Normally, menus are fixed when the website is created and built into every page that displays them. Adding new pages or reorganising the website has to be carried out by a developer, making it an expensive and lengthy process. As a result, your website doesn't grown with your business and quickly becomes obsolete.

Not any more...

PageLocker websites are built with dynamic menus, created using a graphical representation of the website site map in PageLocker (see below). These are converted by the web application into any menu styles created by the web designer. This enables you to add, delete and move whole pages or sections and the website menus will adapt automatically throughout the whole site.

Any site design can be made dynamic – there are no constraints on the design process so even an existing static website can be turned into a dynamic PageLocker site.

Control over Content

A good website provides a clear, controlled view of information of three types – page copy, tabular information and downloadable documents.

• The page copy makes up the stand-alone text and images associated with individual menu options within the site.
  
• The tabular information consists of the organised lists such as lists of members or products. This information may be used in several areas throughout the website.
  
• Downloadable documents are the external files such as PDF files containing press releases.

A PageLocker website lets you edit these three types of content quickly and easily, without any technical knowledge, using simple forms to edit content. These forms are tailored by the developer to each application as well as the technical expertise of those who will use them. The forms avoid all of the unnecessary complexities involved in creating a web page.

Other content management systems fail to recognise the fact that most frequently edited information in a modern web application is in the form of tabular data such as lists of products, contacts, press releases, news items, etc. PageLocker makes the editing of this information very easy, using searchable tables of information linked to editing templates to enable quick editing without worrying about how or where the information will be displayed in the website. Some customers use PageLocker just for the secure, centralised database table editing features. A sophisticated caching system means that your website only needs to access the database for information when one of the tables containing the required information has been edited.

Each page is based on a template, which is designed to your requirements. Any web page design can be turned into a PageLocker template. Integration with PageLocker security is best achieved by designing your application in Microsoft .Net. The template is created so that only certain areas of the page are editable, leaving structural elements such as headers and menus safe and untouchable. You can then create as many pages as you like based on the defined templates. The templates do all of the hard work – you just need to enter the content.

Our integrated WYSIWYG editor lets you style your text and add images just as you would edit a document in Microsoft Word. You can paste text and even tables directly from Word into a region of a web page or into a database record such as a press release or product description. All your sites style sheets and images are loaded into the editor to ensure consistent styling.

Pre-prepared HTML template blocks can be inserted into the section at any point using the WYSIWYG toolbar, and then edited in place. For example, there may be a standard design for a 'for more information' link at the bottom of several sections. These can be defined as templates and then used as required.

If you need to edit the HTML script for your content, PageLocker's editor allows you to switch to 'Script' mode at any time.

Snap-ins

'Snap-ins' can be added and then dropped into place throughout the site. Snap-ins are not editable in the page where they are used but are edited centrally instead. For example, this means that you can create a snap-in, perhaps for a forthcoming event you wish to promote, and then drop the snap-in onto several pages. When you want to promote the next event, you just change the snap-in and the pages will pick up the new content.

Snap-ins, pages and even whole menus in the website can be schedule to display only between certain dates.