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Beyond The Blog

A new tool from Google brings its trademark simplicity and ease of use to web design.

Blogs are all the rage nowadays and everyone seems to want to put their thoughts up online for the world to read. Blogs have taken the world by storm not only because they provide an outlet for self-expression, but also because they are easy to create. Users don’t have to know anything about HTML or coding: all they have to do type their thoughts into a single box, play with formatting options, maybe select a few pictures to toss in and then click “submit”.

The only problem with blogs is that their format is quite restrictive. They are fine if you want only your most recent contents to be prominently visible. Nevertheless if you want to create a web site about a particular subject, have individual subsections and preset each topic on a separate page, you’ll find blogging cramps your style. In such cases, you’re better off creating a dedicated web site for yourself.

Blogs differ with regular web sites mainly in that while the content of blogs is arranged chronologically, the content of web subject arranged sites. You can have a front page that links to several subpages, each with their own content. You can link to a separate page of links or references, and you are free to arrange things the way you like. Moreover, the content of the homepage, which is the first thing users will see each time they visit can remain unchanged while new content can be added below it or on a linked page over time.

Ideally web pages and blogs should be used in conjunction, with the blogs being only one of the pages on the web site. Nevertheless most users content using only blogs on web sites like Blogger , Wordpress and livejournal.com because they don’t have to worry about knowing any HTML code dealing with web hosting companies and paying yearly fees.

Google Page Creator tries to bring blog-like simplicity to creating regular web pages. It’s simple, visual online tool that uses new web technologies such as AJAX to make life simple. You don’t need to know a single word of code or any kind of programming language and you don’t have to worry about web hosting at all. Just click, drag, drop or type and your web site will be ready in few minutes.

Keep in mind while making web pages

• When designing your pages, choose three to four matching colors to work with, and stick with them for all your text, backgrounds, captions, etc.
• Avoid using too many GIF animations and flashing or scrolling text. Try to emphasize your content instead of distracting your visitors.
• Navigation should be easy. Try to create a table of contents on each page. Don’t create new pages and then forget to line to them.
• Don’t make pages too long. Split content logically and make it easy to navigate through. The best amount of vertical scrolling is 1.5x.
• Images shouldn’t take forever to load or be larger than they need to be. If your page doesn’t load within 8 seconds, users are likely to lose interest and navigate away.
• Make sure you check your site using different browsers on different computers. Check it at all common screen resolutions and even on different operating systems.

Step by Step Process to Use Google Page Creator . 

Step-1 : Go to http://www.pages.google.com. Google Page Creator is still in beta but you can log in using your Google account username and password. If you log in successfully you’ll see a splash screen welcoming you.

Step-2: The first thing you’ll see when you log in is the page manager which will shows you all the individual pages you have and all file and pictures you’ve uploaded. Click on the readymade homepage to start.

Step-3: The default homepage is rather sparse. Enter a title and subtittle for your page and fill in the text if you like. Several predefined fonts and style can be quickly selected using the toolbar on the left.

Step-4: Click on “Change Look” in the upper right hand corner to see a gallery of predefined styles. Browse arround and see which color scheme best suits your taste.

Step-5: You can also choose the layout for each page you create. Choose whether to have one big text area or set of columns. You can always change this later if you like.

Step-6: Start adding content to your page. Once you’ve added a picture, it can be dragged and drop into place. A popup menu allows you to resize image on the fly.

Step-7: Add links to your pages wherever you like and create a table of contents linking them all together. It’s a good idea to link back to your homepages from every subpage.

Step-8 : Experimental features are tools that are still under development and could cause errors. They can be enable through the Site settings link in your Page Manager.

Step -9 : Preview your homepage at any time and hit “publish”. Your page will go live and all you have to do is send your friends the address.