Modern site management systems, frameworks, templates, themes, plugins, widgets and other developer tools allow you to quickly create high-quality web resources with a convenient interface, the usual style of providing functionality through the traditional logic of dialogue, controls and buttons. High development speed, security and reliability are the hallmarks of Content Management System (CMS) ratings.
Traditional Web Property Management
Clicking a button on a site is a specific action. A set of specific actions - the menu. A set of parameters for actions - lists, “checkboxes” or a wide selection of items.
Numerous options for modern technology for managing a web resource are not so much buttons, menus, selectors, lists, maps of areas for clicks and other ideas of developers, but the usual design of established traditions in programming.
Web resource development is all the same programming. What was at the beginning of the computer era, became the foundation of the era of the development of Internet technologies. Everything became more graceful and elegant, more complex and more responsible, and the amount of information began to grow catastrophically rapidly.
Spending developer time on manually creating a web resource, designing a unique dialog logic or button design for a site is an old, reliable and true idea. It is found in solving unique or special problems. In the modern world, a quality web resource is:
- Popular CMS
- high-quality theme (template);
- stable set of plugins (tools).
A day of work - and a new store, search engine or electronic document management is already at work.
A person in general and a user (a site visitor) in particular are always loaded with current problems. The desire of the developer to convince his potential client of the prospects of his ideas or a special dialogue is from the field of creativity, art or theatrical skill.
Unique controls
Everyday life is an established tradition in everyday life, at work and on the seashore. Man has always been a confident user of the “habitual way” of life, work and leisure. The Internet user feels confident in the familiar environment, when there is no need to guess what the developer wanted to offer on his site.
Each CMS has its own face, reflecting the established traditions in organizing a dialogue with the visitor. For example, a high-quality and fully functional website button on WordPress is the Shortcodes Ultimate plugin (the well-known shortcodes). You need to quickly prepare a tool environment for organizing complex and multifunctional parsing:
- 2 minutes - install WordPress;
- 3 minutes - installation and introduction to the Shortcodes plugin;
- 4 minutes - installation of four buttons.
This is enough to instantly connect buttons (1) and (2) to open the analyzed pages, button (3) to the site of parsing results, button (4) to the developed parsing script.
In this example, the WordPress theme is refined with additional code. The developer can place the code defined by himself on HTML / CSS anywhere on the page or use the result of the plugin.
It is important to note: the place where the code was created will not always be the place of its application.
No parsing task requires even the simplest CMS: it is always a script, algorithm, the idea of ​​searching and processing data. But at the time of debugging the parsing algorithm, it is convenient to have a window for the source data, a window for the results of work, and convenient control of the work / debugging process.
Description of purpose and elements used
The first two buttons are the source information (examples of sample pages from which you want to get data), the third is the result of the parsing script. The fourth button is the working one (start parsing).
The script requires parameters. It is convenient to present these parameters with HTML / CSS code. Using shortcodes is not particularly effective here. You may also need to write JavaScript code and use AJAX to control parsing in real time.
Any modern CMS provides the developer with the ability to connect a JavaScript handler. But any CMS and a plug-in for it realize the representations (knowledge, skills and experience) of their creator. The goals of a specific application always lie beyond the ideas of the CMS developer, theme, template, plugin.
You can always level out the features of the instrumental environment. The set of elements (5) shows how you can conveniently and organically enter the parameters using the “manual method” necessary for parsing. The selection elements (6) show how this is done through the plugin.
How to create a button for a site: quick solution
The actual solution to this example was made using the Shortcodes Ultimate plugin, which generated a short code - a string of characters (you can use any page of the site to create a short code). The resulting code was transferred to the Twenty Seventeen theme header.php file and used as a parameter to the do_shortcode () function.
In this figure, above and below, you can see pieces of code between which the necessary functionality was inserted. It’s convenient to use the “span” or “div” (1) tag to control the exact position of the elements you want, but this can go against the adaptive layout strategy used by the CMS. Within the element (1), the element from the Shortcodes Ultimate plugin (2) feels great.
In this case, CMS is an environment, not a site. Here it is important to quickly solve the problem: debug the parsing script. The button for the site is one, two, three - and the developer no longer returns to them. His focus is exclusively on the development and debugging of the parsing script.
May not be understood, but important to remember
PHP is a wonderful and practical language. In many ways, it is inferior to JavaScript, but in conjunction they work great. Using CMS is an objectively demanded solution. The time savings are amazing, but the price is tons of code. In many ways, this code is not of interest, often it is simply impossible to even perceive it.
In the above example, the description of element (2) is capacious, and there are four such descriptions for the sake of each button for the site. Description (3) is much more compact and also describes only four elements. This is handmade. Description (2), in fact, is provided by forty times more lines of the plugin and CMS. Description (3) is perceived as is.
Modern programming does not particularly strive to go into details, and a modern developer operates on representations of his favorite CMS. Many people don’t even know how to insert a simple “checkbox” at the desired point on the page or write their own button to enter the site using HTML / CSS.
Traditional visitor requirements are implemented in traditional website creation tools. There is nothing wrong with the fact that each site declares the idea of ​​the used CMS:
- its user-friendly interface;
- her usual style of providing functionality;
- its logic is dialogue, controls and buttons.
In the modern dynamic world of information, the forefront is the speed of decision making and the provision of services. The idea of ​​each CMS is different, but the goal is the same for everyone: quickly create a reliable, high-quality and working web resource.
The perfect site ...
Modern internet technology is good. It is difficult to say the opposite. But the dynamics of their development are not much like the spiral of classical scientific and technological progress. It is rather a Brownian motion.
Incompatibility of versions, types, templates, a variety of tools, the dynamics of the names of various programming tools with the same foundation, like the rustling of leaves on a large tree. But the tree is growing.
An ideal web resource is when there is only one button for a site. This is when one person approached another and a dialogue ensued.
A modern site is when a person has approached, and there ... the developer's opinion about the design, the style of providing functionality, the task and the subject area. There is no dialogue. The visitor is dominated by buttons, menus, and other controls arranged by the developer. This is a tradition, it is familiar and convenient, but is it really correct?