How to work with the templates

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How to work with the templates

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With WebSite X5, you will find it easy to work on the graphic templates (the backbone of your website), because they are all extremely flexible and easy to use.  Thanks to the default templates, with numerous possibilities of customization and, above all, the possibility of creating templates of your own, you can be sure of obtaining the look you want for your website.

You can also import and export templates (extracting them from the projects they were originally created for), and this makes resource sharing incredibly simple.    

Click to expand/collapseHow to use a default template

WebSite X5 provides a gallery of over 500 default templates, which can be added to by downloading more templates (free of charge or purchased). Choosing the one that is right for you is simple:

Open the Template selection window (if you are working on a new project) or the Change Template window (if you want to change the template that has already been applied to a project).
Use the various filters and categories to narrow the search and display only those templates that may be useful for your project.
Look through the preview of the templates to choose the one you like best.
Select the template you want to use and, only if necessary, buy it and/or install it.
Click on the OK button to apply it to your project and open the Template Settings window to customize the structure and styles.
Click to expand/collapseHow to create a new template based on a default template

A default template is often a good start for creating your own custom template, if you like the basic layout but want to add some ideas of your own. This is what you have to do:

Open the Template selection window (if you are working on a new project) or the Change Template window (if you want to change the template that has already been applied to a project).
Use the filters to identify and select the default template you want to start from.
Click on the OK button to apply it to your project and open the Template Settings window to customize the structure and styles.
Make all the changes you want and then go to the Template Settings window and click on Custom Template Management.
In the Custom Library window, click on the Add button to save the current template as a custom Template in the library with the same name.

Now you will be able to use the template you have just created in other projects too.

Click to expand/collapseHow to create a new template from an empty template

When you have created a layout, using an external graphic editor, you can apply it to your WebSite X5 project by starting from an empty template:

Open the Template selection window (if you are working on a new project) or the Change Template window (if you want to change the template that has already been applied to a project) and click on the Empty option.
Choose the template skeleton which seems to best correspond to the results you want to obtain and then go to Template Settings and click on Template Structure.
Use the options in the Template Structure. window to set up the structure you want, import the various graphic elements for the layout and define the margins and alignments.
Go back to Template Settings and from here you can continue to work in the other windows for customizing the various styles.
Click to expand/collapseHow to create a custom template starting from an empty template

When you have created a new template for a project, starting from an empty template, it is a good idea to save it in the Custom Templates library, so that you will be able to use it for other projects. To do this, you must:

Open the Template selection window (if you are working on a new project) or the Change Template window (if you want to change the template that has already been applied to a project) and click on the Empty option to open the Template Structure window where you can set up the structure you want, import the various graphic elements for the layout and define the margins and alignments.
Make all the changes you want and then go back to Template Settings  and click on Custom Template Management option.
In the Custom Library window, click on the Add button to save the current template as a Custom Template in the library with the same name.
Click to expand/collapseHow to import/export a template

You can export a project's template so that you can use it on another computer, or so it can be used by other people.

To export a template that you have created, you must first save it in the Custom Templates Library (see the instructions above), and then:

Open the Template selection window and  click on the Custom Template Management option.
In the Custom Library window, select the template that you want to export and click on the Export... button: a .IWTLP file is created in the specified export folder.
Copy this .IWTPL file to the computer on which you want to import the template.

To import a template that has been exported with WebSite X5:

Open the Template Settings window and click on the Custom Template Management option.
In the Custom Library window, click on Import... button: select the .IWTPL file of the file to be imported.
The imported template will be added to the list of custom templates.

.IWTPL files only contain the images and settings for the relative template: when exported, they do not  maintain information on the project.

To export a project, you have to use the commands in Step 5 - Export.

 


Best practices:

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Where to find new WebSite X5 templates

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How to create a Responsive Website | How to set up the Template