Super Ginormous

Category: Design

Posts on graphic and web design.

  • Basic Alternatives

    Let’s face it, Adobe Photoshop CS3 isn’t ideal for every task. It’s great at a lot of things, but often I find that it’s too much software when it comes to handling basic tasks.

    For red eye removal, cropping basic image tweaks/adjustments, I use Google’s Picasa. Its tools are easy to use, provide pretty consistent results and automatically save backups of my original files when I make changes. The fact that it doubles as a photo manager is a bonus. You can easily send photos via, post them to Picasa Web Albums, make cd backups and more. And did I mention it’s free? The only downside to Picasa is that it is PC-only.

    For online image editing I use Picnik. It works with Flickr and Facebook, so I was able to link my accounts on those sites with my account in Picnik and make adjustments to pictures I’ve already uploaded to those services. The site is a little slow, but it’s great when you’re wanting to make basic adjustments to photos. Right now Picnik is still in beta, but eventually they will be offering a pro version of the site that will let you do a lot more with your photos.

    For everything else I use Photoshop.

  • More on Photoshop Express

    Man, the Adobe MAX conference has unleashed a flood of information on all kinds of new applications and technologies Adobe is working on. One of the things I am most excited about is Photoshop Express. Photoshop Express is a Flash-based image editor that runs within a web browser. CNET has new screenshots and additional details on Photoshop Express. Hopefully we’ll be able to play around with it soon. (via John Nack)

    In the meantime, if you’d like to check out a great online image editor – that’s compatible with Flickr, Facebook, and more – might I suggest Picnik? I’ve been using it off and on for a couple of months now and the technology is very promising.

  • Space is Limited

    Register for the Webmaster Jam Session by September 13th and you could win a stay in one of two Presidential Suites at the Adam’s Mark Hotel in Dallas, TX. Space is getting very limited (less than 17 seats remain as of today!) so if you’re planning to go, what’re you waiting for?

    I’m planning to leave for Dallas on Thursday, September 20th with at least a brief stop planned for Birmingham – where I hope to drop in to see Jeremy Flint at Kinetic Communications. If you’re planning on going and want to meet up in Dallas, drop me an email or follow me via twitter.

  • Making WordPress work for me

    WordpressThe wide variety of plugins available for WordPress is what sold me on the application. If WordPress doesn’t do something you’d expect it to do, there’s probably a plugin available to fill the void. On my site, I use several plugins to keep things running smoothly or to add functionality not present in a core-install of WordPress.

    (I’m hoping that all of the links below work. If you happen to come across one that doesn’t resolve, please let me know!)

    • Akismet 2.0.2 – This plugin checks comments against the Akismet web service to see whether it’s spam or not. This plugin alone has stopped over 24,000 spam comments from appearing on my site. It’s worth it’s weight in gold. If not for Akismet, I probably would have turned comments off a long time ago.
    • Bannage 0.2 – This plugin lets me ban commenters by IP address, username, email address or by the URI they use in comments. I don’t use it often, but it’s come in handy a couple of times.
    • Download Counter 1.2 – I recently added this plugin to keep track of how many folks were downloading the WordPress theme I posted. You can use it to keep track of any file on your site that you’re offering for download.
    • Google Sitemaps 2.7.1 – This plugin automatically generates a Google-compliant sitemap of your site. You can even specify pages that exist outside of your WordPress install. (The sitemap.xml file it generates is also compatible with MSN Search and Yahoo, but doesn’t currently notify either of those services when the sitemap file is updated.)
    • Gravatar 1.1 – If commenters have a Gravatar account, their globally-recognized avatar is displayed next to comments they make here on my site (and on others that support gravatar).
    • HP Blog Printing 1.0.8 – This plugin gives users the option to print multiple posts into a convenient, easy-to-read PDF. (To be honest, I don’t know if it’s used much on the site but I’ve kept it activated regardless.)
    • Live Comment Preview 1.7 – This plugin lets commenters see what their comment will look like as they are typing. I’ve found this feature useful on other sites, and thought it would make commenting more user-friendly.
    • Ma.gnolia 1.0 – This plugin outputs a list of my most recent Ma.gnolia bookmarks. You can view these on my links page.
    • Official Comments 1.1 – This plugin let’s me stylize comments that I make differently than regular comments posted on the site.
    • Related Posts 2.04 – Returns a list of posts and pages relevant to the current post you’re on. I’ve found this plugin works great and directing traffic to other articles on my site that are similar to posts people have found via search engines.
    • Spam Karma 2.3 rc1-2 – Coupled with Akismet, spam is a thing of the past for me. I’ve only had a few problems with false positives, but it otherwise works great!
    • Subscribe to Comments 2.1.1 – Lets commenters subscribe to a discussion thread, so that if new comments are made, they have a visual cue (email) that invites them back into the discussion. If you want return visitors, I think this plugin is a quick and easy way to ensure people come back to your site.
    • WordPress Database Backup 1.8 – Invaluable plugin. I use it before I upgrade to the latest and greatest version of WordPress.
    • WP Audioscrobbler 0.35 Beta – This plugin lists my most recently scrobbled tracks from Last.fm.
    • WP Movie Ratings 1.4 – Powers my movie page, where I keep track of movies I’ve watched recently. (The list is far from complete.)

    Other plugins that I have used in the past (or an ad hoc basis) include:

    • Admin Theme Preview 2.0 – This allows administrators to test out new themes without effecting what front-end users see in their browser. I usually leave this disabled unless I am testing out a new design.
    • Anti-Leech 1.6 – This plugin helps prevent scrapers from stealing content and bandwidth. I’ve used this plugin off and for a while now. It works well, but I tend to deal with scraping on an individual basis. Many of the other plugins I use on a day-to-day basis make using this one redundant.
    • Bad Behavior 2.0.10 – Denies spambot attempts at accessing your site. I love this plugin, but currently have it disabled, because it causes connection problems with the new Windows Live Writer beta.
    • Tiger Style Administration 3.0 – Steve Smith’s Tiger Style Admin puts a beautiful, app-like face on the WordPress backend. The only reason I don’t use it is because it’s not fully compatible with WordPress 2.2+, and Steve has no plans to updated the plugin any longer.

    If you’re looking to add additional functionality to your WordPress site, definitely check out the WordPress Plugin Directory. The plugins I use only scratch the surface of what’s currently available. Because of the extensibility of WordPress, developers are creating new ways to use this powerful blogging platform in different and creative ways.

    But enough about my plugins. What sort of plugins are you using on your site?

  • Tags in WordPress 2.3

    WordPress 2.3 introduces a new feature to the popular blog platform: tagging. Sure, you’ve been able to do it with plugins like Ultimate Tag Warrior in the past, but WordPress’ built-in tag system is simple, unobtrusive, and easy to use.

    In order to get tags to display on individual posts, we’ll use the_tags.

    <?php the_tags('before', 'separator', 'after'); ?>

    Here’s how I currently have things setup:

    <?php the_tags( 'Tags: ', ', ', ''); ?>

    This gives me something like this at the bottom of each post that has tags:

    Tags: Tag 1, Tag 2, Tag 3

    Another new tagging feature in WordPress 2.3 is the introduction of wp_tag_cloud. The tag cloud takes all of your tags and displays them based on how much you use them on your site. You can see a live example of it on my archives page. To get the tag cloud on your site, you’ll use the following syntax in one of your templates:

    <?php wp_tag_cloud(??); ?>

    Where might you display the tag cloud? Well, you could put it in your sidebar, but I am not sure how system-intensive generating it is… I’d recommend creating a stand-alone page for it, or limiting the use of it on key pages only.

  • Nanideska

    This coming weekend I’ll be releasing my second WordPress theme: Nanideska. Nanideska is a two-column theme based on the design I previously had here at cdharrison.com. I was thinking I had a screen capture of it somewhere, but searches through my archives on flickr didn’t yield any results. The following capture/Photoshop image should give you a general idea as to what to expect:

    nanideska

    Look for Nanideska to drop sometime soon.

  • Effercio Blue

    Information on this theme can now be found on this dedicated page: Themes > Effercio. This post will no longer be updated.

    Well, the time is here. As promised yesterday, I’m releasing Effercio Blue into the wild. You can snag it here:

    A demo of the site can be found here.

    Obviously, I’m expecting there to be issues. If you happen to find any that make the theme unusable for you, please let me know.

    The theme includes:

    • Support for WordPress Tags (a new feature in WordPress 2.3)
    • Support for Dynamic Sidebar and Widgets
    • Custom Link and Archive Page Styles
    • Inline Asides*

    If you’re wondering what the rationale behind the name is… effercio is Latin for “stuff”, and that’s what my site’s all about… Anyway, I hope you enjoy the theme! Let me know what you think!

    Addendum

    • (10.05.07) – Added Effercio Blue to FreeWordpressThemes.com
    • (10.03.07) – Released 1.0.1. Fixed issue in header.php where Home link was not working properly.
    • (10.02.07) – Effercio Blue was featured on Weblog Tools Collection.
    • (09.05.07) – Inline Asides can be enabled by creating a category called ‘Asides’. The logic’s already in place on index.php to handle the special formatting for it. If you do add it, you’ll simply need to make one (OPTIONAL) modification to your sidebar.php file. (It hides Asides from the category list.) I use Asides to post links that I wouldn’t normally do a full post on.

      <?php wp_list_categories('title_li=&show_count=0&exclude=ASIDECATEGORYID'); ?>

    Enjoy!

  • A Minor Announcement

    I’ve decided to turn my current design into a distributable theme for WordPress. It’ll be available over the weekend after I clean up some of the rough edges. Here are some of the things you can look forward to in the release of Effercio Blue 1.0:

    • Support for WordPress Tags (a new feature in WordPress 2.3)
    • Support for Dynamic Sidebar and Widgets
    • Custom Link and Archive Page Styles
    • and more?

    If there’s interest in it, I might make some colored variations of it… Leave a comment if you’d like to be notified of it’s release.

  • WordPress 2.3 Beta1

    So, a new developmental version of WordPress was released last night. Being the sucker that I am, I went ahead and upgraded to WordPress 2.3 Beta1, and to my surprise, everything installed without any problems at all.

    I haven’t seen a full list of all that’s been changed in this version, but based on my limited usage of it in the past half hour I can tell you about two of the updates that will make the most impact:

    1. Tags. Posts now support tags without the use of a third-party plugin.
    2. Plugin Version checking. When you’re managing your plugins, you’ll now be able to see if a newer version of it is available (assuming it supports update checking).

    According to the announcement, this version also include “faster JavaScript” and “SEO-friendly URL redirection”.

    All in all, it seems pretty stable so far. So, if you do decide to upgrade, know that it’s not a full release, and you’re bound to run into problems. Make sure you backup any WordPress-related site files and database beforehand. Deactivate all plugins. Then upgrade. Reactivate your plugins one by one checking to make sure none of them break your site…

  • First Impressions on Habari

    I downloaded and installed the newly released Habari 0.2 Developer Review on a test domain, and I’m impressed. Setup took less time than a typical WordPress install. Importing posts, pages and comments from my existing WP site took only a few moments. While I don’t think I’ll be making the switch to Habari just yet, I will definitely be taking steps towards migrating this site over to it soon.