Hi All

From conversations that I have had with Markus and Keith I can assure you that there will be major developments regarding the template and layouts areas of Wiccle and iWiccle in the coming weeks and months.

In order to make sure that we head off in the right direction I am now looking for feedback from the community - if you have used the templating kit how did it work for you? In an ideal world how would you want templating and template integration to work? Would it be of any interest if we produced bespoke templates to order for clients?

Let me know your thoughts, be as imaginative as you wish, lets start a debate on this.

Simon

Hi Simon,

As always, thanks for asking your users -

• Yes, the Templating Kit was a Godsend. Without it my site would not have been up-and-running as quickly as it did.

As for templating ideas:

I'm very much a user (not a developer, not a designer, not a web expert) and, as such, I can't help feeling that any site's menu (or navigation system) is somewhat core to the site's design.

That said, I can't help noticing that most iWiccle sites look the same - all with color-variations of the default tab menu system.

While we (most likely) all know that the menu system can be customized to be anything we want, we're all (most likely) too inexperienced to change it.

I would love to see a number of variations of the menu system (selectable at installation) along the lines of - menu at top, menu at left, menu at right, text menu, button menu, tab menu, etc etc).

AND (as you'd expect) - each variation come with customizable templates, so that the user could select a 'standard' template... and then have the option to 'customize' it.

Like I said - I'm a user. I have absolutely NO appreciation of the simplicity or complexity to develop any or all of the above. 

Simon - any thoughts?

John

Thanks for the feedback.

Like you I am a user more than a developer and one of my roles around here is to be the voice of the "non-techy" ! Although to be fair we are all focussed on trying to make the software easy to use for everyone.

By doing a google search on "Powered by Wiccle" I found many sites, as you said, that have only slight adaptations of the default template which made me wonder if people have looked at the templating kit or if it is too complex to use. I'm glad that the templating kit worked for you but I just get the feeling that it is holding back people from being really creative with iWiccle.

As I said in the original post we have really big plans around the template and layout area and your observations about the menus have confirmed that our thoughts are in the right direction. From my perspective there is no reason why developing the template/UI should be any more difficult than developing the content and functionality. If we can bring the templating into line with the rest of Wiccle ease of use I'm sure that we will all benefit.

Point taken with the menus, and I have (again) something scribbled down on that in that famous list of notes of mine. If you find the time to link to (or illustrate) some optional menu structures with a two-level setup (main menu and submenu), I'd like that. =)

Here's one idea that I had while building my iWiccle site - The Wiccle Menu system! - best explained in bullet points because everyone who understands iWiccle should understand exactly what I'm talking about here:

• Keep the sub-menu system exactly as it is right now in 1.21. As a longer term project (maybe) vary it with slide-out or pop-up or drop-down (or whatever) boxes.
• For the Main Menu system - as an admin option, give users a choice of:
  • Menu on Left - a vertical column on the left of the page with content boxes being proportionally shrunk to accommodate it.
  • Menu on Right - as per above but with the menu column on the right of the page.
  • Menu on Top - similar to what exists in 1.21, but with menu options in multiple rows rather than a single row with the 'More' drop-down.
  • Users could customize spacing etc via CSS.
• Treat the main menu options as Content Boxes and allow users to design their chosen menu in exactly the same way they get to choose their content boxes - square, square padded, rounded, rounded padded, rounded flattop, etc etc (currently 15 options in 1.21).
  • In doing so, 'rounded flat bottom' would effectively provide a 'tabbed' menu system and 'blank' would effectively provide a 'text' menu system. The various box options (in 'button-sized' boxes, would effectively provide a range of 'button' menu systems.
• Allow users to select the menu 'content holder' (the box containing all the menu options) - again from the 15 box options.
• Allow users to select the 'menu option' box (or button) - again from the 15 box options. These boxes/buttons would sit within the menu 'content holder' (and be made up of smaller 'button-sized' boxes).

Obviously a new set of 'button-sized' graphics would need to be designed (and added to the templating kit).

In summary, what I'm suggesting is that the current Wiccle page builder thinking and flexibility be applied to a Wiccle menu-builder.

Good stuff, John! Thank you for spelling those out in such detail. I had been playing with thoughts along those lines, but seeing your ready action plan makes it all the more smooth to add in. The menu builder and customizer will also be getting per-membership controls atop what you've noted.

These menu options will then also be included into our upcoming Template Creator.