Menu

Richard Pearce

When I met Joomla, I had no idea how much it would impact my future. The relationship was frosty at first. Hostile in fact. I was happy the way things were, but Joomla insisted that life could be even better, if I was prepared to make some changes. The problem was, the path to our ultimate happiness required a solution that had not yet been built. And it was up to me to produce the solution. Okay - sure, Joomla did provide the materials, but no cohesive way of moulding it all together.



I made a tentative approach, but was sternly rebuked. Something about having inadequate permissions. I tried again but couldn't find a way to have even the most simple of conversations. Sadly we parted and I went back to my long-term partner, Dreamweaver.



But I knew I was missing out on something. It nagged me day and night until I decided to try again. It was easier this time. Things started to look bright and I was optimistic that I had found my lifelong partner. But alas we fell at the final hurdle. We had come so far, surely something seemingly so small as a menu item couldn't come between us. But is was so. And so tragically we separated again.



This time my reunion with my previous HTML editor was not so pleasant. We were never right for each other. So I knuckled down with a new determination to use the few resources I had to build a Joomla website. The details aren't important. All you need to know is that everything finally came together and now Joomla and I are best of friends.



I want you to enjoy this friendship too, so I have produced a methodical step-by-step solution to learning Joomla. Start with our free course The Basics. Then move on to our advanced courses. I also publish hints and tips via this blog. Your first steps might also be tentative, but with my help, you are guaranteed to save a lot of time and frustration.



Connect with Richard: Facebook | Twitter | Google+ | LinkedIn

Owner of Build a Joomla Website. Responsible for 1 wife, 4 kids and 17 fish.

How to choose a template

In part 4 of this series on the steps to plan and build a Joomla powered website, you will learn some steps to choose a Joomla template.
Tags:
Recent Comments
Nancy Medina
Hi, I would like to have access to the templates demos that you offer, specially the Events Templates. Thank you, Nancy Medina... Read More
Wednesday, 12 October 2011 02:45
Richard Pearce
Hi Nancy - we do not supply templates. You can find suitable Joomla templates by: 1. Simply searching for "Joomla Templates" using... Read More
Wednesday, 12 October 2011 10:34
Continue reading
10008 Hits
2 Comments

Avoiding Scope Creep

In part 3 of our series on how to plan and build a Joomla Website from scratch, you will learn how to avoid the number one fear of web developers - scope creep.
Tags:
Continue reading
8978 Hits
0 Comments

Sensible Navigation Structures

In part 2 of how to build a Joomla Website from scratch, you will learn how to create a sensible navigation structure for your site. 
Tags:
Continue reading
11125 Hits
0 Comments

How to Build a Joomla Website

Part one of a series of posts describing the process of building a real Joomla website from start to stop.

Tags:
Continue reading
15614 Hits
0 Comments

Give your articles some style

Many of the pre-made Joomla templates available today include various formatting options to improve the look of elements within your article. For example, if you wish to highlight a paragraph, you can include a style that displays the text inside a colored box.

Continue reading
8629 Hits
0 Comments

Joomla Banner Ads

Whether you're looking to sell advertising space on your website or promote your own activities, you need to understand how the Joomla banner feature works. This can be daunting for beginners so here is an overview of the process.

Continue reading
11666 Hits
0 Comments

Joomla! 1.6 on the horizon

Joomla 1.6 is coming towards the end of its beta phase which means it will soon be available as what is known as a "Release Candidate". This will not be the final version, but at this stage it is likely that there will not be any major changes. The latest status report suggests that 1.6 will be released before the end of this year. The main changes with this new version are more flexible access control and unlimited levels of categories. However some major changes were necessary to implement these features and as such, it will not be possible to simply upgrade your site from 1.5 to 1.6. Here are my thoughts on some questions that you might be asking.
Tags:
Continue reading
3279 Hits
0 Comments

Image thumbnails

In a previous article, you learnt how to use an extension to automatically resize images. Here is another approach that is worth exploring.

Tags:
Continue reading
13625 Hits
0 Comments

Automatic image resize

One of the greatest frustrations for developers using content management systems is spending hours getting a website looking perfect and then handing the reigns over to the client, only to have them do something ... I can think of a few words here but let's go with "unwise".

Tags:
Recent Comments
Richard Pearce
Have you tried JCE? The commercial version has a feature called Image manager extended. That allows you to resize images as they a... Read More
Friday, 09 November 2012 16:53
Continue reading
12225 Hits
3 Comments

Tabs and slides

One of the nice things about web pages is that they can be as short or long as you like. However, long pages can be intimidating and your readers might find it difficult to find the information that is relevant to them. Consider displaying some of your content in "tabs" or "slides" using the following extension.

Tags:
Continue reading
7230 Hits
0 Comments

Free Joomla TutorialLearn Joomla for free with our 16 lesson, 2 hour course.

Get Started