Category / Blog

Basic blog posts

by Ben

Ridiculously good-looking but just ridiculous underneath

Finally I’m nearly there with the basics of this theme. The look and feel is about right, and when I load the page I like what I see. I just don’t like the code that creates it.

The code behind it is a hugely modified version of the Writers Blog theme by Eric Crooks. I loved his simple yet elegant theme and knew it would be a great starting point. However; there are a few things now I need to do with the theme to finish it that require a rewrite of the basics to accomplish.

I don’t like monolithic programming structures. That is Microsoft’s biggest mistake in my opinion; and the reason Windows gets so slow after even a short period of use. But what I have here is a combination of so many little css hacks and alterations that reviewing my code makes my eyes water.

Bad Benjy.

So, it’s time to stop it and tidy up (fantastic cartoon when I was growing up – anyone else remember it?) With all this colour and panache I’ve lost what I hold dearest in web design: semantic markup + clear and concise CSS = ease of use/adaptation for all.

Once I’m happy with it I can get on with uploading some of the other wordpress themes I’ve been working on.. and everything else I tinker with when I’ve half the chance.

by Ben

Upgraded to WordPress 2.8

Incredibly useful article for anyone using wordpress 2.8. A mini-review rolled into a brief collections of howtos.

A must read if you’re thinking of updating or you just have.

This week I upgraded to wordpress 2.8, and despite a few warnings the upgrade went utterly without a hitch. Backing everything up first helped to alleviate my worrys. After ensuring everything was tickety boo I did a little googling to see what people thought about the new release, what troubles or successes they were having and during the course of my searching I came across this little nugget of a review/guide:

webdesignbooth.com/wordpress-28-and-10-things…

The article covers most of the improvements/updates succinctly so I won’t go into too much detail here but I will say the wordpress team have put ever more work into simplifying many of a blog owners functions and tasks.

The widgets configurations screen is a vast improvement, no fiddly save settings – everything is accomplished through seamless AJAX. I also really like the new html/css editor for your themes; now with functions lookup and syntax highlighting, making editing template files online now much quicker.I tinker with my layout too much for this not to be a great addition.

After all, who can keep all the functions in their head at one time? The wordpress codex has become my most visited site in the last few months according to firefox..

Anyway, to sum up: thumbs up; fantastic new additions to the wp backend and overall productivity within the blog.

by Ben

Design tweaking

Surprise surprise I’ve been tinkering with the layout again, what do you think?

As you may have noticed, in the last few days I’ve been tinkering with the design slightly, bringing it slowly closer to the finished article.

If you like the background, expect to see more of it when release it as a wallpaper. I’ll be doing some colour variations and possibly some Linux badges may find there way on somewhere.

My big question now though, is do I make the main content black to match the rest of the page or leave it as white to stand out and ensure it’s easily readable?

Love to hear your comments.

by Ben

It's all iphone, iphone, bloody iphone

Good god if I hear anything more about this damn phone I’m going to scream! I’m sure it’s lovely to use and packed so full of features you’ll never find half of them; but I’m just sick and tired of hearing about it or the latest gadgets available.

Perhaps I’m just being churlish here since I don’t have one (and have no plans to change that fact) but it just seems to be everywhere at the minute. I’m signed up to several of sitepoint.com’s (usually) great newsletters but I received one today that consisted entirely of iphone information and links to archived iphone articles.

I don’t care about the bloody iphone!

They are quite expensive as phones go, surely I’m not alone in not having it? Come on sitepoint, there are far more interesting, audience-including, topics to cover – so tell us about them – not a phone!

Rant over.

Normal service will be resumed shortly…

by Ben

It’s all iphone, iphone, bloody iphone

Good god if I hear anything more about this damn phone I’m going to scream! I’m sure it’s lovely to use and packed so full of features you’ll never find half of them; but I’m just sick and tired of hearing about it or the latest gadgets available.

Perhaps I’m just being churlish here since I don’t have one (and have no plans to change that fact) but it just seems to be everywhere at the minute. I’m signed up to several of sitepoint.com’s (usually) great newsletters but I received one today that consisted entirely of iphone information and links to archived iphone articles.

I don’t care about the bloody iphone!

They are quite expensive as phones go, surely I’m not alone in not having it? Come on sitepoint, there are far more interesting, audience-including, topics to cover – so tell us about them – not a phone!

Rant over.

Normal service will be resumed shortly…

by Ben

Linux Mint Promotion

Clem, the man behind Linux Mint is looking to do a little promotion for what I think is a pretty damn good distribution of Linux. With the recent release of Linux Mint 7 “Gloria” the OS is really moving forward with some great intuitive additions to the Linux Mint installer as well as their synaptic equivalent.

But I’m not here to start reviewing Mint… yet.
Continue reading →

by Ben

Windows 7 Release Candidate (build 7100)

shot-0.1-windows7 Well, in the last few days I’ve installed and have begun to get intimate with Windows 7 and honestly, I’m quite impressed; in an underwhelmed and slightly “well it’s about time” kind of way.

It’s improvements thus far, while occasionally quite good, are obvious userbility tweaks which should have been present in Vista.

I’ve never been one for Microsoft and have argued against its use and policies before. But just as I often can’t stop trying out distros of Linux I thought I’d try this. Hey, I got into the beta program for free and downloaded it for free. Up to that point – what difference is there between this and Linux? Well, quite a few actually but to that justice I need to delve a little deeper to form a more complete opinion.

Until then, enjoy these screenshots of my currently running system and tell me what you think. It definitely looks good. That much I can say!

Continue reading →

by Ben

Another theme update

Yet again I’m posting up another screenshot of my work in progress theme.

Basically, with this theme I wanted something really personal, the kind of theme you’re unlikely to find anywhere else. I also wanted to make its palette slightly ubuntuesque with oranges and browns. I think it’s coming along pretty well.

Yet again I’m posting up another screenshot of my work in progress theme.

Basically, with this theme I wanted something really personal, the kind of theme you’re unlikely to find anywhere else. I also wanted to make its palette slightly ubuntuesque with oranges and browns. I think it’s coming along pretty well. Continue reading →