The Best Tutorial on PSD to Joomla Conversion

Joomla is the most comprehensive content management system in the world. In order to create a robust and attractive website using this platform you need to use PSD to Joomla conversion. You need to however keep in mind that converting PSD to Joomla need a lot of skills and expertise on part of the developer such as PSD to HTML/XHTML and PSD to CSS and seamlessly integrate with the Joomla CMS. The conversion also needs to be executed with great precession to ensure that the website attracts visitors as well as the search engines. Here are four important steps involved in converting PSD to Joomla website.

1. Work In Photoshop – This is the first step in converting PSD to Joomla template. Enable the auto select layers as it will make your job easy. Divide the website into logical parts using rulers. Work on the parts which you don’t want to duplicate using the CSS such as the images, logo and the buttons. This allows you to add some life to these elements which otherwise appear dead on the site. With the help of gradients and drop shadows you can add some visual attractiveness to these elements. Slice the different sections carefully and copy them into new image files. Make sure you turn off the background. If you have to slice small elements copy them into a new layer and edit the images bigger than its actual size.

 

2. Convert to HTML – Converting the images from PSD to HTML/XHTML is the next and the most important step in the conversion process. You need to code the images files using sematic coding techniques as this defines the functionality of the website very well. This also helps in the website being friendly towards the search engines. You can start with the logo and the navigation sections while coding PSD to HTML. Make changes inside the header_container and make changes to the text and the images as required for the website. For the images include the rel attribute on the image links inside of the figure tags.

3. Styling With CSS – Once the HTML coding is over you should start styling the CSS or the Cascading Style Sheet. In the PSD to CSS conversion you need to begin with the style.css file which contains basic setup of the elements. Reset the file to meet the requirement of your website. Start customizing from the top of the website starting with the navigation menu and set the text sizes and multi list levels. In the last step you need to configure the footer section of your website. In the next step set the JavaScript to perform all the functionalities of your website. You can also make use of plugins for this if you wish to. Limit the number of HTTP request and try grouping the scripts to optimize the performance of your website and reduce its load time. While coding make sure that the sub menu is hidden on page load. Set up the animations to take place when one hovers over the corresponding menu items.

4. Work with Joomla - In this step you will need to create relevant folder and directories to run your website. Create a folder structure which includes all the required files in it and start with component.php file. In structuring the website Index.php plays a very important role. Among other files that need to be customized are Template_thumbnail.png which is an image of the template itself that will show in the admin section of Joomla, and template_details.xml which serves as the main file which Joomla reads to install your template. Once this is done you need to install template.zip and install this into your Joomla content management system. This is also termed as Joomla integration. For this you need to access template manager and set your new template as the default and you are done with PSD design to html/Joomla conversion.