[derek west]

thinking of doing a college course, it starts in january for 10 weeks, 3 hours a week. £155 for the course, £400 for dreamweaver.
any thoughts on this. would i learn much. wouldn't mind building a few websites of my own and being able to edit them would help. is this a good start?

[Mike Halliday]

I would do a course on video filming & editing, from what people say google now own youtube etc..etc

so making videos will be a needed skill and very marketable if you were to branch out.

but isn't wordpress a better website option?

[Robert Watson]

Hi Derek. I spend a lot of time on Lynda.com. £25 per month for unlimited access (no contract) with exercise files to follow along with. Its like having a personal coach whenever it suits you.
http://www.lynda.com
Hope that helps.
Rab 

[garyj]

I would do it D, its a useful thing to know, also Dreamweaver can be got for much cheaper than that!

[wynne jones]

Derek, if you do it what do you think it will achieve for you?

[garyj]

Wynnes got a point, I can use Dreamweaver but my sites are done in 1&1 templates because its so easy and hassle free. I would recommend 1&1 to anybody who wants a site, you could have one up in a couple of hours.

[derek west]

good question wynne
i want to design my own websites with an understanding of HTML. and i want to understand SEO.

i have 4 website ideas i want to develop.

yes i could get someone to do them for me but then theres editing and updating and ongoing SEO. it makes sense to understand all this my self so i can keep the websites fresh and up to date.

these are mainly carpet cleaning websites so its not like i need a degree in understanding and getting them ranked.

i could buyt a book or two but i'm not focussed enough to do it this way.

i also want to do this course with my son who doesn't live with me, he's quite good at websites and taking a keen interest in this as a path for the future, it would give us something interesting to do together and it would help me to help him to achieve his goals if he decided to go for it as a business. he's 14 by the way.

[wynne jones]

I can entirely understand the last reason Derek.

A dreamweaver course won't teach you any SEO

I think some people get off on all the geeky stuff rather than an end result that gets the phone ringing. It's a personal choice but I know which I'm more interested in.

[David_Annable]

Hi

If your interested in the subject matter then do a course.

If you want a professional website or several get a professional Website Designer to do it.

Dave

[garry22]

Derek,

I've got Expression Web, Microsoft's similar version, which I wrongly assumed was just a quick step up from Frontpage.

Given the choice of that or Dreamweaver now, I would go for Dreamweaver due to the large number of third party plug ins and accessories available.

if you do go for it, then a ten week course would be a minimum. you are talking full on Pro web design software. Without learning standards based coding you are wasting your time. Both myself and Robert Watson have had times when the computer has nearly gone through the window trying to do some "simple" thing that ends up wasting a whole day. I reckon it took about a year to fully move from Frontpage to EW. Your course is a must.

Unless I need to build a full on site, I'll use Wordpress nowadays.

On the plus side, if it's a decent course, you'll get a lot of fun and satisfaction out of building sites. Best of luck.

Garry

[derek west]

cheers garry

its a night course run by one of our local colleges. 3 hours on a wednesday night for 10 weeks so 30 hours tuition in all, plus if i buy it we can practice what we've learned at the weekend. dya think that'll be enough to get a good understanding of it all?

[Shaun_Ashmore]

Things move so fast in the web world what you'll be learning today will be old hat tomorrow, it's not just 3 hours a week for 10 weeks it's most likely 3 hours a day for eternity IMO.

Wasn't that long ago when website linking was the hot topic and blogs again IMO you need to make it a full time occupation to keep up, okay you may get a decent site up there but some new whipper snapper will do the 'in thing' and he'll trump you... well, until another comes along, I would earn the money from cleaning and re invest with a good web company who you trust.

Shaun

[garry22]

It's a really sensible move the college course (I wish I had done that).

Wait till you start slicing graphic designs. You can have absolutely unique designs that way.

Have a look at this company... http://www.webassist.com/

They do a fantastic little training course for only $20.00, which shows you how to take a graphic design and turn it into a website using Dreamweaver.

They also do a monthly membership thing where you can use all of their expensive add ons. For a few dollars a month, you get access to loads of things that would cost hundreds to buy separately.

As I said, in hindsight, I wish I had bought Dreamweaver instead.

Garry

[Vernon Purcell]

thinking of doing a college course, it starts in january for 10 weeks, 3 hours a week. £155 for the course, £400 for dreamweaver.
any thoughts on this. would i learn much. wouldn't mind building a few websites of my own and being able to edit them would help. is this a good start?

Ive done it already.. to be honest I would not do it again, unless you are doing web design as a living just pay someone
I had this site done for £235 www.masterclean.com
and this for $50 www.carpetcleaningcrawley.com

[wynne jones]

Good luck with it Derek, the discipline and doing something with your nipper that you both enjoy is reason enough.

I spent today doing an personal audit. Where I am and where I want to be. I hope you all do this from time to time, it's very easy to be blown 'off course' if you are not vigilant.

I'm just wondering as you read this now, what's important to you and are you going all out for it?

Cheers

Wynne.

[happy mondays]

The course is very good at Sir jd, but it wont just be three hours a week if you want to get anything out of it, lots of time will be needed for you even just to get a very basic understanding. It would also help to have even just a basic understanding of HTML and CSS, if you havent alot of it will go straight over your head.

Building a basic site, amending text, adding pages, pics and uploading is easy and you will learn how to do it from the course, but only with alot of time reading and studying the notes which are mostly emailed to you from the tutor Gill. Very basic seo is covered I think. She will advise what books to buy and which sites to visit on CSS etc. Fireworks and photoshop will also be on your shopping list, the course in Jan uses cs5, but any recent version of it is ok, I have cs4.

Comparing some of the wysiwyg programs some have mentioned on here to dreamweaver is like comparing an old morris minor with a new bentley   

Dont think your lad will be allowed on the course as its adult learning, but you can ask.

And give me a shout before you buy it     

[derek west]

cheers garry wynne and paul. i'll be gutted if me lad can't do it, might just paint a tash on him and say he's 20,
i'll ring tomoz and find out, sounds like just what we're looking for, he's been teaching me a little HTML, seems pretty straight forward, well its not rocket science

[Mark Lawrence]

Wow, thats a big step Derek.

I hope it goes well for you and you learn something useful.

But here's the honest, slap in the face, speak how it is reality. It takes years to learn pro building of sites, there are so many variables it crazy. Sure you might learn how to upload pics and do text but thats about as much as your gonna take in.

Then there is the brain damage on graphic design which is a must if you want your sites to look good. Photoshop CS5 is an example and honestly this is a whole course on its own.

So what I'm saying is, you will be wasting many many many more hours trying to work stuff out - that potentially your business could suffer from.

Sorry to be blunt, I'm not trying to deter you and I admire your get up and go. But we have to accept that we sometimes cant do everything and have to get help sometimes.

Good luck if you choose to go ahead - let us know how you get on!

Mark

[happy mondays]

Wow, thats a big step Derek.

I hope it goes well for you and you learn something useful.

But here's the honest, slap in the face, speak how it is reality. It takes years to learn pro building of sites, there are so many variables it crazy. Sure you might learn how to upload pics and do text but thats about as much as your gonna take in.

Then there is the brain damage on graphic design which is a must if you want your sites to look good. Photoshop CS5 is an example and honestly this is a whole course on its own.

So what I'm saying is, you will be wasting many many many more hours trying to work stuff out - that potentially your business could suffer from.

Sorry to be blunt, I'm not trying to deter you and I admire your get up and go. But we have to accept that we sometimes cant do everything and have to get help sometimes.

Good luck if you choose to go ahead - let us know how you get on!

Mark

But hes not wanting to be a pro web designer Mark, hes wanting to learn how to build basic sites and how to upload them. The course will give him the tools and the confidence to do this. You are right it does take a very long time to learn how to be good at it, this will tie up valuable time on other things. One thing I do know....  with a bit of time and effort he will be able to build sites that others are charging good money for, he wont have to wait for them to add a bit of text or change a picture, its good to learn and Sir JD's is very good.

Derek, your right HTML isnt rocket science, but wait until you see what css can do to it    if you have the spare time, it will be well worth it.

   

[John Milnes]

I would echo the sentiments of the above.

The thing is, if you want to put a professional website up and running you can do it by using the templates avalable for next to nothing and no one will know any different. AND they will look just as good! And they are well developed.

Start getting into stuff such as Dreamweaver and focusing on web design, then you are departing from your business and family etc...
It will ultimatly take a lot of your time and even then you will probably get ped off with it.
That said, web design continually evolves and you may have to keep up to date with what is going on...it's an art on it's own.

It's good to have ambition, but best to have it focused on your core business.