Hi to all. I need some help regarding Web Design. I am a Web and Graphic Designer and not so much familiar with PHP and Coding. My boss wants me to design the website like Starbucks (http://www.starbucks.com), Costa Coffee ( http://www.costa.co.uk ). I have no idea whether they are using any PHP Script in their websites or Manually coding it. I can design a Website in Photoshop and can convert it to HTML and CSS. But i really don't have any idea how to create a website something like Starbucks or Costa Coffee. Please guyz help me out and suggest me any PHP Script like Starbucks or Costa Coffee or something similar. I really appreciate your time and help. Thanks
Hi Meqaisar. See, it's not so easy to go into such advanced coding if you're not experienced. Even I suffered to develop in the early days. Ask you boss about the budget. And ask him whether you could work with a third person to develop the site. You can then contact me I can show you my work, and can provide you a similar site to that of StarBucks. Cheers
There's no way to tell what server-side language is being used by looking at the site. (You need the login and password to the site to tell, and you and I aren't going to get Starbucks' or Costa's login and password.) Costa has a 'sign up' function, so it definitely uses server-side code. Starbucks uses Flash for the movie, and it could be entirely HTML and Javascript, but I doubt it. As far as "a script like Starbucks or Costa Coffee", that's like asking you for instructions on how to make "a painting like the Mona Lisa". You're a graphic artist - why is your boss assuming that you're also a computer programmer? You're not. If he wants a computer program written (a web script is a computer program), he has to hire a programmer (a web developer, in this case). If he also expects you to repair cars and redo the electrical wiring in the office, I'd look for a new job fast. But that's what he's doing - hiring a specialist (you) and asking that specialist to also be a specialist in a totally different field. TOTALLY different. Art requires a dominant right brain. Logic - programming - requires a dominant left brain. da Vinci was about the last person who was both an excellent artist AND an excellent logician. If you're that good, I hope you're making a couple of million dollars a year - at least. Otherwise, just tell him that you can design the site, but you'll need a developer to program it, since you're not a developer, and that's not something that just anyone can do.
The Starbucks website is horrible and there's no place in the real world for Flash any more. It's outdated and will cease to be supported soon: Source: http://www.itproportal.com/2012/08/15/adobe-kills-flash-player-android-focusses-html5-instead/ The Costa website is okay, but from a development/design perspective, don't let your boss simply say "uhmm yeah well I like the costa website so we'll go for that" You need an in-depth discussion to create something unique (as he is promoting a brand) that showcases his/her services which I'm assuming is a coffee shop of some kind. As far as your skills, if you can create something in Photoshop and convert it to HTML, I don't fully understand your problem... If you can work with HTML, it's not difficult to put in a nicely styled navigation bar, slider and blog into the website...
I agree with previous poster (Scottlpool2003) about Flash. Flash can look pretty but it is can easy become a developer nightmare or a headache for a user. You can use Flash sometimes, but in very-very limited situations. The less you use it - the better for a user your site is. With all kind of Browsers, platforms that you have to deal with, it is better to not use technologies that could bring you problems down the road. What is your bosses budget for this kind of project? If you can outsource it - it could be an option. Another option I can offer, if you boss can invest about $50-100 into some premium template for Wordpress - you can create some nice-looking site fast and easy. It would be based on a Wordpress, it would look pretty (given that you are going to use some descent theme), you will not have struggle too much creating this site (although you still need to invest some time updating it to your boss liking). Anyway, wordpress could be an option for you in this case. It have pretty low learning curve. Let use know what you decided if you do not mind.
Thanks " Scottlpool2003 " for your response back to me. I've talked to my my boss regarding this situation and mentioned the problem to him. He said it will be okay to Design the website in HTML and we don't need any sign up feature right now for our business like Starbucks and Costa. But he surely demands me to Design the Menu Bar ( SpryBar ) and Slider same like starbucks. Now as far as concerned regarding the Slider, yes i can do the slider work, but i have no idea how to make MenuBar same like Starbucks and Costa. As you can see that whenever you just hower the menu it displays the images in the Submenu. It would be really great if you just help me how can i make such MenuBar. I really appreciated your time and response Thanks
They (Costa) are using this jQuery effect for their navigation: http://cherne.net/brian/resources/jquery.hoverIntent.html Restyled of course! It also looks like they are using some box-shadow in CSS3
I don't believe a coffee shop would need to use MVC as it wouldn't be a large enough project to require it
You can make some very nice menus using CSS. Look at http://cssmenumaker.com/ for just a few examples. Search css menus to be inundated with choices. You'll find many sites that give you almost copy/paste code (and some that let you design the menu on their site, then copy the customized code to use on your site). Putting panels and pictures on the menus will probably take a little work on your part. (A little - a plain CSS menu will take you 5 minutes once you decide which one you want.)
@ scottlpool2003 , @Rukbat...Thank you so much guys for your support and help. I have got what i was looking for Thanks again.