Okay,
I know it can be done manually, recoding everything to reach W3 Transitional HTML standards in Joomla, this is where it is hurting me - I'm using MX which is verifying the code is valid transitional, but when I W3 check it I get an unbelievable amount of errors. I know what all the errors are, and more or less how to correct them, I'm just wondering does anyone have any ideals on how to speed up the process without removing all the formatting and <php> inserts to actually allow Joomla to work (the default W3 site validation left a site of mine in dire straits until I restored a backup of the template).

Any help at all is much appreciated. I really want to get W3C validation for purposes of saying I can on Joomla, but it feels so much more complicated than with HTML. Without all the ramblings, I'm looking for code cleaner software any reasonable price for Joomla 1.0.13/1.5

Regards,
Baz

Regards
Baz

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Isn't 1.5 a lot better with standards ? ... I'd have assumed if you get the right templates it is ?

(I've not played with the latest 1.5 stable release but from what I'd seen in early RC's it was..)

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Forbairt Media | Web Design & Development Galway / Dublin, Ireland - coming soon ... ( vague but descriptive isn't it )
Recent Work: Safari Club African Safari Holidays - South Africa Safaris
Other Stuff: FluffyLinkulator Rapid Inclusion Service Tools

Yes 1.5 is better,
But you still have to contend with the fact that it is a long way around a simple problem because certain tags which are pretty much nessesary to keep the template together are not valid with W3C. For example symbols such as & = etc which are required to implement PHP in a HTML page seem to cause entity problems. Would trying to strip everything back to CSS where possible help? I could do with dumping the tables in my Joomla work (very badly).

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After recently investigating various other CMS's .. what is it that's keeping you with joomla ?

Joomla is a complete ***** in some ways...

I hate the limitations on subsections unless you delve into the realms of plugins

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Forbairt Media | Web Design & Development Galway / Dublin, Ireland - coming soon ... ( vague but descriptive isn't it )
Recent Work: Safari Club African Safari Holidays - South Africa Safaris
Other Stuff: FluffyLinkulator Rapid Inclusion Service Tools

I agree, but the usability factor is a major plus when getting clients to update their own content, one days training and they are away with it. Also the number of previously produced modules, etc is a major plus factor for allowing clients have extra usability, for the price of a small donation, particularily for those clients with (honest) small budgets but large ambitions.

Wordpress is a lot lovelier, but doesn't offer the same broad base for everything from e-commerce to media driven websites, if you mentioned it isn't the most secure either, I would also have to agree, but again SSL certs do a lot of that work where required... in the long run I'd love to see a "new" joomla, as happened with mambo.

Rgds,
B

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(I mean Joomla isn't the most secure of course!)

Actually lets not turn this into another Joomla bashing forum on the web

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not going to start bashing joomla ... I like the potential it has ... I've just been looking at alternatives and finding they are quite impressive as well.

virtuemart + joomla ... is beautiful to a certain extent in my mind .. there are lots of things I don't like about it though

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Forbairt Media | Web Design & Development Galway / Dublin, Ireland - coming soon ... ( vague but descriptive isn't it )
Recent Work: Safari Club African Safari Holidays - South Africa Safaris
Other Stuff: FluffyLinkulator Rapid Inclusion Service Tools

virtuemart + joomla the flash pop up for payment details can be a bit off putting I think to site customers, memories of casino pop up windows maybe!

I don't want to burden you but if you come accross any better than Joomla on your travels, would you mind dropping me (probably the forum in general too I suppose) about them. I'm really learning beyond the design and implementation with CMS's, i.e. security, coding, etc, so I'd love to get to know a few more systems... it'll keep me busy anyway!

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I guess it really depends on your requirements ... its easy to say wordpress is great for a lot of things ... throw in caching and you've got something that a lot of clients are very happy with ... bung on firestats and they go ... oooh .. ahhh

add in the seo modules and away you go ...

what specifically about joomla are you using ... I'm aware there are loads of modules .. but given its at 1.5 and a lot of the modules no longer work with it ... without hacking ... what in particular do you like about it ?

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Forbairt Media | Web Design & Development Galway / Dublin, Ireland - coming soon ... ( vague but descriptive isn't it )
Recent Work: Safari Club African Safari Holidays - South Africa Safaris
Other Stuff: FluffyLinkulator Rapid Inclusion Service Tools

Thanks Forbairt for taking time to talk about this.

Basically the thing that mainly attracts me to Joomla is that fact things are easy enough to modify, i.e. via CSS, and the backend is very friendly to clients for updating, etc. Also a feature such as the mosimage feature in Joomla would be a major plus, with the media manager, I know Wordpress similar in that way.

Things that would actually get to me to move away from Joomla would be:
1. The menu structures (they kill me).
2. Obviously the fact that you highly reliant on the client not mucking up something while they are in the backend if they have just enough knowledge to be dangerous.
3. Problems with Firefox / IE and either/or depending on what you are doing when editing content, editing structures, etc.

Really I suppose I want the usability of Joomla and easy addition of mambot style items, without all the gliches mentioned above... if you need any advice on Myspace templates ever I think thats the only thing I might know a bit about over most of the people here feel free to ask

Thanks,
Baz

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