Hi Janine,

I’m writing in part to tell you how much I’m enjoying your book, although I’m still very new to the concepts, the Dreamweaver program, and web-design in general.

I’m also asking if you might have any recommendations on sources for Dreamweaver templates. I’ve downloaded a some from various Web sites, and I’ve found that they are often not developed with the neophyte user in mind. Trying to modify them involves a fair amount of trying to figure out what the original designer/developer was doing.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Brian

Hi Brian,

One of the most confusing things about templates is that there are so many different kinds. For example, if you download a template designed for Flash, it won’t work in Dreamweaver. Similarly, many templates that are designed for blogs use PHP and require advanced programming knowledge and a web server.

Even if you do get a template designed using Dreamweaver’s template features, it can be difficult to know what and how to change things such as colors and fonts if you want to alter the template design.

Most good pages are designed with CSS these days, and if you learn CSS, you can probably edit most of the well-designed templates you can find on the web.

If you’re still new to design, you may appreciate a book I wrote called Web Sites  For Dummies — it’s part of the new Do It Yourself series it combines templates I created in Dreamweaver complete with instructions for how you can edit them in Dreamweaver.

When you buy the book, you get access to a special part of my Web site where you can download the templates.

You can find the book in the The Digital Family Bookstore.

I hope that helps and I wish you all the best,
Janine