Rapid Template Design Series

Posted on May 27, 2007
Filed Under Products |

Rapid Template Design Kit Renamed

Today I opened my mail sitting on the counter for three days and discovered that one of the colleges that use my RTDK (Rapid Template Design Kit) requests that I change the name.

An unusual request but valid none the less as I’ve long considered it myself, so here is the skinny on the pending updates. The reason behind the request is that it should reflect its use in various courses that use the kit such as PhotoShop for Web Masters, Introduction to Web Design, Graphics Design Games and Web, etc. All of these are non credit courses.

So after meeting briefly with the other three instructors who were responsible for the development of the instructional materials, we agreed we would change the name to Rapid Template Design Series. I wanted to name it Photoshop Design Series but there is a book with that title and a company that publishes a magazine also uses that name as well. I don’t want to tangle with big publishers so Rapid Template Design Series is what its now called.

A Little History of the RTDK

For those who don’t recall or may just be tuning in especially you who are educators and instructors, here is where the RTDK came from. The RTDK in part, started out back in 2003 as a small collection of tutorials on designing templates for a product called OpenRealty that I offered free of charge on my old site JaredsDesigns.com. Just shy of 1,800 copies in total were downloaded while it was available. Then…

In 2004 I was contracted to convert an existing K12 school districts static html website to a CMS which we chose Mambo after comparing it to more complex solutions available at the time. Part of our agreement was to provide three years tech support and a collection of instructional videos for the staff whom will use Mambo to administer the schools departments. Departments included for example physical education, math, english, the library and so on. Mambo CMS was a sure win because of its categories and sections way of organizing content. This became the second part of the mix.

Then the template kit materials became available in November 2004 and sold in the schools book store as nothing more than a shrink wrapped set of instructional papers, all pre punched for a three ring binder, two CD’s, the class syllabus, and a collection of assignments for use in a NON credit class on web design. Who the course was marketed to isn’t important, but the first kit was the precursor to our more lofty idea. Maintaining support materials for the half dozen schools that use this little instructional packet is quite simple as we only update the label on the cover per semester and update the versions of any tool included on the CD.

After NON students begin to buy the materials after having read my posts on my community college teachers blog, a few of us figured it might be a good idea for an online product. The materials in the bookstore are not self contained meaning that they require instruction. So the plan then was to provide instruction by video with an instructor to accompany the materials. A full blown course compliment was born.

Where is the template design kit?

Well if you attend colleges in Western Washington State you can likely get it in the book store. They DON’T DO mail order and if you need the course ASAP as a college then Packet Publishers and Distributors will have it in their catalog this summer. TCP will have it and so will Amazon in November of this year if deadlines are met. The online ordering version will be available on the site http://www.templatedesignkit.com this late summer and will be ranging in price from $9.95 to $149.95 depending on series (print, web, etc). Schools and colleges are discounted 70% on all series above the intro series and resellers and web site owners who sell the material will receive a generous price break as well. This is a physical delivery product because of weight, volume and number of computer files included with the printed guides.

If you have questions, contact me but please keep in mind that the current version does not have an ISBN as of yet so if you are from a school or college requiring ISBN numbers for your catalogs you should list it as supplemental materials until our application returns from the government. All materials are copyright 2004 - 2007.

Comments

Leave a Comment

If you would like to make a comment, please fill out the form below.

Name (required)

Email (required)

Website

Comments

1 Comment so far
  1. Private Label Applications : Jared Ritchey® June 18, 2007 8:05 pm

    [...] wrote this post http://www.jaredritchey.com/rapid-template-design-series.html regarding the series a few weeks ago and as far as features goes nothing there has [...]


TEMP CODE: GDHXCDX17249629
Close
E-mail It