CSS vs Tables - Can X-cart go Tableless?

SystemSkins · #1 11-13-2007, 11:39 AM

So here I am trying to do a few ideas that I have in my head put into my website. Having extreme difficulty I have ventured over to a CSS forums and started asking questions. For one, no one wanted to talk to me because the site had tables in it, GRRRR, and for those that did talk to me they told me that in order to do what I wanted to do it would need to go tableless, not the whole thing, but just the area that I want to modify to do what I have in mind. I had someone PM me telling me that they were doing free-lancing work and building up a profile because they wanted to leave thier current web designing company and start working on their own. He told me he would convert my X-cart into a tableless system for me for free in a few days as long as he could just put my site up on his site as an example of his work.

My questions:

#1. Should I go CSS based and tableless? What are the benefits/disadvantages of doing so?

#2. Would I be able to give him a copy of X-cart to do this for me or would I be voiding my licensing agreement? If I did give him a copy, I would only have to give him the .tpl files right? Er... now that I think about it, I would have to give him the whole thing because how would he check to see if it works without the .php files.

I'm pretty sure I can trust him, he is a very active member on those forums for over a year with over 500 posts. I have seen his portfolio and he does do pretty good work.

Doug

balinor · #2 11-13-2007, 11:49 AM

1. A tableless layout is great, but there are some pitfalls:

a. Automatic patches most likely won't work anymore.
b. Installing third party mods can become a chore, as the code won't correspond to their install instructions. Most of them still use tables
c. X-Cart add-ons won't work correctly out of the box

Basically you are creating a lot of extra work for yourself down the road until Qualiteam and all of the developers follow suit. You need to weigh the benefits of that yourself. For me, I almost always use mostly CSS for the layout, but there are still some areas that a table is a good idea (cart, reg form, etc). But that also means I need to manually install just about anything I add to their carts.

2. DO NOT give them a copy of X-Cart. They can download a demo to work with or work on your site. Which CSS forum are you talking about? And post count does not necessarily equal competence

Does he know X-Cart and Smarty? If not, he can do some serious damage to your site, so make a backup first!

SystemSkins · #3 11-13-2007, 11:51 AM

I'll send u a pm with the forum and his name.

balinor · #4 11-13-2007, 11:55 AM

That doesn't really matter...the key is if he knows Smarty or not. If not, it will be an absolute disaster, I can guarantee it.

SystemSkins · #5 11-13-2007, 11:56 AM

You mentioned the pitfalls, what about the advantages? If I wanted to take on the risk/workload of the patches/mods, what would I be weighing that against in benefits by going totaly CSS?

balinor · #6 11-13-2007, 11:58 AM

Well, you could position your content a lot higher on the page, which is a big SEO benefit.

Pages would load faster as they would be a LOT smaller.

Much easier to make design changes down the road.

SystemSkins · #7 11-13-2007, 12:00 PM

hrmmm, I can definitaly see that as a big benefit and IMO it outweighs the burden of add-ons/updates/mods. But that would mean I would have to do the add-ons/updates/mods myself because if he does do this for me, he more than likely wont be there the next time around, or at least not for free.

bigredseo · #8 11-13-2007, 12:02 PM

Also - since X-Cart Forums are a locked forum, and they're an active member, they likely already have X-Cart

balinor · #9 11-13-2007, 12:05 PM

Personally, I'd be VERY leery of anyone wanting to do something for free. What happens if he does a half ass job and then bails? You have no leverage for him to finish the work. As the saying goes, if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is

SystemSkins · #10 11-13-2007, 12:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by balinor

Personally, I'd be VERY leery of anyone wanting to do something for free. What happens if he does a half ass job and then bails? You have no leverage for him to finish the work. As the saying goes, if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is

True, but like you said, just give him a demo copy and if he returns it "completed" then I can just make a backup copy of my current site and drop his in and see if it works. If he bails... well, I just wont hear from him. I'm not going to halt my website building just because he is doing this. I told him I'd think about it and after my site goes live and I'm done working on my site 18-20 hours a day then he can work on it. This way I wouldn't have that much repeat work.