been overcome and what a person needs to do to his or her site to optimise it for search engines. Building on the author’s experience from getting more visitors to your website in 90 minutes it gives an in-depth walkthrough to all of the elements you should consider when optimising your site.

12. Installing additional functionality

There are literally hundreds of plug-in extensions for Joomla. This chapter explains how to find them and install them, and also has a summary of the top extensions.

13. Multi-lingual sites

Using the Joom!Fish extension it is possible to create a powerful multi-lingual site. This chapter explains how to install and configure the Joom!fish translation component.

14. Backing up your site

This is an unfortunately often overlook aspect of web design, and is especially important for database-driven sites such as Joomla! But backing up a Joomla!-powered site can be straightforward, with the help of a few free tools! This chapter discusses several methods for backing up both your HTML and mySQL databases.

Summary

Appendix 1 – CSS Styles List

A comprehensive list of all CSS styles used within Joomla!

Appendix 2 – Quick Guide to installation and configuration

Want a quick refresher course to what you should be doing to get a Joomla! site up and running? Read this step-by-step summary guide.

Glossary

A full glossary of all terms used in the book.

Priced at GBP £10.99 it is in stock and available within 24 hours. Delivery to mainland UK is free of charge. For more information visit www.marketingyour.biz

About the Author:

Since 1992 Martin Bailey has been involved with the marketing activities of small and medium sized companies, either through working directly for the organisation or by assisting friends and colleagues in their own business ventures.

Based in Cheshunt, Hertfordshire in the UK he regularly assists companies around the world in creating product and brand awareness for their chosen marketplaces. He is an authorised Actinic e-commerce software reseller and has also written a number of IT and technical articles for niche market trade magazines.

He currently handles the marketing for the JETCAM Group of companies and is available for web design and general marketing consultancy through JETCAM International. If you are interested in obtaining consultancy for your business, please contact the author.

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