Curiosita Labs

Thoughts on programming, web development and design.

Circuit Board

Author: djbrensinger Page 29 of 50

WordPress Themes, Database Cleanup and More

By

On January 28, 2015

In Web Development

WordPressWhile working on a WordPress project, you may want to consider how to enhance your WordPress them, clean up your database and review your site before launching it. I found 4 articles that can help you make your WordPress site super.

Themes

WordPress themes allow you to customize and make your WordPress site unique. When you first considering building a WordPress website, you have two choices: build your own theme or choose a pre-made one. A pre-made theme get your site up and running faster than designing your own. Since there a lot of themes, you to narrow down your choices. Think about the price of the theme, what kind of features does it offer, will the theme work for your website and easy to customize. What To Consider When Choosing a WordPress Theme has seven items to help you find the theme you are looking for.

Once you found a theme or built your own, you may want to enhance it. There are WordPress functions that you can use to make your theme even better. In 10 Ways to Change the Way Your WordPress Site Works With Functions, you can use functions to customize your footer, add Google Analytics, or automate the Copyright Date of your site.
Computer Coding

Database Cleanup

As you add plugins, experiment with widgets or even theme designs, you may notice that your WordPress acts a bit slower that it did when first installed it. You may want to cleanup your WordPress database for increased website performance. Running a cleanup can help get rid of extra items that are no longer necessary and cause performance issues.

Launching a WordPress Website

When you launch your WordPress website, you may forget to do some things. You may forget to fill out the Site Title and Tagline or set the correct timezone. Check out
5 Things You May Forget When Launching a WordPress Website to see if you may have forgotten anything.

Summary

Whether you decided to use a pre-made theme or build your own, you’ll still need to customize it. Customizing a theme can mean making simple changes, adding plugins and functions. Whatever you decide to do to make your WordPress site unique, you need to know how to choose a theme, add functions to customize it, cleanup the database occasionally and make sure you double check your site before launching.

What tips do you have for WordPress developers and owners?

How to Add Text To Photo

By

On December 26, 2014

In Design, Photography

Text On PhotoHave you ever had a great photo that you wanted to add text to? Did the result work the way that you wanted it to? When you add text to a photo, it should compliment the photo not compete with it.

What techniques can you use to add text to a photo?

Here are 5 simple techniques you can use to add text to a photo:

  1. You can add text directly to the image.
  2. Insert a transparent shape and add your text to that shape.
  3. Overlay the entire photo with a transparent shape and add your text to that shape.
  4. Blur the image and then add the text directly to the blurred image.
  5. Use a floor fade. Create a gradient that fades the photo from dark to light.

Presentation Panda on SlideShare tells you how and when to use these techniques. Every photo is different. They show you how to decide when to use these techniques. Presentation Panda shows you the right and wrong way to do each approach. Review this SlideShare presentation to learn about the best way to add text to your photo.

By adding text to a photo, you can customize a photo for your website or blog. Adding text directly to the photo is the simplest and easiest method. This method doesn’t work for all photos. Have you used any of the methods mentioned in the slides?

What is smart design?

By

On November 28, 2014

In Design, Programming, Web Development

Computer CodingAs we use mobile devices, they change how we interact with our devices and content. Developers and designers need to consider many things when developing a website. You have to think about responsive design, speed, UI/UX, patterns, touches and gestures. Sara Cannon explains how mobile design trends affect how we design.

Smart design is

  • Content-focused
  • Fast
  • Informed
  • Refined

How to you create a smart design?

Be content-focused

Your design should be Mobile First, Readable, Designed for Content and uses digital storytelling. It just works. A visitor can read your site on their computer, laptop, tablet or phone. They can read your website using what ever device they choose. Make the content the most important part of the design. Use web design techniques, like photos, videos, fonts and more to help tell a story.

Be Fast

Your design should be fast. People have a limited attention span when it comes to slow loading websites. Make sure your site loads quickly. Sara talked about balancing speed vs awesome. Some photos may make a design look awesome, but they take time to load. You need to decide if that photo is really necessary. If it is, you can optimize the photo for the web. A tool that smushit optimizes photos for the web. You can speed up how your site loads by using tools like Icon Fonts and SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphics). You can get Icon Fonts from Font Awesome, Fontello or IcoMoon. Nounproject is one place to get svgs. By replacing icons with fonts, you can increase the speed of your site.

Be Informed

Every website performs differently. You have well and bad performing pages. By using Google Analytics or another web analytic tool, you can learn more about how your site is performing and find out what works. Not enough people do user testing. User testing of your website can tell you a lot about what works and what doesn’t. You can also learn why someone uses your site in unexpected ways. Use usertesting.com to invited people to help you test your website.

Be refined

A little bit of motion can add refinement to your website. Add animated navigation icons with CSS Transformations. The motion lets people know that something has happened.

When you consider a new website or redesigning an old one, think about how to focus on the content and not just making the site look pretty. A site that is readable, fast and just plain works is going to have more people using it than one that looks awesome. Remember to make a site that is content-focused, fast, informed and refined.

Milwaukee WordCamp 2014

By

On October 31, 2014

In Design, Programming

WordCamp Milwaukee was held at the UWM Continuing Education Center at the Grand Avenue Mall, July 25-27. UWM’s Continuing Education Center was a great location. Thanks to the WordCamp Milwaukee team for organizing this event. Thank you to the sponsors and speakers for making the event possible. It was a great weekend for learning more about WordPress, Web Development and Business.

As with other WordCamps, it can be difficult to choose which sessions to go to. They offered sessions for developers, designers, marketers and business people. Here are my notes from a few of the sessions I went to.

Brain Based Conversions!

Luke Summerfield talked about how to increase website conversions. By using learning about how psychology and neurology affects our decisions. Luke gave us some techniques for optimizing your website and marketing.

  • Demonstrate Authority by adding Testimonials, Case Studies and Awards and partnering with authorities (experts).
  • Show Social Proof by adding or letting users post photos and videos. Include a way to add reviews and ratings. Let people see that you are active on social media.
  • Demonstrate Reciprocity by sharing others content, random acts of kindness and offering free content.

SVG is for everybody

Chris Coyier explained what SVG is, how to use it in web design and resources to help you incorporate it into your design. SVG stands for Scalable Vector Graphics. It uses XML to define the image. Which means the image can be scripted, searched, indexed and compressed. You can create them with any text editor or drawing software. SVG’s can be resized without a problem. They can be used as: an image, in a background and inline HTML. Most browsers support SVG. You can use caniuse.com to see if your browser supports it.

Tools Mentioned By Chris

The WordPress JSON REST API

Rachel Baker and Ryan McCue talked about the WP-API. A plugin that provides an easy way to use REST API through HTTP and JSON. Why is this needed? As WordPress moves towards becoming an application framework, new tools are needed. WP API provides a simple and easy interface to WordPress. You can talk to WP Query, users API, posts API and more.

Where can we use it? Plugins, Forms and Validation, Front-end content editing and displaying content on another WP site or multisite. Anything that you can think of for CRUD (create, read, update and delete). Where can you get it? The JSON REST API plugin is available on github.

How to tell a customer they’re wrong and make them love use

Marc Benzak talked about a time when a customer had an issue with their website and believed it was Marc’s tool, ServerPress, that caused the issue. After working carefully with the customer on this issue, Marc’s team determined that the problem was with the additional programming that the customer had hired out prior to using ServerPress. Marc gave us tips on how to handle a stressful situation with a customer who is panicking and angry.

Ask these 4 questions

  1. Is there any truth (Did we really screw up)?
  2. Am I reacting logically or emotionally?
  3. What are they really saying between the lines?
  4. Are they really calling my baby ugly?

Your customer is upset because of trust, pressure, unexpected issues, lack of education and information and panic.

Before addressing the customer, remember:

  • It’s a team effort
  • Your ego doesn’t count
  • There is no place for emotion
  • Don’t take it personally

When you address the customer, use this equation:

(Apology + Resolution + Education) + Apology = Satisfied Customer

Summary

WordCamp Milwaukee was a great event for learning and connecting with designers, developers and business people. These tips on web design, development and managing customers are just a sample of what can be learned and shared at a WordCamp.

If you have a WordCamp happening near you, plan to attend to learn more about WordPress and the community.

Developing a website is a process

By

On September 12, 2014

In Design, Programming, Web Development

WordPressDo you have a process for developing a website? Buildings, cars and websites all require steps to build a website. Without a systematic process, you wouldn’t be able to consistently build houses, cars or websites. At WordCamp Seattle 2014, Morten Rand-Hendriksen, gave a talk on Web Design is a Process. He focused on first 3 of a 5 part process: Prepare, Plan and Build.

Here are my notes from the presentation:

Prepare

Content Strategy

  • Ask questions about the content: Why does it matter? Why should it be on the website? Who is the target audience?
  • Complete a website content audit. Create a list to know where all of the content is.
  • Create a sitemap of your website
  • Create a template map to match the WordPress hierarchy. Identify the templates that you are going to need to use.
  • Develop a wireframe for mobile only without any design elements. Use paper to create your wireframes.
  • Ask real people if your design works

Build the Site

  • Build the site with a blank starter theme and add the content
  • Add accessibility in before adding design elements
  • Add design elements in the browser. Use modular or atom design.

Summary

Website development is constantly changing. Morten provides different ideas on how to design a website. He suggested matching the WordPress templates with templates that you are going to use. This will save you time when you build your theme. Morten’s suggestions can help you to speed up the design and development time, so you can finish project faster and get paid sooner.

What changes are you going to make to your design process?

Page 29 of 50

Previous

Next

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén