Change my layout design?

hi there … i have a problem…
i have a website but i build it using website builder.
now i want to change my layout design only … how will i gonna do it ?
im not knowledgeable enough in css & html.
thanks

hi there,

a rule of thumb is not to use Website builders for this particular reason… You want to change it later, but you really have no clue how to do it.

The best way is to look into some HTML and CSS yourself, or hire someone to do it for you.

To get started with HTML and CSS there are plenty of articles/guides/books here at SitePoint.

Hope that helps

if i wear to begin with my site what will i gonna do first to start building my site ?

As behati has explained, if you want to do this yourself, you’ll need to learn HTML and CSS. There are plenty of books aimed at beginners, such as this one from SitePoint, or you can do a search on the internet for others.

If you don’t want to learn the skills yourself, them you’ll either have to continue using sitebuilder software, or pay somebody else to build your site the way you want it.

Or ask someone nicely :smiley: (Although not on this forum)

Although the above-mentioned option might not produce the quality that I think you’re looking for…

If you just want to get your site modified slightly, we can help you out with that. If the site is online, then we could tell you what to change (and how to change it).

If it’s not online and you only have the HTML and CSS, then (I don’t know if you can do this, check with an Advisor or a Mentor or such staff) you can post a link to a text document or zip file containing the code so that we can see it. It’s not recommended to post your entire website’s code on the forum. (Again, check with forum staff on whether or not you’re able to do this.

~TehYoyo

This is a golden opportunity to learn. I transformed a (now-archived) site from a badly constructed table-driven site (with well over 120 pages) into a leaner and cleaner CSS-driven site. I made a tremendous amount of mistakes, came yowling to SP for help every five minutes :slight_smile: and ended up with a site that still has a great many flaws, but I learned a great deal from the process. You can do the same!

uhmm ofcourse i really want to learn about making websites but
what i really mean is that … f i want to start a website, where will i go to start coding my website ?
ok let’s take the website builder out of the topic … what i want to know is location that i will go to put my codes on my site.:slight_smile:

OK, I think I understand your question now. :slight_smile:

You need to get an HTML editor. (It’s possible to use an ordinary text editor, like Notepad, but something that highlights the code for you makes it easier to read.) There are various free ones, such as this, [URL=“http://notepad2.com/”]this or [URL=“http://bluefish.openoffice.nl/index.html”]this. Using that, you edit a copy of your file on your own computer and then upload the file to your site using an FTP client, such as [URL=“http://filezilla-project.org/”]Filezilla or [URL=“http://www.coffeecup.com/free-ftp/”]FreeFTP. Editing the pages directly on the server is not recommended.

If you just want to change your existing site a little, you should be able to download the files to your computer, make your changes and then upload them again. However, sites built with any kind of site-building software generally have more convoluted code than you want or is necessary. You might find it easier just to start from scratch and build your pages as you want them.

if i will do this … does this mean, what i have created in my present site will not be included after i upload this ?

Well, as I said before,

If you just want to change your existing site a little, you should be able to download the files to your computer, make your changes and then upload them again.
That will allow you to keep as much of your site as you like and make just the changes you want.

Are you not able to use the site builder software to make changes to your site? It might be easier in the short term, if you can do it that way. We can help you do it manually, but that’s likely to be a slow process if you need to learn HTML and CSS along the way. On the other hand, as Black Max said, using these skills on a real site is a great way to learn.

the site builder that i am using is not actually for putting codes … i can only put applications by using tools like “input html”, but the sad thing is that i cant edit the html/css codes manually.