Template Tutorial for Site Managers

Template

This page describes use of Evergreen Web Templates for Dreamweaver.

Creating the Template

A template will be created for your site by the web team after you have met with them to develop an information architecture plan. The information architecture will be based on the communication goal, audience and most logical organization of the site.

Modifying the Template

To ensure a consistent look and feel across the Evergreen site, make sure that you have a clear understanding of the web team's guidelines and standards related to the topics discussed within the Web Resources Style Guide. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact the web team at (360)867-6626 or by email.

Applying the Template

1. Open the page to be converted in Dreamweaver.
2. Select Modify > Templates > Apply Template
3. Select the appropriate v3b4 template and click Select.
4. In the Inconsistent region Names dialog box, highlight the bodycopy line and then select content. Do the same with any other regions that you want to move to the new template. For example, if you want to keep your meta tags, highlight titleandmeta and then select meta. For all other regions, after highlighting them, select nowhere.
5. When done resolving regions, click OK.
6. The template has now been applied to the page.
7. Create a Page Header that exactly matches the left nav text for that page if appropriate.
8. Change the Title so that it resembles the Page Header and ends with "at Evergreen". It should be kept to less than 20 words.
9. Change the meta keywords and description on the page as appropriate.
10. Select Commands > Clean up XHTML and remove all font tags.
11. Scan the HTML and remove all class definitions, span tags and any class attribute associated with any other tag.

Template Guidelines

• Once navigation is decided, left navigation usually consists of links to pages within the site. (Exceptions to this can occur when the site content actually spans more than one 'site'.)
• Whenever possible, if there are more than 5 links, the links should either be categorized and alphabetized within the categories, or alphabetized. (The categories do not have to be in alphabetical order.)
• The side bar area should be used for 'nice to know' information and links to additional information that isn't considered as important as the left navigation.
• Whenever a link takes the visitor off of the site, it should open in a new browser window.
• The Page Header should be identical to the corresponding left navigation name.
• No left navigation link should be made to look different than any other. If there is something new to highlight, do so using the content area on the home page for the site.
• Office hours in the sidebar should be listed in this format:
  Hours: Mon - Thu 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.