Esotropiart

Yeah, y'alls getting tired of site updates that don't go site-wide, eh? Well, I don't blame you. I'm not doing this for professional reasons at this point, however, so if you are watching this process, consider yourself "lucky". You are probably one of about ten people (max) who get to see these ephemeral stages. Woo hoo! How exciting.

There is a reason I have delayed redesigning the entire site. Without some sort of template system, it is a massive chore to update the many pages of a typical web site. It is crucial for the sake of future productivity and sanity to develop a template or set of shared elements. Otherwise, each time a small change is made to a layout, image or menu, every page must be updated separately.

Before this newest revision of the site where I have been implementing the use of PHP, I relied on Dreamweaver's templates to provide updating ease. As many know, however, there is a stark disadvantage to using templates. Each time a template is altered, Dreamweaver must check the entire site and make changes to each file that is linked to the template. Then each file that was changed must be uploaded to the site so the changes can be seen by the end user.

Mostly likely a better technique for easy mass updates is to use SSIs (Server Side Includes). This approach involves analyzing each page layout in order to determine which blocks of code are common between groups of pages. These common code blocks are then copied to a separate file and saved on the server. Each time the code is required in a page, a PHP (or other server-side scripting language) include statement is employed. When the user visits a page where one of these common elements are used, the code contained in the include file automatically replaces the include statement, and the user is none the wiser. The advantage of course of this system is efficient updates. To update all instances of similar code throughout the site, a change need only be made to the include file.

While you few devoted fans have been waiting with much anticipation and ardor, I have been working on two very important tasks. I already mentioned the first, which is to develop an efficient template (or SSI) system. The second relates to CSS. Until just a few days ago, I was using tables to separate the large block elements of my pages (simply because they work, no fail). I decided that, if browsers aren't going to support simple CSS-P functionality, I'd put off using 100% CSS for visual layout. Well, I changed my mind and started experimenting with 2 and 3 column layouts. I came up with my own take on the whole fluid, multiple column scenario and was fairly pleased with the results - enough to put it all into action. Both the home page and this blog page employ this new CSS layout. Mind you, this layout took some serious thought because I didn't want one of the typical cheesy CSS layouts that break apart when the browser is shrunk. I was not satisfied until I created a layout whose blocks and windows remained exactly where I intended. Not that it's all that impressive, but if enough people ask how I was able to achieve this unbreakable fluid layout, I'll work on an explanation for ya's. Otherwise, there are a million and a half other solutions out there for you (I didn't like most of them).

So, theoretically, I am close to being able to redesign the entire site in this new fashion. Well, don't get your hopes up! I don't have infinite time to devote to this site as of yet. Let me know what you like or dislike about this new layout by posting a comment. Keep in mind it is not 100% finished yet.