Unisco Education HTML5 Template

Unisco Template Documentation v1.0 by Surjith S M

Introduction

First of all, Thank you so much for purchasing this template and for being my loyal customer. You are awesome!
You are entitled to get free lifetime updates to this product + exceptional support from the author directly.

This documentation is to help you regarding each step of customization. Please go through the documentation carefully to understand how this template is made and how to edit this properly. Basic HTML and CSS knowledge is required to customize this template. You may learn basics here, here and here. or see a short video below (created by me).

Buyers Guide to Customizing HTML Templates

If you are new to HTML, I highly recommend that you watch the video tutorial below which I have outlined all basic steps for customizing HTML. Its 20 minutes long. But It worth it if you are a newbie.

Please note: The demo shown in this video is based on another template, but it will definitely help you in editing this template.

Requirements to Customize this Template

You will need the following sofwares to customize this template.

  1. Code Editing Software (eg: Dreamweaver, Sublime Text or Notepad++)
  2. Web Browser for testing (eg: Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox)
  3. FTP Tool to upload files to Server (eg: FileZilla)
Be careful while editing the template. If not edited properly, the design layout may break completely.
No support is provided for faulty customization.

Getting Started #back to top

If you are able to read this documentation locally, which means you have successfully downloaded the package and extracted the zip. The file structure as follows :

    Unisco/
    ├── Help Docs/   
    ├── HTML/
    │   ├── css/
    │   ├── fonts/
    │   ├── images/  
    │   ├── js/  
    │   ├── php/ 
    │   ├── sass/        
    ├── PSD/

The folder you have to customize is the HTML folder. Copy HTML folder from the package and paste it in your Project Folder. (This helps you to prevent overwriting in original files. so if you messed up something, you will get the original here.)

Pages #back to top

Here are the list of HTML Pages included with this template

  1. Home Page index.html
  2. About about.html
  3. Academicsacademics.html
  4. Admission Formadmission-form.html
  5. Campus Lifecampus-life.html
  6. Contactcontact.html
  7. Course Detailcourse-detail.html
  8. Eventsevents.html
  9. Researchresearch.html
  10. Sample Pagesample-page.html
  11. Shortcodesshortcodes.html
  12. Blog List blog.html
  13. Blog Single blog-single.html

Home Page Slider #back to top

For home page header slider, we have used Bootstrap's Carousel. To customize the images and the caption, please follow the steps below

  1. Copy your header images in to /images folder
  2. Now replace the img tag src with the new image name
  3. You can also change the caption inside the carousel-caption div
  4. For more settings like speed, delay etc. Check out the Official Docs

Code Sample:

                  <div class="carousel-item active">
                        <!-- Carousel Image -->
                        <img class="d-block" src="images/slider.jpg" alt="First slide">
                        <!-- Carousel Caption -->
                        <div class="carousel-caption d-md-block">
                            <div class="slider_title">
                                <h1>Your Heading here</h1>
                                <h4>Long some heading goes here.</h4>
                                <div class="slider-btn">
                                    <a href="#" class="btn btn-default">Link One</a>
                                    <a href="#" class="btn btn-default">Link Two</a>
                                </div>
                            </div>
                        </div>
                    </div>

Instagram Feed#back to top

To setup the instagram feed just above the footer on all pages, Please follow the steps below.

Step 1: Get Client ID from Instagram

  1. Login to your Instagram Account
  2. Go to https://www.instagram.com/developer/
  3. Register your application by clicking "Register a new client" button
  4. Enter the details as required and register
  5. Now you will get the CLIENT ID

Step 2: Get Access Token from Instagram

  1. To obtain Access Token, Go to http://instagram.pixelunion.net/
  2. Click on Generate Access Token
  3. Now Authorize the App and you'll receive the Access Token

Step 3: Get Instagram User ID

You will need an Instagram User ID to make this feed working. (Follow the steps below)
Please note that your username is NOT user id, Its a numeric vlaue eg: 123456789
  1. Go to this website
  2. Enter your Instagram username and fill the captcha
  3. Now you will get your numeric Instagram User ID
  4. PS: If the above link don't work, you can google to find another ways to get Instagram User ID from your Username

Step 4: Adding the details in Javascript

  1. Open the /js/script.js file
  2. Find the Instagram Feed Script Section (Use Ctrl + F to search)
  3. Now add Client ID, Access Token and your Instagram User ID to the script (see code below)
  4. Save and refresh your browser to see latest photos

If you need additional customizations, you can read the plugin documentation here: http://instafeedjs.com/

            ...
            var feed = new Instafeed({
            get: 'user',
            userId: 'INSTAGRAM_USER_ID',  // User ID here
            resolution: 'low_resolution',
            clientId: 'INSTAGRAM_CLIENT_ID_HERE', // Client ID here
            accessToken: 'INSTAGRAM_ACCESS_TOKEN_HERE', // Access Token here
            ...

Twitter Feed#back to top

To setup Twitter Feeds in the Footer section, you need to follow the steps below

Please note that Twitter Feed will NOT work on localhost because it require PHP files. Please upload to a PHP server to test.

Step 1: Getting API keys from Twitter

To setup Twitter feed, you need to obtain CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET, ACCESS_TOKEN, ACCESS_SECRET from Twitter.

  1. Go to https://apps.twitter.com/
  2. Click on "Create a New App" button on the right top side
  3. Enter the details as required and submit
  4. Now go to "Keys and Access Tokens" Tab
  5. Generate Consumer Keys by clicking "Generate Consumer Key & Secret"
  6. Click on "Generate Access Token & Secret" to generate Access Keys
  7. Now you will get four API keys

Step 2: Adding the API keys

  1. Open /php/twitter/config.php
  2. Add your Consumer Keys and Access Keys by replacing the variables (See Code below)
    // Consumer Key
    define('CONSUMER_KEY', 'CONSUMER_KEY_HERE');
    define('CONSUMER_SECRET', 'CONSUMER_SECRET_HERE');

    // User Access Token
    define('ACCESS_TOKEN', 'ACCESS_TOKEN_HERE');
    define('ACCESS_SECRET', 'ACCESS_SECRET_HERE');

Step 3: Add twitter username in Javascript

  1. Open the /js/script.js file
  2. Find the Twitter Feed Script Section (Use Ctrl + F to search)
  3. Replace the "Username" with yours (See Code below)
            ...
            'count': 2,
            'username': 'TWITTER_USERNAME', // Change username here
            'hideReplies': true,
            ...

Done. Now save files and upload to a PHP Server to test. For more customization, Please read the Plugin docs here: https://github.com/sonnyt/tweetie

Calendar Widget#back to top

A calendar widget is included in this template, You can see it on events.html page by clicking on "Calendar View" Tab. To setup, please follow the steps below.

  1. Open the /js/script.js file
  2. Find the Calendar Script Section (Use Ctrl + F to search)
  3. Now you can see a script block, where you can add your events in JSON format
  4. Just replace existing events and update event time (See code below)
                events: [
                {
                    title: 'All Day Event',
                    start: '2017-05-01'
                },
                {
                    title: 'Long Event',
                    start: '2017-05-07',
                    end: '2017-05-10'
                },
                {
                    id: 999,
                    title: 'Repeating Event',
                    start: '2017-05-09T16:00:00'
                },
                {
                    id: 999,
                    title: 'Repeating Event',
                    start: '2017-05-16T16:00:00'
                },
                {
                    title: 'Conference',
                    start: '2017-05-11',
                    end: '2017-05-13'
                },
                {
                    title: 'Meeting',
                    start: '2017-05-12T10:30:00',
                    end: '2017-05-12T12:30:00'
                }]

Google Calendar #back to top

Managing events inside the js script can be difficult. So You have the option to sync your Google Calender to the Event Calendar widget in the website. Please read the instructions below to activate Google Calendar

Step 1: You must first have a Google Calendar API Key:

  1. Go to the Google Developer Console and create a new project (it might take a second).
  2. Once in the project, go to APIs & auth > APIs on the sidebar.
  3. Find "Calendar API" in the list and turn it ON.
  4. On the sidebar, click APIs & auth > Credentials.
  5. In the "Public API access" section, click "Create new Key".
  6. Choose "Browser key".
  7. If you know what domains will host your calendar, enter them into the box. Otherwise, leave it blank. You can always change it later.
  8. Your new API key will appear. It might take second or two before it starts working.

Step 2: Make your Google Calendar public:

  1. In the Google Calendar interface, locate the "My calendars" area on the left.
  2. Hover over the calendar you need and click the downward arrow.
  3. A menu will appear. Click "Share this Calendar".
  4. Check "Make this calendar public".
  5. Make sure "Share only my free/busy information" is unchecked.
  6. Click "Save".

Step 3: Obtain your Google Calendar's ID:

  1. In the Google Calendar interface, locate the "My calendars" area on the left.
  2. Hover over the calendar you need and click the downward arrow.
  3. A menu will appear. Click "Calendar settings".
  4. In the "Calendar Address" section of the screen, you will see your Calendar ID. It will look something like "abcd1234@group.calendar.google.com".
  5. Dependencies

Next, you should add the below line of code in the HTML file before </body> and script.js(very bottom) to support Google Calendar:

<script type='text/javascript' src='js/gcal.min.js'></script>

Step 4: Modifying the script in javascript

Now it's time to change the calendar script in JavaScript for Google Calendar.

  1. Open the /js/script.js file
  2. Find the Calendar Script Section (Use Ctrl + F to search)
  3. Now you can see a script block for calendar
  4. Just replace the block with the code as shown below
  5. Be sure to change the API key and Calender ID after replacing the code
    $('#calendar').fullCalendar({

            header: {
                left: 'prev,next today',
                center: 'title',
                right: 'month,listYear'
            },

            displayEventTime: false, 

            // Calendar API Key
            googleCalendarApiKey: 'YOUR_GOOGLE_CALENDAR_API_KEY', 
        
            // Calendar ID
           events: {
            googleCalendarId: 'abcd1234@group.calendar.google.com'
        }
            
            eventClick: function(event) {
                // opens events in a popup window
                window.open(event.url, 'gcalevent', 'width=700,height=600');
                return false;
            }
            
        });

Google Map#back to top

Google Map of your Location is shown in the contact page. To setup, follow the steps below

Step 1 : Get your API Key

Google recently announced a new update for Google Maps Embed API. So, with effect from July 22nd 2016, Embed Maps will not work without an API Key. So each site owners need to create a new API key to make it work. Here are the steps to do that.
  1. Go to Google Maps Developers Website
  2. Click on "Get a Key" button
  3. Fill in the details as required
  4. Now choose API Key for "Web Browser" and submit
  5. Now you can see the API key. Copy that.

Step 2 : Add the API key to the HTML File

Open the HTML page which contains the Google Map (eg: contact.html). Now, Find the following line of code (at very bottom of the page).

    <script src="https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/js?callback=myMap&key=YOUR_MAPS_API_KEY_HERE"></script>

Change YOUR_MAPS_API_KEY_HERE with your actual Google Maps API key.

Step 3 : Add Latitude & Longitude in HTML

  1. Open contact.html and find the div for google maps (see code below)
  2. Change the data-lat value with latitude and data-lon value with longitude
  3. You may also change the data-zoom to adjust the Zoom Value.
  4. To get Latitude and Longitude of your location, Please visit https://www.gps-coordinates.net/
    <div id="map" data-lat="40.674" data-lon="-73.945" data-zoom="12"></div>

Form Settings #back to top

Contact form #back to top

To setup contact form, Follow the steps below.

To receive emails, First you need to set your email address. Open /php/contact.php file in your code editor. Then you can change the Email ID and Subject. See code below

Note: Contact form will work only on a PHP Live Server Environment with Mail() function Enabled Servers. It won't work locally as well as on server where Mail() function is disabled. So Please contact the server admin before opening a support ticket. 
/*
 * ------------------------------------
 * Contact Form Configuration
 * ------------------------------------
 */
 
$to    = "email@example.com"; // Your email ID here 

$server_email = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';  // Your domain email to authenticate outgoing emails.
Tip: If you did not see the message in your email inbox, a) Please check Spam / Junk Folder b) Try using another email.

Redirect on Success (Thank you page)

If you want your users to be redirected to another page after completing the form successfully such as Thank you page or Success page. It is really easy to do with this Template. Open the HTML and Just add data-redirect="/path/to/thanks.html" to <form> element and you are done. See example: 

<!-- // NOTE THE data-redirect attribute -->
 <form action="php/contact.php" method="POST" data-redirect="success.html">

Alternatively, If you don't want to redirect your users and want to stay in same page, Just change the data-redirect attribute value to none.

Subscribe Form #back to top

This step is to setup Mailcihmp Subscription form in the footer. First You will need to get some details from Mailchimp.

  1. Mailchimp API Key (See help)
  2. Mailchimp List ID (See help)

Once you have the API and List ID, Open /php/subscribe.php and Add your API Key and List ID. You can also configure some more options if you want. Such as Double Optin, Send Welcome and MMERGE tags like First Name and Last Name. See sample below.

/*
 * ------------------------------------
 * Mailchimp Email Configuration
 * ------------------------------------
 */

$apiKey       = 'YOUR_MAILCHIMP_API_KEYS_HERE'; /*Your Mailchiimp API Key*/
$listId       = 'LIST_ID_HERE'; /*Mailchimp List ID*/
$double_optin = true; /*Set False if you don't need to verify user enmail */
$send_welcome = true; /* Send Welcome email to new users */
$email        = $_POST['email'];
$fname        = ''; 
$lname        = '';

Redirect on Success (Thank you page)

If you want your users to be redirected to another page after completing the form successfully such as Thank you page or Success page. It is really easy to do with this Template. Open the HTML and Just add data-redirect="/path/to/thanks.html" to <form> element and you are done. See example: 

<!-- // NOTE THE data-redirect attribute -->
 <form action="php/subscribe.php" method="POST" data-redirect="success.html">

Alternatively, If you don't want to redirect your users and want to stay in same page, Just change the data-redirect attribute value to none.

Admission form #back to top

To setup admission form (admission-form.html), Follow the steps below.

To receive admission form emails, First you need to set your email address. Open /php/admission.php file in your code editor. Then you can change the Email ID and Subject. See code below

Note: Admission form will work only on a PHP Live Server Environment with Mail() function Enabled Servers. It won't work locally as well as on server where Mail() function is disabled. So Please contact the server admin before opening a support ticket. 
/*
 * ------------------------------------
 * Admission Form Configuration
 * ------------------------------------
 */
 
$to    = "email@example.com"; // Your email ID here 

$server_email = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';  // Your domain email to authenticate outgoing emails.
Tip: If you did not see the message in your email inbox, a) Please check Spam / Junk Folder b) Try using another email.

Redirect on Success (Thank you page)

If you want your users to be redirected to another page after completing the form successfully such as Thank you page or Success page. It is really easy to do with this Template. Open the HTML and Just add data-redirect="/path/to/thanks.html" to <form> element and you are done. See example: 

<!-- // NOTE THE data-redirect attribute -->
 <form action="php/admission.php" method="POST" data-redirect="success.html">

Alternatively, If you don't want to redirect your users and want to stay in same page, Just change the data-redirect attribute value to none.

Shortcodes #back to top

This template comes with some useful shortcodes to use for your website. Its all orgainzed in shortcodes.html page. Available shortcodes are listed below.

  1. Buttons
  2. Typography
  3. Tabs
  4. Accordion
  5. Toggle
  6. Alerts
  7. Lists
  8. Columns

Extras #back to top

Web Hosting #back to top

Once you have finished all customizations, The next step is to upload your Landing Page to a Live Hosting Server. For that you will need to buy a Hosting Plan and a Domain name from a Service Provider.

Buy Hosting from Dreamhost

Uploading to Server #back to top

Once you have registered a domain name and Hosting, You will get FTP details from your hosting provider. Use that login details to connect with your server. You will need an FTP Software for this such as FileZilla. Connect with your server and open /public_html folder in your server. Then copy all HTML, CSS and JS files from your local machine to your root /public_html folder in your server. Please note the HTML files should be in the Server's root folder. If your local project is in /your-folder/ Do not upload the folder directly. Instead open the folder and select all HTML files and CSS, JS folders and upload.

Website Optimization Tips #back to top

A Fast & Optimized Website has several factors which needs to be implemented in order to achieve the desired results. There are several Optimization Techniques available which will definitely affect your Website's Performance in a Positive Way & we want to share a few of them with you:

  1. gZip Compression & Browser Caching

    This is probably one of the Most Important Techniques you should definitely implement in order to bump up your Website's Loading Speed. gZip Compression is used to compress the Files that are delivered when loading a Website. It covers HTML, CSS, Javascript & Font Files along with other miscellaneous text files. Where as Browser Caching also covers Images & Videos apart from including the above files. This is used to saves the Static Data in your Browser itself so that when you open the Next Pages on the Same Website, the content does not gets Downloaded again, loading the Website fast.

    gZip Compression & Browser Caching can be enabled using the .htaccess File on an Apache Web Server. You can use the Codes from here: https://github.com/h5bp/html5-boilerplate/blob/master/dist/.htaccess to enable these modules on your server.

  2. Image Compression & Optimization

    We tend to use Lots of Images on our Websites but we often do not make efforts to Compress & Optimize them. Remember, the Larger the Image, the more time it takes to download and therefore this slows your website loading times affecting User Experience. Your customer will leave your website if it does not load within 3-5 Seconds which adversely affects your Sales. Therefore, it is important to Resize, Optimize & Compress your Images before using it on your Website. Here are some Tips which might come handy in optimizing images:

    1. Resize your Images: Resize your Images before using it on your Website. Do not just Download an Image & place it as it is in your Website's <img> Tag without resizing it. The size/resolution of the Image matters since it is not recommended to use an Image size of 1200px x 800px in a Content Size of 300px x 200px as this is unnecessary. Resize it to 300px x 200px
    2. Image Formats: There are three common file types that are used for web images which are JPEG, GIF, & PNG. For images with a Flat Background use JPEG images, for images with a Transparent background use PNG images and for images with Animations use GIF images.
    3. Compressing Images: Images Compression is important as it considerably reduces the size without losing the quality. There are several FREE Image Optimization Tools available to Download.
      For MAC use ImageOptim
      For Windows use Riot for compressing JPEG Images & PNG Gauntlet for PNG Images.

  3. CSS & jQuery Minifications

    It is also recommended that you Combine & Minify all your CSS Files to a single CSS File & all Javascript Files to a single JS File since Minification reduces the size of the File and Combining the files helps in reducing the number of HTTP requests made to the server. This is also an Important Factor in increasing the speed of your website. There are several tools available online to Minify your CSS & JS Files. Our recommendations are:
    For CSS use CSS Minifier and For Javascript use Javascript Minifier.

  4. Content Delivery Network

    You can use a CDN to further speed up your website. You can use the CDN to deliver static files of your website like CSS, JS, Images & Font Files. There are several CDN Hosting Providers available on the Internet but we would recommend MaxCDN or CloudFlare. Note: CDN setup requires Extra monthly Fees to setup, so it is completely optional & according to your needs. Cloudflare also has a Free plan, you can try that for free.

  5. Fast Web Hosting Servers

    A lot depends on your Web Hosting Servers, so it is recommended that you choose a Hosting Company/Server that provides a Reliable & a Fast Hosting Service. You can also choose our shared hosting plans. See above.

Check Google Page Speed Check Gtmetrix Grade

Credits #back to top

We are really thankful to the makers of the frameworks, plugins and images below. We used these to make this Landing Page more functional. Demo images, you have seen in Live Demo is not included in the download package because of their copyright restrictions.

Frameworks

  1. Bootstrap

Plugins

  1. Slick Slider
  2. Owl Carousel
  3. Counter Up
  4. Waypoints
  5. Instafeed
  6. Font Awesome
  7. Tweetie
  8. FullCalendar
  9. Validate.js

Libraries

  1. jQuery

Images / Videos

  1. Shutterstock
  2. Getty Images
  3. Unsplash

Others

  1. Mailchimp
  2. PHPMailer
  3. Google Maps

Changelog #back to top

How to Upgrade #back to top

If you have purchased an earlier version and want to upgrade your website to the newwer version of this template, You can follow the steps. In each update, we will keep a changelog or version history, where we will keep the log of all changes made. We will list out the Changes made, Features added and Pages modified. So it will be easier for you to replace the existing. If you have modified a file which has latest update, for example, CSS, Open both page in a code editor and use a Comparison Sofware or an Online Tool like Diff Now to compare changes in both files. Then you can manually copy paste the changed lines without affecting your file. NOTE: We recommend that you keep a separate file for new additions or changes if possible.

Version 2.0 (19 Sep, 2017) #back to top

-- 13+ New Page Layouts
-- RTL Version
-- Home Page Variations
-- Video Background
-- and more...

Version 1.0 (10 June, 2017) #back to top

Initial Version

Rate it #back to top

If you like the template, Please consider Rating it on Themeforest by Visiting your Downloads Page : http://themeforest.net/downloads That means a lot to me :)

rate this template

Support #back to top

Please remember you have purchased a very affordable template and you have not paid for a full-time web design agency. Occasionally we will help with small tweaks, but these requests will be put on a lower priority due to their nature. Please be patient, polite and respectful. We will try to answer your questions as soon as possible

Support for my items includes:
  1. Responding to questions or problems regarding the item and its features
  2. Fixing bugs and reported issues
  3. Providing updates to ensure compatibility with new software versions
Item support does not include:
  1. Customization and installation services
  2. Support for third party software and plug-ins
Before making a support request, please do...
  1. Make sure your question is a valid issue and not a customization request.
  2. Make sure you have read through the documentation and any related guides before asking support on how to accomplish a task.
  3. Try to use "Google Search" for common questions. Most of the times, which will help faster than the support.

Contact Support

Thank you! #back to top

Once again, Thank you so much for purchasing this template and being by loyal customer. You can reach me pesonally on Twitter @surjithctly or via my Personal Email (No Support requests please.. use support website instead)

Copyright © Surjith S M. All rights reserved.