Look of a site, what is dominant? the VM template or the Joomla template??

[Dog_Guy]

Hi this is probably VM 101

And I have used VM for five years but none of the developers I have been talking to have been able to explain this in lay persons terms.

Currently I run two sites using Joomla 2.5x and VM2.x

I want to migrate to J3.x and VM3.x and I am looking at using experts for sales optimisation (colour, placement etc of all things on the landing page).

On my current sites I have the same set up for each. A traditional home page (lots of text and a few images down the centre strip), and on a sub page have the VM landing page. The main look of the site is due to the J2.5 template. I am only using the VM files (and template?) that came with the upload, and they only seem to apply to each little VM plugin space I activate.

GOING FORWARD - For my e commerce side, One developer says just buy the VM3 responsive template I want and put it on the default Joomla template/ site,  AND the site will look just like the VM demo looks where I buy the template.  ??!

For my second site, VM shop is only a secondary concern, so I am intending on buying a Joomla template (how I want the majority of the site to look, no doubt controlled by the css file etc) and will just use the standard VM template on the VM landing page for the ecommerce shop.

The thing I dont understand is how do you make one template dominant over the other on a site? I thought the VM template only worked on the VM landing page (where I display the categories as large icons), but it can also define the look of the whole site?

Can anyone explain this in lay terms and/or have a link that goes into more detail?

Thanks!

B

[Dog_Guy]

one of my potential developers has said:

"If shop is not your primary goal then purchase joomla template.
there are options in admin to which view you want to select.
there is default view of vm and also in most of the templates there are override files already created for virtuemart in
template/template name/html/com_virtuemart path."

This does not completely clarify for me.

If I look at a VM3 template demo, how much of that page will my Joomla site look like throughout all the pages of the new site?

Or is it better to buy a Joomla template that I think will make a good home page and just put the VM template (icon categories) in one of the layout spaces on the joomla template?

I thought the VM templates changed font and the short form description fields of the shop display, not the main layout of a page or all the other style for a site?

Does anyone have visual examples of templates that would explain the difference and links to explain how to turn on or off templates on given pages?

Thank you,

B

[bluezeyes]

Hi,

well i'm not the expert on templating and or Layouts but,

If you buy and use only one template which is designed for Joomla only,
it could work together with virtuemart, if virtuemart's own css / js is used.
But this is not guaranteed by the template developer.
what could happend is
- that the Layout can looking weird, caused by conflicting / missing CSS values
- that all or parts of VM in FE will not work caused by conflicting JS-functions
etc.
And things like invoices/orders/mails are in VMs std design too which may interfere with the general site design.

That can all happen can happen, depends on how the developer designed its template in respect of other components the client (you) may use.

If you buy a template which is designed for VM, its working with Joomla in general and not to interfere with VM, it have may customized layouts (overwrites) for modules like cart, product display, printing etc.
so you have less work to create a unique seemless look for your website and the shop,
sometimes it comes with extended BE-settings which ease to control the layout and design.

Kind regards,

bluezeyes

[Dog_Guy]

Hi Blue eyes, thanks

"If you buy a template which is designed for VM, its working with Joomla in general and not to interfere with VM, it have may customized layouts (overwrites) for modules like cart, product display, printing etc.
so you have less work to create a unique seemless look for your website and the shop,
sometimes it comes with extended BE-settings which ease to control the layout and design.
"

Regarding the look though ..

If I buy a VM template and put it on a joomla site, will my site look exactly the same as the VM Demo shows on the VM template site?  Or will my site look just like that on the main VM landing page?

I would have thought that the main look of the site is still caused by the Joomla template, that is why I hadnt bothered with buying a VM template before, because the standard one that comes bundled with VM looked ok. Or doesnt a template come with VM ?

Is a VM template actually a Joomla template that also modifies the VM shop component looks? Does the VM template change the whole site layout, where the User1, user2, main text regions are on the page??

If I can find documentation or links to explain this it would be great. I am sure that this is probably obvious but again I havent found it yet!

Thanks

Bruce

[jenkinhill]

I'm sure you have asked similar questions to this before. There is no documentation or links, just common sense and experience.

There are Joomla templates which also describe themselves as VirtueMart templates. ie they are a Joomla template with template & css overrides to provide a matching appearance and maybe some "enhanced" function. Some of these are highly coloured and styled to suit a particular product range, eg you can get purple templates  (often coded in India) themed for jewellery or sites that look similar to eBay or Amazon.  All at a cost - and so often built around one version of VirtueMart, so things may break when you update VM unless the template supplier keeps up with versions and provides continuing support. We have seen a lot of template buyers unhappy about the lack of support once they have installed it and want to change someting or an explanation of why something does not work.

Then you can buy a Joomla template which does not have VM support pre-configured so you can install VM and use its default template. For many that works well, but in some cases VM does not display nicely because the Joomla template has some css styles which interfere with VM layout. Or the template has a large number of bells & whistles, loads megabytes of JavaScript, so is slow and has conflicts with the VM component scripts.

I have a basic rule when working with my clients. I either build a Joomla template from scratch or use a relatively simple commercial template which I modify for a paricular client needs. I do not buy in a VM theme, but adjust the layout & css using overrides to get something that works for the client and for their potential customers.  For a store site I avoid flashy slide shows, moving images etc, many of which can detract from the simple business of making it easy for the customer to find the products, display the products and related information in a clear manner, and making it obvious how to buy!

A big advantage with current versions of VM is that changing layout & styling is very easy with just a little css/html/php knowledge. But now the default VM layout is pretty good looking, and suitable for use "out of the box" in a large number of cases

[Dog_Guy]

Thank you for a thorough reply.

I may have asked this before, but as I didn't get a real answer back then, and tech has changed with versions considerably, I thought I would ask again.

Note I was intending on changing J and VM versions AND the template all together so that I can start the year with a fresh and up today e commerce site.

It sounds like unless I am a programmer (and I am not) that I will not be aware of what template will work well with what VM template etc, so I will have to rely heavily on the updaters abilities to make things go smoothly. And their advice before I buy a template.

A few of the developers, from different countries are warding me away from VM 3 saying that it is not stable for their clients? I am posting this on a VM site so I am sure that I wont get agree-ance with their comments on that, but it has made me think about staying with VM2 - just not sure how much longer that will be supported and when I will have to upgrade anyway.

So it looks like you suggest just getting a JOOMLA template that I like and make sure that the coder can upgrade and install the template I select.

I have noticed though that while VM template sites and demos show you the VM page working well (which I am now considering making the hmpg) that joomla template sites rarely have shopping carts shown on their demo, so its hard to know how the VM will look shoe horned into their template.

It would appear for the average site owner without coding skills that with this cms tech that you have to hand a lot of faith over to someone else - cant just buy off the rack and install. I am sure it gives a lot of flexibility, but not to the average site owner .. (ps not after a bun fight here) this upgrade is going to take a lot of time and money and I just want to go into it knowing all the pit falls and how to maximise my chances of early success of an upgrade to a good looking site, that works.

[GJC Web Design]

My question would be why are you bothering with an upgrade to VM3/J3?

J2.5/VM2.6 will be around for many years to come..

What are you expecting? From the frontend useability it will be identical to what you have now...

If you what a change of "look & feel" just re-template what you have.. damn sight cheaper and far less hassle