Made some changes to the toggled menu on mobile views. Centered up, padded, and more to my liking.
Next up is playing with what post information is displayed in archived views vs. single-post views. After that I need to nail down exactly how I want my custom front page to look on mobile and how that differs from the regular archive view on mobile.
I’ve removed the sharing buttons from my posts. Don’t think anyone ever used them and I think they’re mostly clutter. So away they go!
Just getting started to work on Loot, my first WordPress theme, and I quickly realized how little I’ve done in a local WordPress environment recently. Focusing on WordPress.com issues have made me much better and faster at troubleshooting for my job, but much squishier on working in WordPress core.
https://twitter.com/alexjgustafson/status/644541133184454657
Thankfully, I still had MAMP installed and this post got me going with pretty much anything else I needed:
“WordPress Theme Development Tools” by Ian Stewart | ThemeShaper
It’s part of a complete tutorial on WordPress theme development to which I’ll keeping coming back.
One of my projects to finish out 2015 is to create a new WordPress theme. Getting more concrete than that has been hard – it’s clear I’ve never really worked on a design process before. To help get me going I started scanning through the theme directory for WordPress.com and speaking out loud why I liked certain themes.
I gained some traction once I realized the most compelling statements were not about any technical element, but how the theme made me feel. What the theme seemed to help inspire. Kind of like how Apostrophe makes me want to start a magazine, I want the theme I make to have the same effect on someone.
After some brain dumping (I dump, I don’t storm) it became clear that I’d like my theme to inspire gaming and fantasy – like D&D which I love so much. If my theme inspires even one person to blog about their gaming, or to game in the first place, it’s a success.
With that in mind I started wireframing. First, some mobile ideas…
And next, a front page reminiscent of a character sheet…
Obviously there’s a ways to go, but now I’ve got some near-term goals I work on to get the project running. Working name is “Loot.”
I enjoyed my Titansgrave wallpaper for a while. But Titansgrave Season 1 is over and it’s time for something new.
I’m now using “Poetry” from this collection of subtle WordPress wallpapers.
So it’s still news to a lot of folks that my wife and I are expecting a baby. One of the things we’ve talked about is how we’re going to distribute info about this kiddo as it grows up. So many people our age put all kinds of pictures up on Facebook and other social media, but once you do that you really lose a lot of control over what can happen to that photo.
And honestly, how many of us would’ve wanted our baby pictures out on the internet everywhere when we come into adulthood? My child doesn’t know its stance on privacy yet, so I’d rather err on the side of caution until their old enough to make their own choices. That said, I’m not foolish enough to keep grandparents away from photos of grandchild.
So here’s our plan!
Shocking, right? I blog at WordPress.com and it’s a really great hammer for lots of web-related nails. I need place to put things on the internet – I can do it for free here.
Just a story about something that happened? Public. It’s all good. I don’t think my kiddo will hate me for sharing stories as much as sharing photos.
We’ll give out a password to our family (and friends that ask us for it) and use the password protection available on every post or page, just always the same password. This makes the photos totally available for the folks we actually want to see them, but not the weirdos on the internet and definitely not the marketing department in Facebook HQ. Grandparents won’t even need an account.
Nope. This is more a notice that this sort of thing is possible when you actually own your site instead of trusting other services with it.
The editorial folks at WordPress.com have done a lot of work making Blogging University courses, teaching folks how to make the most of their shiny new WordPress blogs. They’re really helpful and include a commons area to interact with the other folks taking the course and help from staff members like me. And they’re free!
I’ll be volunteering in a Blogging 101 course this July:
Blogging 101 is three weeks of bite-size blogging assignments that take you from “Blog?” to “Blog!” Every weekday, you’ll get a new assignment to help you publish a post, customize your blog, or engage with the community.
You’ll walk away with a stronger focus for your blog, several published posts and a handful of drafts, a theme that reflects your personality, a small (but growing!) audience, a grasp of blogging etiquette — and a bunch of new friends.
Learn more about the courses going on in July (we have a 201 writing course, too!) and how to register here:
Still working on my first year with a8c, but the company recently hit a milestone.
Ten years ago the first official Automattician was Donncha O Caoimh, and he had no idea what he was in for. Neither did I, honestly. And it’s been amazing.
“Ten Years of Automattic” via ma.tt | Matt Mullenweg | Unlucky in Cards.
How cool is that Felicia Day screenshot cameo? 🙂
That video (and more!) at Celebrating 10 Years of WordPress.com & Automattic |Hot Off the Press (WordPress.com Blog)
Want to get in on the next ten years? We’re hiring.
It also rocks. But more accurately, I wanted to share a few rules I’ve set in place for myself for creating a consistent blogging habit. Please steal them for your own blog and help make the web a better place.
It can be really fun to change up themes, get picky with the CSS, and pick out the absolute perfect 7 tags and 2 categories for each post. I’ve put in no small amount of customization on this very site. But on a personal blog, this absolutely must come second to your ideas. Whether you blog, photoblog, vlog or whatever– your content should be your number one priority. No one cares what color your car is if you can’t keep gasoline in the tank.
I picked a daily pace for my blog because it is a small-scale project. My hope is when you choose to follow you’ll become one of my friends, or at least gain and understanding of me that my friends would. Occasionally you’ll get some longer blocks of text, but lots of times it’s just little updates about things I think I are cool.
I really like Ipstenu’s site, which she updates Monday-Wednesday-Friday, but her content is at a higher plane of thought than mine. The extra time is warranted.
My favorite podcast is Welcome to Night Vale, which is released only twice a month. But to push publish they need to write ~25 minutes worth of fiction, record it, and edit it along with all their live shows, promotion, business, and all the other asides that go along with being working artists.
My point is, the actual pace you choose doesn’t matter. What does matter is that it matches your effort and you consistently deliver.
When you’re creating something, you must collect your ideas in a nice big pile. I normally just use draft posts in WordPress. I use Simplenote for other stuff, but occasionally a snippet of blog post will get saved there on-the-go too. Whenever something strikes as ‘that’s cool’ take a note down.
If I have something in my drafts for over a week, I send it to trash. It was clearly fleeting to me and I had other things to write about. Letting those ideas go is fine, and I’ve had no regrets about that. But I’ve forgotten and regretted to many other lost thoughts due to the laziness of not taking notes.
These are rules I made for myself. They might not make sense for you. They do not guarantee internet fame and certainly not internet fortune. But I’ve found that by following these rules I blog everyday and enjoy doing it. Most importantly, they’ve helped me create a site I’m proud to say is mine.
Alex "Gus" Gustafson 