HTML5 compatible sites still remain the best choice for interactive site design .. and they’re compatible with millions of mobile devices as well.

1. Access Control. This is the big one, of course. In this new release, you can fine tune what your viewers see, what your administrators can see/edit, etc. There are user groups that can be created, and then each menu item, category, article, etc can be set to be viewed by one of these user groups. You can assign users to multiple user groups in the event they need to have access to several different areas.

You can see here inside of an article how it prompts for each user group that should have access. Or, you can just set the category and not have to set each article’s permissions.

2. Sections are Gone. There are now only Categories, and they have infinite nesting levels. This was something that was loong overdue.

3. Automatic update alerts. WordPress excelled over Joomla before in this – when an update for a component, plugin, or the core files were available, the backend admin would notify you and ask if you wanted to upgrade. With Joomla, there was really no nice way of knowing if a component had been updated, and updating the core meant downloading a zip file that you’d have to extract to patch. Now there’s an update manager that let’s you update components as well as core files when there are updates available. Very nice.

A few other things we noticed:

- There’s no ‘front page manager’ or ‘front page’ option. Instead, it’s featured articles.
- ‘Save’ and ‘Apply’ have been renamed to Save and Save & Close
- People on site now shows you front end as well as backend
- It appears you can only restrict module access to front end viewers. It’d be nice if you could do it for administrators too.
- The media manager still looks the same. Ugh. They could have made this more usable
- The menu manager now shows you the modules that are linked to that menu. Very useful!

- There are batch processes available for certain items (like, set all the checked menu items to this group)
- Categories are available to edit from the article manager now
- The base care now ships with 3 different front end templates and two backend templates. One of the front end templates is a stripped out, no CSS template that will be useful for designers that are starting from scratch.

All in all, it’s a good upgrade and while it’s not perfect, it’s more on par with the WordPress style of administration, which we do like.

The newest release of Joomla 1.6 has just come out with some really cool new features built in. We’ll be reviewing it shortly and posting our thoughts here on the blog!

Merry Christmas from Brent & Anna and the rest of our design team! We hope that wherever you are spending this holiday, you’re in the company of family and those you love! Enjoy this little video we made

Windsor Point wanted a new look that would bring their look and branding up to date. They wanted a mix of professionalism blended with a feeling of care and emotion that showed the level of care they provide at their continuing care retirement community.

Their new site allows them to post photo galleries, frequent blog posts, and keep their community calendar updated.

We used a Joomla content management system framework for the most flexibility for their needs. The news area and calendar features are now easily updated, and administrated by the marketing department of Windsor Point.

One of the nicest upgrades from the old design are the  photo galleries, which are now utilized often, and show a glimpse inside the life of Windsor Point residents.

Click here to visit the Windsor Point website!

After the old site was migrated over and hundreds of old sermons converted to the new system, we tweaked it a bit more to make it just right for them – and this is what the finished design came out like:

They were quite pleased with the look, and are able to display and update the information on the website even more easily than before. Susan & Ellen, it was great working with you, and we hope your new site serves you well into the future!

The Debate Over Web Standards and Flash

If you want an interactive website that features rich media, you have to go with flash right? Umm… no. In the past Flash filled a large void of interactive web media, that browsers couldn’t handle with web standards. Now, with the advent of modern web browsers and javascript, it makes little sense to use flash. Many things like light box images, scrolling text, and other motion objects are all accomplished without flash, using web standards. First off, you might wonder what web standards are.

Web Standards: Web standards generally refer to standards in web languages such as HTML, CSS, Javascript, etc. It’s raw web code in it’s purest form. Advocates of web standards typically work directly in the code, rather than through a program like Front Page which generates non-standard HTML by default – making the code messy and not universal.

Flash: Flash is proprietary software from Adobe, formerly known as Shockwave Flash, and then Macromedia Flash. It sits on top of the browser to extend functionality, and for many years filled a void in displaying rich media when CSS and Javascript were inconsistently supported across many browsers.

The debate over Flash vs. Web Standards has again been brought into the public eye with the latest feud between Apple and Adobe, over Apple’s refusal to build support for Flash into the iPhone or iPad. Apple’s stance is that Flash is a buggy plugin that crashes a lot and is unstable. Also, since it’s not an actual web standard but is proprietary, it’s not as universal. I have to say I agree with them.

Flash Is No Longer Universal Enough

The trend now is mobile internet. Within the next few years it’s expected that mobile internet access is going to dominate the lion’s share of the market. Many of these devices will not have the support to display Flash. It makes sense to tailor your website to reach this viewing audience.

Why We Steer Clients Away From Flash

One thing we like to try and do is keep costs down for our clients. With a flash website, it becomes basically impossible for the client to make small changes to their website, without calling up the web designer to change some text. Since there’s no ‘real text’ in flash, and it’s all part of a movie file, that original movie file has to be edited and re-uploaded each time a change is made. With something like a content management system, the client can make many of these small changes themselves.

If you wanted to make a simple text chance in your website, which screen capture below looks easier?

The image on the top is a view inside of Adobe Flash CS4. The image on the bottom is the text editor for WordPress’ latest version. We can tell you without a doubt that it’s much easier to do a text change in something like the Content Management System shown on the right. This means that ultimately, a flash website is going to be much more expensive to maintain as you need to go to your developer every time you need a small change done.

Another reason why we don’t recommend a total flash website, is that it actually hurts your website in search engine rankings. Since there’s no real text (which is what search engines read when they scan your site), it looks like a blank slate to them. There are no keywords or other text to support what your business is really about. If you want to outperform your competition in search engine listings, it’s going to be much harder to do with a flash website.

Music On Your Site

This is huge, extremely common in many flash sites, and something almost every photographer includes in their website. The site loads, and music starts rolling. Here’s some reasons why that’s bad:

1. First off, it’s illegal. Unless you have obtained a broadcasting license for the song that you’re playing in the background of your website, it’s actually illegal to include a song in this way on your site.

2. It’s repetitive. After the song has cycled through, the viewer is going to get sick of it.

3. Musical tastes vary greatly. What you think is a really cool song, someone else could hate. They might even leave your site because they don’t like the music that’s playing.

4. It could conflict with music the viewer is listening to. Many people listen to music on their computer while browsing. Your music comes on, and starts conflicting with what they are listening to, giving another possible reason for them to leave the site.

In short, there is no good reason why you would need to have music on your site. The cons far outweigh any pros that there could be, plus – in most cases the music playing is being done illegally (whether known or unrealized).

We Can Show You A Better Way To Display Rich Media

There is so much interactivity that can be accomplished now using web standards. The nice part about having your site developed this way, is that it can be viewed virtually anywhere on a number of devices. With an estimated 21 million people on the iPhone market alone, that’s a huge number of people you’re excluding with your flash website. The alternative is cleaner, easier to maintain, and less expensive for you in the long run.

I hope this has helped you to make an informed decision about your website needs, and how to stay current and relevant in the fast-changing pace of the internet market. Contact us if you have any questions!

Brent Deitrich

Their new site is now live, so we invite you to click here and take a look at it. They handle aspects of physical therapy for people of all ages, including many local athletes from Fuquay Varina and surrounding communities. Since they wanted their site to be customized to them and more personal, they hired us to come in for two photoshoots to capture them in action with their therapy patients, as well as shooting staff photos for the website. This is a really smart idea when planning your website to give it that personal touch. Stock photos can be useful, but nothing beats professional stock photos for your site that show you in the picture.

The photo above is one of our favorites, and really shows what a fun-loving group of people you can expect to work with if you utilize their services. We asked everyone to make a silly face for a fun picture, and the girls were like “huh?” and the guys were like “yeah!”.

We had fun working with all of you and look forward to continuing our relationship in the future! Best wishes on your new website!

Brent Deitrich