The Science Behind Web Templates

A web template can be defined as a pre-defined schematic or pattern which you can re-use to fulfill you own requirements. A template can be of various types ranging from a formula based electronic calculator to a web design. It is a ready to use design created by web designers and sold for profits. Web templates are similar to any other website that allows the integration of text, audio, video and various other applications with it. A web design also makes use of certain strategies with which it can be deployed and distributed using the internet as a medium. A web design system is a methodology used to develop web templates. Web design systems are meant to work three functional levels; the principles to carry out these functions are pre-defined.

The core principles or functions can be listed as follows:

1. Web design systems work towards saving development time
2. Web design systems also work towards building a cost effective website or a cost effective online presences
3. A good web design system ensures that a webmaster or the owner of the website needs to spend very little time on maintaining his website

Web templates are a result of these three requirements. A web design system can enable you to produce a large number of replicas quickly and accurately, similarly, web templates can be used to create as many web pages and web sites as possible without having to worry about extra development costs.

A web template is created by using a small number of programming instructions. This helps you fine tune the template without having the need to learn programming or web design. These limited or finite programming instructions resemble simple guidelines that are important for every web site. A web template is created to fulfill a few requirements. These are also the same reasons which become guidelines while creating a web template. A webmaster while using and creating a template should realize that there is a difference in the business logic value and the presentation logic value of a master template. A master template once created, can be used to create replicas and hence a make a profit. A web template carries a basic sense of inheritance from its parent or master template. Inheritance however, does not mean repetition in this case. In this case when a replica of the master template is created, only the functions of the master template are carried forward and not the design. For example, we use multiple e-mail accounts listed with multiple service providers. These service providers have similar functions but different layouts and designs for their website.

Another important aspect that should be taken into account while creating a template is its flexibility. The need to retain content but change the look and feel of the web site is a common demand. This requirement can be fulfilled only if the web template has a flexible design and interface. The process of re-designing a template should be simplified. The third and possibly the most important rule that should be implemented is the re-usability and reproducibility of a template. People who need to use the web, but have no technical proficiency should be able to use a web template.

Our discussion so far dealt more with the science behind creating a template. Now, let us talk about how a web template can be used for practical purposes.

Practical use of a web template:

To keep it simple, a web template is a pre-designed web page which you can use for your website. Now, why would you want to use a web template? Why would you want to use a pre-designed website, which is, in most cases, used by a large number of other webmasters to build various websites? This draws us to reason with the root cause of the concept. Templatization does save you a lot of development time. Efficiently using your development time is especially important when your requirement is large and you need a fast turn around. Internet businesses thrive on information, and a successful internet business thrives on delivering information quickly.

Templates give you the option of setting up a website within minutes. You may want to fine tune the website by tweaking the branding option and placing your own logo in the space provided, you may want to optimize the HTML code by experimenting with the “Meta Tags!”, or you may simply want to copy-paste the content you have into the

area of the web page. What is even better; templates help you overcome basic programming and designing hassles and hurdles. You require very little or no knowledge about programming and designing to make a website of your own.

Web Template Resources:

So to speak, there are literally thousands of websites on the internet that let you download a template for free or for a very small price. You will find lots of various designs on various websites. However, choosing the right design and the right template for yourself is entirely based on your requirement. You may want to pick a template just looks very nice, or you might want to pick one with a lot of features and functions on it. A famous tool provided by Adobe called the Dreamweaver, or even the MS Frontpage provides templates as options in their software packages. There are numerous advantages that come along with web templates; reusability is one such cost cutting advantage that you can make use of. If you download a free template, you may be required to link back to the owner and creator of the template, however, it is not mandatory for one to use a template in the ‘as is; state, it is very likely that you will find a web template you like, however, in case it becomes extremely difficult to find one that appeals to you, you can select a template which comes closest to fulfilling your requirement and have it customized. Each web template can be modified to suit your needs; you can play around with the color combinations, layout, designs etc. Once again, as mentioned earlier, you don’t need to get into the technical aspects of web design to build your own website. There are a lot of categories under which these templates are sold.

Listed below are a few categories, under which templates are more commonly sold:

Website Templates
Flash Templates
Flash Intro Templates
SWiSH Templates
Dynamic Flash Photo Gallery Templates
osCommerce Templates
ZenCart Templates
CRE Loaded Templates
Corporate Logo Templates
Corporate Identity Templates
Various Blog and Content Management System Templates

Three Web Template Purchase categories:

It does not matter if you go to a website with over 30,000 templates or a small website with a resellers account; you are more likely to find only three ‘Template Purchase Categories’, which are listed as follows:

Free Templates: This type of a purchase and use account will require you to let the owner’s link remain on the main page of the website, customization is not an issue and there are no restrictions on it.

Premium/Paid for Templates: The possibilities of finding more variety in this category are limitless. A bunch of designers get together, and create some very good templates, the makers of the website retain re-seller rights which enable them to sell the same template many times and as a result sell them at extremely low prices. There will be no links that you will require to keep on your website.

Buying a web template through this category and then customizing it is the ideal way of starting a website. The template does not cost too much and the customization will help the template fit your requirements completely.

Unique/Exclusive Templates: The web designers, who create the website, sell their reseller rights along with a web template sold in this category.
You own complete reseller rights to the template. This design is not sold to any other person after you.

Using a web template is cheap, easy and not very time consuming.
Web templates are made in such a way that you can simply choose and start to use!