ABOUT ME

Hello, My name is Darin Loken, and I am the founder and head designer of "TK WEB DESIGNS". I built my first webpage back in 1998. It was pretty simple, using the basic HTML language. I started out on webtv, but went to a PC a couple of years later. Soon I was busy helping people on webtv via email, I was getting around 70 emails aday back then. So to make things easier on myself, I made a website to help the Webtv people out and opened it in 1999. Soon that site grew to over 50 pages covering everything that a Webtv'er would need to know, it also won me almost 80 awards for my efforts and Webtv/Msntv did a story on me and they included my site on their help pages for their new subscribers to their service. My handle was, "The Kid", And my website was called, "The Club House."

I was going to college for electronics then, later that year I finished with my electronics school, but never quit building web sites and trying to learn and build better ones. I was building web sites for friends for free then, and buying books and learning as much as I could through them and discussion groups online. Then in 2003 with some pushing from my family and friends I decided to make the jump into the web design business.

I had been looking at other web designers web sites and knew it was going to take me a long time to learn to do web pages like them. So it was then that I had to make a decision. I could continue to make pages by hand and learn as I go with the "Hands on" approach. Or buy a program like Netobjects and use it the rest of my life. Netobjects is a program that will do the coding for you, it comes with premade templates, it's a "Web Site Maker" in other words. Or take the long route and go back to school. Well I started this whole thing by learning to do it the right way, learn the codes and "Practice, Practice, Practice", so why change? I didn't want to be a person who took short cuts, and didn't want to be a person that depended on programs and editors the rest of my life. I wanted to learn to do things the right way. If something went wrong with a page I made I didn't want to have to rely on a program to fix it.

Going to school is one of the best things I ever did. I learned so much there about web design and web development, about search engine optimazation, what it takes to make a good web site a great one. The importance of using XHTML coding,and the structure of the coding, and how to use the content of the page along with images, and how they help search engines. And so much more than I wouldv'e than if I would've just tryed to "teach myself". Learning how to run the programs and run them correctly, and when you know how to run the correctly you can run them fast. This helps a lot in web design, the faster you can get things done, the better the client likes it. But I will never sacrifice the quality of the work. I use the ,"W3C" validator, this tool will tell you EVERTHING that's wrong with your or anybodys web site, so you can fix it. When I'm done with my web sites the coding is always perfect, it's what it shoot for, I won't settle for less. You should bookmark that validator page, then go some web sites and see how many errors your web designer made. If he's a good web designer it will come up clean. Other web designers don't care about their work, just want your money. I've heard other web designers brag about how good they are. One said, "I'm so good at web design, I scare myself". I validated one of his pages he made for a DJ, the first page had 176 errors, 176 on ONE page. And the search engine optimaztion might not as well had been there at all, the only thing he got right was the title. If I were him I would be scared too, scared that the person I made the site for would find out just how bad the site REALLY is and would want his money back! Here at "TK Web Designs", we don't brag about how good we are, we let our work speak for itself. If you have to brag about your work, then there's something wrong with it, your work should speak for itself. He told me once he was going to start validating all his pages, I guess that went out the window. He says on his site the importance of coding and a well structered pages, yet his pages are marked full or errors, and he talks about the importance of the w3c and XHTML, but doesn't seem to follow their rules, or his own words he says on his site? Making your pages validate might take a day longer, but it shows your dedication to your work. That you pay as much attention to the quality of your work as the looks, and not kicking the site out as fast as you can. One time it took me almost 2 days to make the site validate because of one ampersign was out of place. But I took the time to make SURE the page and the whole site validated! And this guy up here, he just said, "People don't care about the W3C if they don't know what the hell it is, all they want is pretty and easy to navigate sites!" Which shows the dedication he has to his work. Here we care as much about the work, (coding), as you do about the money your going to spend paying for it. You want the best a person can make it and we strive to give you just that, not just a, "Pretty site that's easy to navigate". We make sure the coding is as good as possible so in the upcoming years it will still work with the upcoming changes in the world wide web.

Who is the W3C? The W3C stands for, "The World Wide Web Consortium", and was founded in October 1994 to lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing common protocols that promote its evolution and ensure its interoperability. Today, W3C has over 450 Members and nearly 70 full-time staff around the world who contribute to the development of W3C specifications and software. They help govern what is allowed on the "World Wide Web". You can read more about them Here. And why is validating your pages so important you might ask? There are a number of reasons making sure your pages validate with the W3C rules, for example: "Compliance help insure accessibility for the disabled", "Compliance helps insure that your website is accessible from a number of devices; from different browsers to the growing number of surfers using PDA's and cellular phones, tablets, ect", "Compliance will also help insure that regardless of the browser, resolution, device, etc. That your website will look and function in the same or at least a very similar fashion.", "It also helps with your SEO, or Search Engine Optimization". This was taken from: Beanstalks article. Anybody can learn Html and build web sites, or by a program that does the coding for you like, "Netobjects", or other "Editors". But a real web designer not only knows how to use the CORRECT editors out there. But knows what the codes are all about that the editors are putting in. And will strive to make the best web sites he can with the tools he has. This also falls under the category of "Web Developement". People in the computer field such as web designer trying to make a better intermet through their work. This includes using "Markup Language", in other words, doing the best job they can in the field that they have chosen. And for web deisgner's, it means making your pages validate, doing the best job you can in other words. Not just using a program to make the codes, or an editor without correcting any mistakes it might have made, and using XHTML language since the regular HTML language has been considered outdated since 98'.

At Tk Web Designs we use a combination of hands on and an editor called, "Dreamweaver". Dreamweaver is considered the best editor out there, it doesn't come with premade templates, but it will make the codes for you, it's faster in other words. We usually take anywhere from 1 to 2 weeks to make a site depending on how big the site the is and how much scripting is required. The more complicated, the longer it will take. There are web designers out there that make web sites in 3 days? Their the kind that use premade templates, and programs like, 'Netobjects", a program you can buy for $200.00 dollars. It's a web site making program and comes with premade templates. I can't see how people can use programs like that, and charge anwhere from $600.00 dollar to $1,200 dollars and live with themselves? I know I couldn't. I know this one web designer that uses "Netobjects" and says, "Web design has always been my passion". Then later he says, "Art and photography have always been my passion", then he has a web site for construction and dry wall where he says, "Dry wall has always been a passion of mine" LOL. I think if you offered this guy a couple of hundred dollars to paint your car he would say, "Painting cars has always been a passion of mine" LOL. Anythng just to get YOUR money. If you took away his "Netobjects" what would you have? A person who wished he knew how to design web sites, because he totally relies on the program to do the coding for him. Without the program he couldn't make a web site if you paid him $10,000 dollars for a 3 page web site that looked good, because he would be totally lost, and the coding would be nothing but the very basic HTML he learned back on webtv. And it's the same with the other person I was talking about above. Both totally rely on their editors to do their work, they haven't taken the time to actually learn what it takes to actaully make a web site without one. They don't know what the codes are all about their putting in, and their lost without their editors. Sad way too be, or to call yourself a professional web designer.

With us you will always get the best web site we can make, for the price we can give you. NO premade templates, the coding on the site will be perfect, the site will be easy to navigate, it will be fast loading, it will stretch or contract depeding on the screen size viewing it, will work with all browsers, the search engine optimazion will be the best we can make it, and will work with cellphones, pda's, tablets, ect, anything you can get online with. With us, you will always get our BEST!

 

Thanks for reading, Darin