Using Templates in Manila

[Samuel Reynolds]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: frontier-users-admin at userland.com
> [mailto:frontier-users-admin at userland.com]On Behalf Of Peter Thirkell
> Sent: Sunday, September 30, 2001 6:15 PM
> To: Frontier-Users
> Subject: Using Templates in Manila
> 
> 
> Hello
> 
> I'm trying to improve my understanding of how to design 
> templates for a more
> professional look in my Manila sites. At the moment I have 
> some "out of the
> bos" sites, but my students would like a more sophisticated look.

My suggestion:
1. Find an internet site you like, and save a page to disk.
2. Open the site in your favorite text editor (I suggest
   BBEdit or Alpha on the Mac, or TextPad on Windoze; all
   three are shareware, available for DL from the internet).
3. Locate the *content* of the page, and replace it with
   the {body} macro.
4. Clean up the HTML as necessary (remove redundant
   tags, MS Orifice garbage, etc.).
5. Copy the text and past it into the Template textarea
   in a Manila site.
6. Edit and view; repeat ad infinitum (or ad nauseum).

This should allow you to develop a good understanding of
how the page is constructed. I find it most useful to
extract a page template in stages:
1. Template with {title} and {body} macro, but all other
   links and images hardcoded.
2. Change hardcoded links to "quoted" or {glossSub} links.
3. Generate site-specific images and add them to the site.
4. Change hardcoded images to Manila {pictureRef} macros.

This approach stood me in good stead even before Manila.
It's a good learning exercise for teacher and student alike.
Just keep in mind that it's a *starting point*; after doing
this a few times, you (or you students) should start to get
a feel for what works and what doesn't, for what drags
performance down. You can start to build up a "library" of
starter templates.

Some characteristics I look/strive for:
- Minimal use of nested tables. They are commonly used for
  overall page formatting, but try to avoid the use of a
  table with one cell with a nested table containing content.
- Minimal use of Flash and similar plugins.
- Maximal re-use of "structural" images. If the same image
  is used on multiple pages, try to put it in the template
  so it doesn't get downloaded repeatedly for different
  pages (Manila makes this relatively easy).
- Automatic construction of indices and reference lists.
  The Metadata plugin makes this relatively painless.
  And it's a *major* (that's **MAJOR**) improvement over
  hand-coding lists!

HTH.

- Sam