Joomla Friends » Open Source Content Management System

Open Source Customization Overview

admin — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 14:22:58 +0000

What is Open source Customization?

Open source customization is a process of customizing open source content management system (CMS) or scripts like wordpress, joomla, oscommerce, mambo, phpbb and many more, in order to achieve desired functionality and look. Open source customization of this hugely popular CMS requires good knowledge of PHP, CSS, and HTML.

What can you do with the open source CMS like wordpress and joomla?
WordPress is most used blogging software in the world. Its’ seamless user interface makes content write-up, publishing and organizing very easy and enjoyable. WordPress can be used to make a full flange website with almost all the functionalities like ecommerce, forum and Job-portal. Website made with word press are search engine friendly and easy to share with other websites and users. WordPress is widely used for personal and community websites.

Joomla is award wining open source web based software that delivers website without touching a single line of html, css or php. Joomla admin interface is not as easy as wordpress but it gives more control over look and how your content can be viewed on different parts of your website. It has vast library of component, just like wordpress plug-in library. Through this library one can easily make website with almost all functionalities. Joomla is widely used for company and corporate websites.

Why you need customization of wordpress, customization of joomla and other CMS?
To achieve look and feel of the website as in the design files like photoshop .psd
To gain desired functionalities like contact form, navigation system, image slideshow
To retain all browser compatibility for your website, so no matter what browser user is using to view your website the look and feel remains consistent.
To enable website with search engine friendly features and techniques, that improves CMS website ranking in Google, yahoo and MSN.
To make sure that website displays content uninterrupted in all screen sizes.

How to customize joomla and wordpress?
Once you have joomla and wordpress installed in your hosting account, all you need to look for is design part and functionality part.
Design part is essentially look and feel of the website. Most of the CMS has their design files working separately then that of the programming. To customize wordpress theme you should look out for the theme folder and the style sheet in it. In case of joomla customization you have to search the template files which print the content in the screen with desired font colors, heading, list style and so on.

Functionality is something that prints the content in your site without any look and feel features. All the cms can be grouped in to dynamic websites as all the content are stored in database and then the CMS files written in php queries this MySql database and delivers the content to the real world. The Content that has been delivered to the screen can then appear into the page with the help of design part.

Let’s summarize the process step by step:
(1) Download the CMS
(2) Install it into the webhost’s server
(3) Check the basic version of the CMS without any customization in your domain
(4) Start customizing design part by modifying template/theme files.
(5)To achieve desired functionality in addition to what has been given by the default CMS, you have to make word press widget/joomla module/wordpress plugin/joomla component.
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Joomla CSS Templates

admin — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 10:52:38 +0000

As I am sure you already know Joomla is an open source content management system for websites. Since it is open source, this means that anyone can write an extension of the core components that come with the initial software installation and the new extension will be able to work with and to extend the functionality of the original core components.

However, to write various extensions of the core software components, one must have a little knowledge of HTML codes and CSS codes. Without this knowledge, writing the extensions can prove to be very difficult. The extensions have to be written just right, so that the core components will work with them.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) help give the website its fonts, headings, borders and the alike. You will not be able to change the fonts, unless you change the CSS coding. Style Sheet codes help to give the little touches to the overall feel of the website.

Even if you can write in HTML coding, that coding will have to be converted over to CSS as the Joomla software requires that you have both in order for the program to function properly. Being an expert in HTML will not help with CSS because it is essentially two different “languages”. In other words, you can structure your style sheets to HTML standards without compromising the look and feel of the website.

CSS templates help to provide smaller file sizes and faster browser rendering. Search engines love websites who have smaller file sizes. This is the advantage of the CSS templates compared to the HTML templates.

I know, all of this can be confusing. Don’t be scared by all of this, unless you have a background working with style sheets or HTML, this can prove to be extremely confusing. Believe it or not, this programs style sheet an even be confusing for the professionals as well; however, if you will search the internet you will find several different tutorials available that can help you to understand more about this subject.

There are people out there who can do this or we wouldn’t have all of the various extensions to the Joomla core program that we have today. So, if you find that you do need help understanding all of this mumbo jumbo, you surely can find someone that can help you with it.

One of the best pieces of advice that I can offer you, is to visit the “help desk” for this open source software program. They will be able to answer any questions that you may have. TeachmeJoomla is another website that I have found that can be very helpful to the Joomla programmers or non-programmers that want to try. Another extremely helpful website is that docs joomla website. You can find Joomla documentation on anything and everything that you want to know.

This software and all of the codes involved can be extremely confusing for the majority of consumers out there; however, don’t be afraid to ask for help. You can research it as well, as you will find many websites that are dedicated to this topic.
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Joomla For Realtors – Using Joomla to Build Realtor Sites

admin — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 09:40:52 +0000

Are you trying to find that perfect software that will enable you to build your Realtor website? Have you thought about using Joomla. Joomla is a perfect open source content management system to use to help develop your Real Estate website.

Because Joomla is an open source software program, anyone can write an extension of the initial software program and it will work in conjunction with the initial core components. This is the reason why the market has be saturated with Joomla modules, templates, components.

If you can dream it up, more than likely and extension to the initial Joomla software has been developed. This makes the possibilities for the Joomla software to be absolutely limitless. You can literally find thousands of extensions all over the web. You can definitely develop a unique, one-of-a-kind website using this free open-source software.

The Joomla templates will help you to define the style and layout of your website. There are literally thousands of template styles available all across the internet. So, if you have a certain layout in mind, you can probably find it. With the widespread availability of the templates, it may take time to find that perfect layout. If you don’t come across that one layout that will give your website that “WOW” factor that you desire, don’t forget that by using the various extensions that have been developed for the Joomla core software, and you can always modify a pre-existing template to better suit your needs.

There is actually a wide variety of Realtor templates that are currently available on the internet. Some of them you can even acquire for free. Templates are available for instant download, and you can only use a template for one website. So if you are thinking about developing more than one site, you will have to download the template more than once. Don’t forget either that you can use a different template for each of the pages that you will have on your website, if you want to. Templates are also available for purchase. Usually the one’s that require payment are more “fancy” that the plain, free templates. They can be flash templates that will definitely catch the visitor’s eye whenever they visit your page.

You will definitely have to have some sort of an idea of what it is that you are looking for in the design and layout of your website before you begin to try and locate that perfect template that will best suit your needs. This will make your life much easier. If you still can’t find the one that you want, consider hiring a designer to develop one for you. Of course you will have to pay for it; however, your site will be the only one using that template and will prove to be unique.

Using Joomla to build a Realtor website is the perfect choice because it is easy for one to operate compared to the other software programs that are available on today’s market. It is the most popular open source content management software; therefore, the availability and the options that you will have, are endless.
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Joomla Flash Templates

admin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:28:03 +0000

Joomla is the most popular open source content management system for websites that is available on the market today. With it being open source software, anyone can write extensions and variations that are designed to work with the initial core components to extend Joomla’s functionality. With this being said the availability of extension is absolutely unbelievable. If you can dream it up, it has probably already been made.

Joomla designs are extremely popular and widely available. There are literally thousands of options that one could choose from. The Joomla designs define the theme, style and layout of the website itself. If you want a plain Jane website, that’s possible. If you want a unique, one-of-a-kind website, that is possible. If you want something flashy that will grab the attention of your visitors that is also possible.

First, you must know that these open source software themes come in two different versions. The versions are 1.0.X and 1.5. Whichever template you decide to go with, make sure that you have the version that will work with the version on Joomla that you initially downloaded, installed and are using as this point in time.

There are Joomla flash themes available on the market today. These are front end templates. Flash themes are not needed on the back end of the website. The front end is the side of the website that all of the visitors will see, so when trying to design the best, coolest, most exciting website out there, just remember that you will need a front end template. A back end template is the design that the administrator, editor, webmaster will see. It is not needed on the back end.

Flash themes for this software can be exciting. They do grab the visitor’s attention. You can have moving graphics and art, sound etc. Have you ever visited a web page and the page at first says “loading” and then all of the sudden music starts playing stars are flying or something along these lines? If you have then you have seen a flash theme. Flash themes definitely do draw the visitors attention and their eyes to that certain point; however, you just want to make sure that you don’t add to many elements as a flash template can become overwhelming if abused.

You can find flash templates for this open source system on the internet. All you have to do is search for them. Flash themes tend to be a little more expensive than normal templates; however, there are a few websites that offer free flash templates. If you want a specific design to suit your specific needs, your best option is to hire a designer. Let them know what it is that you are specifically looking for and they can design a flash theme to fit your needs.

Your newly designed website will be yours, as you will pay the designer to work on your project, you will have bought the rights to the template. This means that no other website will be able to use your template and your website will be truly unique.
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