With completely hosted solutions like Squarespace becoming more and more popular everyday, should content creators using WordPress and similar platforms be concerned? What about the designers and developers that create plugins and themes for these systems?
In order for blogging/content management systems like WordPress to survive, there needs to be a thriving community of developers and users alike. There’s certainly no shortage of either in the WordPress community, so I don’t see it going anywhere anytime soon. Truthfully, I find that there is a place for both a DIY solution like WordPress and an entirely hosted solution like Squarespace. I personally prefer having to dig deep into the CSS, XHTML, and PHP to truly customize a WordPress blog/site, though.
I understand that with Squarespace more advanced users have the ability to make these changes if they choose, but for me, the do it yourself aspect of WordPress is what makes it so fun.
Filed under: Theme Development, WordPress by James Barclay | Social tagging: Theme Development > WordPress
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It’s become rather amusing for me to find out just who is using my WordPress theme. Sometimes it’s not so flattering, other times it is. The other day I discovered that Jobtac, a job posting site for employers and job seekers alike, is using Simplixity for their blog. Thanks a lot, guys!
Filed under: Theme Development, WordPress by James Barclay | Social tagging: Web Design > Web Development > WordPress
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Today I uninstalled Quicksilver, in favor of using the LaunchBar 5 beta. It was late 2007 when developer Nicholas Jitkoff released the source to Google Code, and I’ve been hanging on tightly ever since. I understand that the project will continue to be updated, but I’ve come to my wits end, and am done struggling with the application for now. We’ll see how long this lasts…
Filed under: OS X, Technology by James Barclay | Social tagging: LaunchBar > OS X > Quicksilver
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I’ve been thinking a lot about this concept lately. Have we come to a point where the Dreamweaver style IDE, (integrated development environment), has become a thing of the past? Ninety percent of my formal training has been heavily dependent on this model, yet I can’t see any forward thinking web designer/developer continuing to rely on it. In many ways, the browser has become my WYSIWYG of choice. You can quickly see the effects of changes made to style sheets and you’re not confined to any one proprietary system.
Filed under: Web Design, Web Development by James Barclay | Social tagging: Web Design > Web Development
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While browsing through my HTTP referrers I found that an online business network called Loopthing is using my WordPress theme for their blog. So far it looks like the blog is somewhat secondary, (the link to it is on the bottom of the page), but I’m honored nonetheless. Go take a look.
Filed under: Theme Development, WordPress by James Barclay
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I recently discovered that a gentleman named Pete made a modification of my WordPress theme for his own site. It’s exciting to see this being done so early on. It’s called The Teacher List, go check it out.
Filed under: Theme Development, WordPress by James Barclay
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After correcting a minor mistake that I made to my credit link, the folks at WordPress accepted my new theme and will be featuring it on the WordPress theme directory page. If you’d like to preview or download the theme you can do so here.
Filed under: Theme Development, WordPress by James Barclay | Social tagging: Theme Development > WordPress
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I just completed designing/developing my first WordPress theme. It’s called Simplixity, (which seems appropriate). I am by no means done with this theme, I’ve just come to the point where I wanted something to release. I submitted it to the WordPress Theme Directory, but am still waiting for a response as to whether or not they’ll feature it. I’d like to sincerely thank Small Potato, the author of a wonderful tutorial on how to build a WordPress theme, for the invaluable information he has provided. Take a look at the theme, (which is currently active), and let me know what you think.
Filed under: Theme Development by James Barclay | Social tagging: WordPress
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So I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to download Windows 7 while I still could, (the beta closes on February 10th), and I’ve been quite impressed thus far. The installation process was a breeze, and I was up and running in less than a half hour. The performance is rather snappy considering I’m running it in a VM on a 1.83 GHz MacBook Pro with 2GB of RAM, (of which 30GB of disk space and 768MB of RAM is allocated for its use). As for the setup in VMware Fusion, the only unusual step I had to take was to create a custom VM. The operating system that I chose during this process was Windows>Windows Server 2008, (there is currently no Windows 7 template).
While it may be unlikely for me to switch to using Microsoft software, it’s definitely worth a free download, especially when the barrier to entry is so small. Get it while you can.
Filed under: Technology by James Barclay | Social tagging: Microsoft > Technology > VMware > Windows > Windows 7
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Over the next few months I will be working on developing a WordPress theme. I am currently using one of my favorite themes from the WordPress theme directory, which I will be editing in hopes of becoming more familiar with PHP and WordPress in general. Keep posted to see where this all ends up.
Filed under: Theme Development by James Barclay | Social tagging: php > Theme Development
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