Using XDP8 amd WordPress together

**EyesOpen** · 15 July 2012, 08:37 PM

Hi Knowledgeable Experts,

I use XDPX[8] for my simple web designs like for a "point to" web site but I want to build a high-end business site and so want to use WordPress if possible with a Xara graphically designed web site. I'm not too familiar with WordPress but I think it can be edited in a rich text format file. Here's my question: Can I design the site in XARA and save it as a rich text format file then use it in WordPress without any or small modifications?

I'm not going to do this for all my designs, only for business web sites.

Thanks in advance for your sage advice.

**gwpriester** · 15 July 2012, 10:40 PM

John

I know that Barbara Bouton uses WordPress for the new Xara Xone site. I am not sure how well it integrates with Xara though.

Paul (pauland) might have a suggestion or some of the other members who are familiar with creating templates for WordPress.

**mwenz** · 15 July 2012, 10:43 PM

Hello John,

If you want to save a degree or two of frustration and labor, install WordPress and xampp or wampp so you can run PHP (it's what WordPress is using). Look on the web for tutorials and themes that are easily modified--themes that are bare-bone themes. Learn WordPress. Learn how to modify it. In the end, you will have a better site.

Now, Xara will fit into this modifying of the WordPress theme as far as images required. Images such as backgrounds, banners, etc.

And...no. WordPress is not in any way related to RTF.

Take care, Mike

**mwenz** · 15 July 2012, 10:45 PM

Originally Posted by gwpriester

creating templates for WordPress.

There is Artisteer for creating WP, Joomla and Drupal themes. From my understanding the later versions create less code-bloat.

Mike

**wolfpup187** · 25 July 2012, 09:47 PM

I was hoping to find a way to make templates in Designer Pro (DP) for Wordpress (WP) here, but I can see from the posts that what I am doing may be the best solution for me. I thought I would share what I am doing in the event it may help someone else. Let me preface with I use DP because I have no programming talent!

I designed my website in Designer Pro 1st, however it may be better to go the other way around. Since WP is kind of limited in design options, starting with a template in WP then designing the matching pages in DP might be easier. First I tried to find a template that was somewhat similar to my DP template (I used the Alpha Theme). Since you can replace the header in the WP template I used, I turned my "header area" in my DP document into a jpeg to use for the header in WP. I had to move the menu down and get rid of the cool 3 layer mouse over effects, but it looks pretty good so far. I have just started putting this one all together and so there is still a lot of room for improvement and tweaking the documents to mesh.

Here is the website: www.pac-kin.org

The Home, Our Stories, News and Contact pages are the DP website. The Legal, Education and Work Groups pages are in WP. These are the pages that I needed the content management, membership and other features available in WP for.

Let me know what you think!

Thanks.

**pauland** · 25 July 2012, 10:36 PM

I think you have the right idea and it works.

I'd suggest trying to make the two versions look as similar as possible - even if it means compromising the Xara version. At the moment it's a bit jarring.

I think it's the best way to mix Xara and Wordpress output.

**wolfpup187** · 26 July 2012, 03:24 AM

Yep Pauland, and as I said in my post, "I have just started putting this one all together and so there is still a lot of room for improvement and tweaking the documents to mesh." I definately noticed the "jarring" too. There's a black line on the top of the WP that I have to add to DP, etc...

Thanks for the input. Much appreciated.

**rpfear** · 07 November 2012, 09:09 PM

Hello,

I'm starting to explore how I can combine a CMS/blog with a site that I've designed with DP and like the way you have combined the two. Just wondering if you've integrated the the Xara pages with a Wordpress.com template or with a hosted template using a Wordpress.org installation?

Thanks.

**wolfpup187** · 08 November 2012, 04:58 AM

Hi rpfear,

Since my post in July, I have completely dumped what I had... so the whole para about which pages are WP and which are DP is no longer! I ended up using WP almost exclusively. I am just now adding some DP pages back in for flexibility on an area with photos for donations. It is still in prelim work, but basically I took a screenshot of the WP page and used it to help with the design of my DP page.

The page I have just developed for the photos is http://www.pac-kin.org/photochoice.htm - I don't have this page linked from anywhere in the WP site yet.
I designed the menu to link to the WP pages, but I haven't added the dropdown portion of the menu and am not sure I will. I haven't figured out how to integrate the DP pages with WP templates. Too much programing for me!

I guess it depends on what you need from your site. The one thing I notice in the WP site is it seems to take a long time to load the pages. My main goal was to have a site where others could put content on it and it wouldn't be up to me to update it all the time.

If you figure out a way to integrate DP pages with a WP template I would be very interested!