Introduction to Expression Web – This class is newly updated for Expression Web 2 but you may take this class using either version of Expression Web.

Are you ready to take the plunge and move to a standards based web editor?

This class has been restructured to get you up and running with Expression Web in just 4 weeks. While you will not be an expert on Expression Web or a professional web designer you will be able to create and manage small websites and, with practice, be able to expand on the skills you learn to create more complex websites using Expression Web.

Prerequisite:

Expression Web – You may download the 60 day trial version from the Microsoft Expression Web Site our class is 4 weeks long so the 60 day trial is adequate. If you choose to take this class with the trial version make sure that you obtain and use the registration key or your trial will end before the full trial period.

Prior Experience:

No prior web design experience required but will be useful.

Book:

The book required for this class is Foundations of Expression Web: The Basics and Beyond available at Amazon or a bookseller near you.  ( There will be reference to sections of this book that will help you better understand CSS.

Introduction to Expression Web – The Class

This course covers the fundamentals of standards based web design, including xhtml and css:

Week 1 – Getting Started

• Why Worry About Standards
• Why CSS Layouts?
• Website Planning
• Installing Expression Web
• Interface
• Configuring Expression Web
  • Site Settings
  • Page Editor Options Overview
    • Version 1
    • Version 2
    • CSS Tab
    • Font Family Tab
• File Menu
• Page Properties
• Semantic HTML – Structuring Your Page
• Publishing

Week 2

• CSS Basics
• CSS Tools
• Fonts
• Block
• Background
• Box
• Positioning
  • Options in the New-Modify Styles Dialog box
  • Float vs Positioning
  • Lists & Tables
• Applying Styles

Week 3

• Contextual Selectors
• Creating Page layouts
• Layout Examples

Week 4

• Dynamic Web Templates
  • Creating the DWT
  • New Pages and DWTS
  • Editing a DWT
  • Detaching or Changing a DWT
• Preparing an Existing Page for a DWT
• Site Reports
  • Report Options
  • Slow Pages
  • Hyperlinks
  • Accessibility Report
  • Compatibility Reports
  • CSS Reports
• External Stylesheets

By the end of the 4week course you will have a simple multi-page website that will work on all modern browsers. You will have an understanding of the underlying principles of effective web design that will look good.

If you are interested in taking this class, you can read more about Introduction to Expression Web and register for the class at Start To Web. Cost of the Class is $89.95. Readers of this blog can obtain a 10% discount by using the coupon code PGfriends.

Crafting CSS layouts is tricky. In this article, Kevin Yank introduces CSS tables (which, once IE 8 is released, will be supported by all major browsers). They promise to make CSS layouts much easier for everyone.

Today, a talented web designer must be a modern-day MacGyver-that 80s TV action hero who could turn a rubber band and three tin cans into a serviceable aircraft. Turning the average site design mockup into a living, breathing slice of HTML and CSS is a comparably delicate miracle, which must be accomplished using whatever makeshift tools happen to be lying around in current browsers.

That’s exactly why so many professional designers still choose to use HTML tables for layout. How can we expect beginners to adopt CSS for layout when it takes someone with the resourcefulness (and snappy dress sense) of MacGyver to fully understand the techniques involved?

Thanks to the imminent release of Internet Explorer 8, CSS layout is about to become something anyone can learn to do-no chewing gum or makeshift explosives required.

Read Tables: The Next Evolution in CSS Layout

If you are interested in learning more about Cleaning Messy Code and getting your site standards compliant, Tina Clarke and I will be teaching this in Migrating from FrontPage to Expression Web Class and Ebook which begins on August 30th.

I have been using Expression Web since it first became available in Beta format. EW is the successor to Microsoft’s web editor FrontPage which is being discontinued. You can download a free trial from Microsoft’s site. Expression Web 2 gives you all the tools you need to produce high-quality, standards-based Web sites including a very good css editor. EW2 comes with a variety of css based layouts you can use to build your sites.

One of the first books I purchased when I started learning how to use cascading style sheets was Eric Meyer’s Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide.

Eric A. Meyer is an American web design consultant and author. He is best known for his advocacy work on behalf of web standards, most notably Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), a technique for managing how HTML is displayed. Meyer has written a number of books and articles on CSS and given many presentations promoting its use. ~from Wikipedia ~

WebAssist, a company known for its DreamWeaver Extensions, is now offering Expression Web Addons. An EW Addon is software you install on YOUR computer that will add functionality to Expression Web that is not available with the original product. Then came the announcement from WebAssist for a free trial of their newest addon, Eric Meyer’s Eric Meyer’s CSS Sculptor for Expression Web
. Eric Meyer is recognized as a leading authority on Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).

Let Eric Meyer, renowned CSS master, help you create the custom Web standards compliant, CSS-based layout you want and flatten the CSS learning curve. Start by choosing from any of the 30 included layouts-and then modify the design to the max: change the page width and position or number of columns. Specify margins and padding for any page element along with type properties for paragraphs, headings and link states. Bring in background colors, background images (repeating or not) or any style of border. Eric Meyer’s CSS Sculptor generates styles sheets for both screen and print in one operation. You can even save your modified layouts as new presets to be easily re-created or modified further. Bring the master’s touch to your designs with Eric Meyer’s CSS Sculptor. ~ from WebAssist ~

I downloaded the trial version and started working with the program. It works from within Expression Web and adds a selection to the File Menu. File > New CSS Sculptor Page. Select from any of the 30 included layouts-and then modify the design to your liking. Click on the thumbnail for a larger image.

Screenshot CSS Sculptor for Expression Web.

You can choose to have the styles inserted within the head section of your page or saved as an external style sheet. You can choose to have comments added to the style sheet and placeholder text added to the page. The addon was introduced at the same time I was revising my genealogy website so I put CSS Sculptor for EW to the test. This is the final result http://www.family-genealogy-online.com/

Screenshot Family Genealogy WebSite.

I was impressed enough with the program to purchase it when it became available. I use it whenever I am working on a site to create the basic layout then tweak it from with Expression Web. There is also a manual in pdf format available for download.

Eric Meyer’s CSS Sculptor for Expression Web
is available from WebAssist for $49.99.

1. All of the templates use absolute positioning
2. All of the templates create folders for each section
3. All of the templates use two separate style sheets

Absolute positioned elements are fragile and can break easily. Cheryl Wise, Microsoft MVP Expression Web has taken each of the personal and organization templates included with Expression Web and restructured the site so that every folder has a default html page and folders that are highly unlikely to ever include more than one page have been deleted with their single page moved to the root section of the website. She has made these Updated Expression Web “in box” Templates available for F*REE download along with quite a few other templates.

The instructions are written specifically for users of Expression Web but will work for anyone writing html code.