Trying Headway Themes
Okay, so I’ve started using Headway Themes for a couple of websites who’s clients needed some authoring and widget functionality but who I didn’t think needed to plunge into the deep end with something as big as Joomla.
I installed Headway with no problem. Fell in love with the ability to literally grab chunks ofthe site such as the header, footer, widgets and content areas and move and resize them any way that I like. Seriously, someone pleeeeease do this with Joomla!
So far I’ve used a number of it’s built-in widgets including random image widget, custom footers and headers, and a photo gallery (very slick). I’ve used Headway to switch up my menu, completely change the layout of the divs, and do crazy-easy (and quick) text style mods.
It’s rediculous that it doesn’t have an automatic option for rounded corners or body background images when it has so many other more complicated functions BUT alas, having to use the text editor for a line or two won’t kill me I guess.
With the price and the pure hours of time saved on css modification for layout, Headway’s looking like a great buy so far. Check it out for yourself if you don’t believe me.
Anyways, neither of my sites are launched yet, so once I’ve achieved publication, I’ll update this with my final vote for or against Headway.
Jennifer – Thanks for your quick review of Headway. There will be some new features coming in the next version of Headway which will offer some background items. This even while we just released 1.6 to our users.
While we wish we could offer all of the features our users request. It is also important to not blot things too much so Headway causes things to run too slow.
Thanks again
Grant
Co-founder of Headway
That’s understandable. Great program, so far!
Idea: If it’s just the Headway Editor that runs slow with too many extra options, you could consider creating an advanced mode (for trickier css modifications or ones that would only be set once or twice in the design process) that can be turned on and off. Once the user has done the tough stuff, they can switch back the current Headway Editor and carry on without running into slo-mo.
Fun! I’ll check it out now (yes, I’ve downloaded 1.6).
Great idea and I am sure that we will consider that. I do know the background option will be added in the next version. If you are using 1.6, which we just released to our users, it comes with live css editor. Users are loving that feature.
Thanks again!
Grant – this has happened to me twice: I remove all widgets to focus on the design, then I add a widget to a non-home page, and in wp-admin, it tells me that my template isn’t widget aware and I can’t add any to my sidebars… Do you have a quick fix for this? I fixed it last week somehow and now I can’t seem to do it again. It says ‘No Sidebars Defined’