Most ppl get extremely confused when editing Smarty Templates. The thing is, they are not set in stone - they are in fact templates! A guide, a jumping off point. Remedial knoledge of HTML can make all the diffrence when editing your templates. Here is how I make it happen.
First, if you dont have Dreamweaver - GET IT! Save yourself time, money and your hair and just buy the darn thing. Trust me, you'll be glad you did. I'll prolly get flamed from the FrontPage guys, so go ahead. Gimme your worst! Fact is, Dreamweaver is probably the most powerful and intuitive HTML editor in human history - (shameless plug for my editor now complete
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Now, go find the template you want to edit in the admin section of X-Cart. Next, highlight everything in that box and copy the code except the top line which will look something like this ie. {* $Id: head.tpl,v 1.22.2.1 2003/02/19 13:23:08 svowl Exp $ *}. Next, open DREAMWEAVER and create a new page. Just create a regular HTML page because if you create a PHP page, you are stuck with just the code again and wont be able to utilize the WYSIWYG part. Now, paste the code copied from X-Cart between the <BODY> tages in the newly created HTML page. Then, simply edit the layout of template until you like what you see.
NOTE: Be careful not to damage the PHP includes and such. Just edit the layout only. Heck, if wanna go a little crazy, its 100% possible to actually create you're entire site first (in Fireworks or Photoshop) and simply take the PHP code and insert them where you want them to appear.
Also, when you are editing a template, use a little common sense when editing the code, some templates have ABSOLUTELY NO HTML CODE! If this is the case, then it is safe to assume that you cant edit it. When searching for templates to edit, please first look for tell tell signs of HTML. Namely the <HTML> tags. But other tags can be seen pretty easy as well.
Finally, after you are done with your customizations, copy everything between the <BODY> tags and repaste them into the template box in the admin panel of X-Cart. If you do decide to use a completely customized website for your store, dont forget to place the new images in the images folder in the skin1 dir.
Oh yea, anyone still confused about how to edit the default text of your store. Check out the "Languages" link in the admin section. It can be a drag sometimes cause you have no clue what the assigned label is, but you can use the search function which can provide some fruitful results from time to time.
Hope this helps!