We are pleased to announce the launch of our new Client Support Portal. The support portal allows our clients submit and trace all technical support issues related to their websites. The new support portal offers an ability to quickly view submitted requests, trace their status, add attachments, and comment on follow up actions. The support portal sends automated email notifications and reminders, providing an added convenience of hands-free project management.

The Joomla Bliss Support Portal currently includes the following features:

Having completed the site's development prototype stage and received approval from the client, it is important to proceed with certain Quality Assurance (QA) check points in mind. Working "backwards" this way ensures a higher quality of the final website.

Needless to say, upon completion of the website design, the first round of testing should check off the following points:

Please note that the website QA check list below, while applicable to all types of websites, applies to Joomla websites design primarily.

Interface

1. Ensure that the site’s name is correct
2. Make site name in the footer right after the copyright as a link to the home page. Insert following code instead of %sitename% in /language/en-GB/ en-GB.mod_footer.ini: <a href="/" title="%sitename%">%sitename%</a>
3. Add customer’s logo. Change template to store logo in /images/stories/ folder to let client easily change logo. If logo is not available, ensure that their business name appears at the top banner in text, making sure that it looks good and fits the overall style of the template.
4. Remove Joomla’s favicon. Add customer’s favicon, if it is available. If not, place a temporary favicon of your choice.
5. Contact page. Check capitalization in all fields on the contact form; add the updated contact info, ensuring consistency and nice display; test the form to make sure it is working.
6. Install error404 component (or errors2site and add settings recommended by errors2site to the .htaccess file) and configure error message. Check its display. (Was Modify the 404 error page - to reflect the colors of the template (the background of the title bar and the border of the box)).
7. Check the color scheme to reflect the particular needs of the client.
8. Ensure borders around the menu bar look nice and consistently the same for the 2nd and 3rd level.
9. Ensure that all edges and corners on all boxes and bars, etc. appear nicely
10. Ensure that the background image looks nice, especially if a gradient image is used, that no content is accidentally being "smudged over" by the background.
11. Ensure smooth transition for the gradient images.
12. Ensure that link hover/active is consistent throughout all elements of the site (check search, various modules, error page, contact, static pages, etc etc)
13. Test to see that all buttons look good (contact, newsletter signup, search results, login form, and similar elements
14. Check bullets and other formatting and make sure they are all available for use inside the content article inside the current editor (create a content page and use various styles to make sure all options display properly)
15. Ensure all images display properly and that appropriate imagery is used (do not use copyrighted images!). Make sure there are no articles which have /components/content/article/... in their address, i.e. not connected to any, even fake, menu. If necessary, add those menus to site map.
16. Test all forms and functional components, make sure to test them all one by one and correct visual imperfections to reflect the style of the template, e.g.:
    • Square buttons vs. oval buttons
    • Thick borders vs. thin borders
    • Background color and shades
    • Link color and hover/active color
    • Header and sub-header styles 
    • Bullet styles 
    • Font styles Completed
17. Translation pages and search results (page titles, images, etc.) 
18. Go over every page one by one and conduct a visual inspection, looking for inconsistencies in tags, titles, email formats, empty spaces, too much/too little spaces between sections, etc. etc.
19. Check all modules and ensure that the display is correct, no uneven spacing, no border overlapping, nice alignment, etc.

A prototype of a website, for our purposes, is a draft version of a website hosted live (what is called a high-fidelity prototyping). It usually consists of three pages: home, second page, and contact page. Images are placeholders and most information is presented as a "concept".

Building a website prototype can be done at any stage of the project, but we build prototypes as soon as the discovery stage has been completed. Building a prototype very early in the project offers many advantages:

1. Eliminates risks for clients: clients get to see a "preview" of the future website and have a chance to provide feedback
2. Saves time: it is cheaper and easier to make changes early in the development process
3. Ensures higher level of customer satisfaction: clients provide feedback and clarifications as well as approvals after each milestone
4. Simplifies QA: as prototype evolves into a full website, usability flow is tested and reviewed both by developers and the client - before the final QA even begins
5. Provides sufficient time and opportunity for reviews, thus preventing contract disputes and other unpleasant miscommunications
6. Ensures better quality: ownership of the project is shared with the client, hence developers feel more pressure to perform better
7. Simplifies project management decreases risks to a minimum, i.e. there is always plenty of room to correct potential errors and catch misunderstandings.

Those are the main advantages of creating a high-fidelity website prototype early in the project. There are, of course, some disadvantages - but only for developers, none for the clients. The main disadvantages for developers of a live website prototype include the following:

1. More communication time required: clients receive a link to their website's prototype early in the project, and then they check every day, send emails and small questions on the fly
2. More detail work required: client feedback is incorporated in three or four review cycles. But even after the official reviews have been completed, and client's approval on the interface design has been received, many clients change their mind and request tiny tweaks here and there
3. Higher level of frustration: not all clients are familiar with current web design standards or best practices. They often request things that developers are reluctant to incorporate (for example, instead of adding a Site Map link in the footer, some clients request it to be added as a main menu item; some clients request adding a link to an external website as a main menu item, etc.). In most cases, they can be convinced to follow current web design standards, but not always. In some cases, clients' personal taste prevents designers from including the final website in the portfolio display (it happens more often that we thought it would!)

But overall, whatever the differences in opinions or tastes - clients have the final say. As long as clients are happy with the development process and the final results, the project can be considered a success. Client satisfaction is the ultimate measure of success. Our own opinion is just that - an opinion.

Planning on undertaking a website design or website redesign project? Allow us to present the ultimate website redesign checklist.

1. Kick off the project. Get executives on board
   • Schedule informal one-on-one meetings with your key executives and ask them what they would like to see in a new website.
   • Then schedule a group meeting with all key executives.
   • Get their consensus on all main points regarding the future website's usability and look and feel
   • Define roles and get proper authority for yourself. Get your executives to officially appoint you as the Project Lead by sending an email announcement to everyone in your company who maybe involved in this project.

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It is somewhat counterintuitive to accept the fact that open-source web content management systems (CMS) or other open-source projects, for that matter, are actually of higher quality than their commercial counterparts. There are several reasons behind this phenomenon, representing a peculiar mix of social and technical factors. 

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There is a long discussion going on about which one of the three leading open-source web content management systems (CMS) is better: Joomla, Drupal or Wordpress. Here is our view on the topic.

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It is a well-known fact that websites that have a Content Management System (CMS) load slower than those that don't have a CMS. Simply because there is more things to load, a lot more. But that should not sway you away from having a CMS, especially a CMS like Joomla. So here are a few simple techniques that you or your web designer can implement to significantly speed up your Joomla website. 

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