Until a few years ago, it was safe to say that most websites were a combination of static HTML and hard coded pages, relying on a team of people to update, in some cases, thousands of files. This also formed part of the business model for many companies who were relying on ongoing contracts and maintenance agreements with their clients to provide cash flow and resources to update these websites. However, with the introduction of technology, better education, better internet infrastructure and connectivity, a new generation of those wanting a ‘hands on’ approach to managing their online presence has emerged.
Even today, many schools are teaching HTML and website management as subjects in primary school and children are able to build basic HTML websites, so the days of relying on income from project management and monthly fees for site management are becoming a thing of the past. However, many developers are utilizing DotNetNuke for ease of management and up selling services and solutions to.
One of the most time consuming and disruptive activities has usually been getting the content from the client
For those who are familiar with the traditional methods of designing a website, one of the most time consuming and disruptive activities in work flow has usually been getting the content from the client. And often the content plays a pivotal role in either the design of the website, in reference to menus and navigation through to transferring data into the static pages and configuring the other pages that link to them.
While it is no different with DotNetNuke websites, the most efficiently designed sites are when a person who is knowledgeable in this technology, can assist in designing the master pages and layout with the client, either online or via normal storyboards while working with the designer who will be responsible for its look and feel.
Like any other application, getting to know your environment always helps you get more out of it. However, with DotNetNuke, it’s particularly important. Understanding that it is a web application framework that interacts closely with designers, developer and site administrators may help you understand the importance of working with all parties involved in creating the website.
Decisions made by a developer on a custom project, can and does impact on how the content is rendered on the screen, and in turn, can affect the design of the website. It is possible to have a virtually seamless interface with only a few subtle changes to the look, but without understanding DotNetNuke, it’s possible to create a mess too. Graphic designers and developers alike, who want right of passage to create a highly complex visual website with a level of functionality that surpasses others, should only do so when they have had a hands on approach to working with it as a finished product, e.g. as the site administrator.
With DotNetNuke, a well planned, designed and skinned website requires very little support
With DotNetNuke, a well planned, designed and skinned website requires very little support. In fact, you won’t even hear from most of your clients unless they are asking for something new or if they’ve not logged in for a while to make changes and can’t remember something and the beauty of DotNetNuke is its ability to be replicated quickly and easily. That’s the simple part of the equation and the depth of the capabilities of the DotNetNuke Web Application Framework is rarely used to its full extent by the majority of users and no wonder, since the level of customization and the variety of choices to developer, designer and end user would be rarely required on a day to day basis by a single company or business. However, once you start working with a few clients, questions are asked that you simply would never have thought of yourself, so the learning process keeps on going.
New Opportunities
What DotNetNuke is changing in the business world is the ability for non developers to offer their customers solutions that they previously were excluded from. Small business operators, ad agencies, web development companies, marketing companies, charity and not for profit organizations, clubs, interest groups, just to name a few are finding that DotNetNuke is an affordable solution. And, for the larger development companies, corporations and many fortune 500 companies are finding that DotNetNuke is a profitable solution for them.
From early 2000 and on, we saw the evolution of DIY-portals providing a range of preconfigured themes you could choose to display on a website. These were based on content management systems designed by developers and in many cases hundreds of thousands of dollars were invested by companies in creating self managed website systems. The results produced a new market of website companies offering off the shelf, ready to go websites. All that was required was for the new website owner to change a few pre-configured details, select a website design, click a button and a site was created. However, the majority of these were preconfigured, crude and rigid representations of templates that were most like designed in house by a team of developers rather than designers or maybe, simply restricted by the technology and budget.
Nevertheless, it was a huge step forward and brought to the marketplace, a new range of products and services to sell.
Developers and Designers Unite
In the future, there are specific needs to be taken into consideration when working with DotNetNuke websites is to educate designers, developers and project managers in understanding in the role each other plays in the building of the site. And, although the framework is independent in coding, creation and management, a lack of exploration or discovery in the finer details of what’s required for the project will most likely lead to frustration, reworking of files and more overhead in management. It is fairly safe to say that whatever old ideas you had in how a website should be developed and deployed may not apply to designing, deploying and managing your DotNetNuke website.
It is fairly safe to say that whatever old ideas you had in how a website should be developed and deployed may not apply to designing, deploying and managing your DotNetNuke website
The reason for this change in dynamics is multi faceted. It was only a few short years ago we had control of the situation with our expert staff overseeing site management. Once a site was developed, handed over and regarded as ‘live’, ongoing management contracts would be put in place where teams would work together to grow and update the site. Whether it was adding pages, modifying text or images, there was a definite ‘us and them’ relationship between the web developing company and the client who paid for the project. While the client had parted with all the money to get the site designed, developed, deployed, there was never any discussion in who would manage the website in the long term. And the clients in general didn’t ask. It was assumed that the web design company had the skills to keep the site running and maintain the look and feel of the website, the integrity of information and how it was displayed and there were no boundaries so to speak. Sites that were difficult in design could be tweaked, tricked, skewed, hacked and held together with advanced code to create a specific look that a client might want to achieve. It didn’t matter what was behind the site, in the code, as long as the site looked good and the information presented as it did in the story board from the designer.
It was almost as if the designer had final say over the website and the web designer who created the pages, or the developer who may have provided code did not have a voice, because at the end of the day sites were designed from the minds of the visual designer whose relationship was with the client, who was paying the bills. This worked perfectly fine while the clients were not involved in the management of their websites on day to day basis, however like all technologies, things move and change and the focus on websites that look good must also now come with the ability for the growing number of clients to manage themselves.
A Visually Spoilt Generation
In the world of visual enticements, from our electronic techno gadgets, through to graphically rich and tantalizing games, movies with surround sound and cinema like quality movies played from our LCD monitors that now come in 24 inch screens, we’re a visually spoilt generation.
Developers who once generated an income through providing solutions that worked have now been faced with, for some, an awkward expectation that they need to make it look good as well. As the end user has pushed for software that looks as good as it works, the role of the UI (User Interface) designer has become more specialized. Developers who work in this space often have a love for design as well as writing code, have had access to suites of tools to create cool buttons, icons and colors to create stunning Windows applications that not only solve our problems but are beautiful to look at. An application developer can control much more when working in a Windows environment. So, when some great piece of software is written and installed on your system, the developer has control over that environment.
A developer who writes solutions to be used online, through a web browser, has different elements to content with. Usually the challenge is the customer wanting something written and the other is the designer to make it work within a webpage. It can be a challenging mix, but a team that works well together and understands, respects and learns about each other’s space can and does produce outstanding results.
The constraints in working with an online application, by comparison to a Windows or installed application, is the constraints of the browser rendering the information to the end user. An installed application can use the resources of the users computer system and Windows installation (or any other OS installed) and draw what is built into the system and make it work, whether it’s full screen or not.
DotNetNuke provides a developer an excellent environment of separating the code from the design
DotNetNuke provides a combination of Server Side and Client Side management. It is the only Open Source project that runs using the .NET 1 & .Net 2 framework as a choice of installations. The .NET framework provides developers with a set of tools and resources they can hook in to and code further to provide more complex solutions through a web based environment.
Many of the constraints when developing custom code occur when there is a need to display a lot of information in a small area. And, many of the problems when developers and designers haven’t talked together will show when the site is deployed and there is no formatting of text, where hard coding of visual influences, such as the border, cell-padding, cell-spacing and colors used, make it difficult to update and design into the site.
To eliminate many of these problems, the use of CSS comes into play. This area is often not understood in great detail by the developer, nor should it need to be except for some basic pieces of information to create the infrastructure for the designer / skinning specialist to pick up. DotNetNuke provides a developer an excellent environment of separating the code from the design and while working on a modular solution, the design can have important input while the project is underway. Issues regarding font sizes, typeface and colors can be adjusted along the way.
A Developer’s Perspective
One of the biggest influences in designing a DotNetNuke website is the impact on the layout when introducing modules to the page after the new design has been skinned and installed. For newcomers to DotNetNuke it can often mean creating, redoing and modifying a project, making it run over time, over budget and clients become disgruntled.
There are some typical patterns that can fairly be reliable in estimating space required when you don’t have access to those third party modules when scoping out a skin project, but in the fine tuning, it’s very important to see the modules in action, before finalizing because when you’re doing a complete design, based on a tight storyboard offered by a designer, every pixel counts.
Modules that offer multiple search functions which display information in a tabular format require special consideration in their design
Modules that offer multiple search functions which display information in a tabular format require special consideration in their design. Developers and designers should work closely together to get the most out the design. Developers who code for DotNetNuke, whether it be for resale to the general public or customized for clients, need to also consider these factors, and ensure when working with data that it is as close to the data to be populated when the site goes live. CSS can make management of this area much easier, so developers with the older habits of hard coding visual elements need to be avoided where possible.
An Administrator’s Perspective
Perhaps the most visually challenging area within the DotNetNuke workspace is that of the site administrator. Here, is where the pages and tabs are fully expanded, extra menus may be visible and the interface can change dramatically when navigating around the website making changes.
From a design perspectives and best practices approach, consideration to all those involved in DNN including the developer, designer, end user and administrator is important. Before the concept of self managed websites, web developers maintaining their client sites were able to accept non standard or a ‘developer’ look since it was never on public display, but DotNetNuke websites have added a new dimension of being ‘on show’ at all times, particularly if offering as a solution for clients.
Administrators may require specific pages to be designed and constructed for performing online tasks to keep the look and feel intact. As a rule, most of the default administrative functions of DotNetNuke are consistent and much thought has been put into the application over time in bringing and maintaining familiar icons, patterns and methods of management. For websites that require complete customization, there is the ability to completely change the way the modules appear from the administrator’s perspective, but this as a rule is not recommended as it is considered a ‘core change’, meaning that it would affect the upgrade path for that particular site.
Understanding how DotNetNuke works and learning some of the functionality that is unique to this application will give you a better perspective on what works in a commercial environment. Since the administrator of the website will be looking and working in this application, it should be an integral part of the thought process.
The End User Perspective
For close on a decade, it seemed that how a site looks had precedence in how it functions. Often driven by cutting edge ideas, over the years, websites have not escaped the fads of good and bad design. End users were not as savvy as they are now.
Doing business on the internet, from purchasing music to online banking, has made the world wide web a thriving market in spite of the boom and bust eras that many companies suffered. Technology is now much more advanced and affordable, computers are almost commodities and the demand to be online has brought out a new era of websites.
One of the areas influencing many companies to choosing DotNetNuke as their preferred application framework has been the level of customized skinning that is possible
With very few changes to the current skinning engine, DotNetNuke has allowed designers who learn about the functionality and work with developers who provide enhancements, to become accomplished skinners. In particular, one of the areas influencing many companies to choosing DotNetNuke as their preferred application framework (in preference to others such as Joomla/Mambo, Xoops, etc) has been the level of customized skinning that is possible. To date, there still hasn’t been a product on the market that offers scope of skinning that currently exists in DotNetNuke.