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Thesis for WordPress just got hotter!

admin — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 12:32:42 +0000

These are the latest details on the latest thesis 1.7 release straight from pearsonified

Hooo boy! Thesis 1.7 is coming soon, and I’ve gotta say—this is the most excited I’ve ever been for a Thesis release. On the technical side of things, I rewrote a significant portion of the software to add functionality and increase efficiency at every turn. From a practical standpoint, Thesis 1.7 is noticeably faster, far more comprehensive, and way more detailed than previous versions. In other words, it’s pretty doggone slick

But the best thing about Thesis 1.7? That honor may go to the new Options Manager, which not only allows you to backup your Thesis settings, but also gives you the ability to share settings with friends! Skin developers will be especially keen on this new functionality, as it will allow them to distribute recommended design options without having to create long-winded and highly technical installation tutorials.

At any rate, the list of changes in Thesis 1.7 is long (but awesome), so if you’re ready to get started, dive right in!

Insane new SEO controls and detail: Thesis has always been optimized and ready to perform in the search engines, but there were still some areas where exacting, precise controls were lacking. Not anymore. Version 1.7 contains a totally redesigned document that allows for SEO customization at a level that no one has ever seen before. With 1.7, you’ll be able to control the robots tags (noindex, nofollow,noarchive) on every post and page of your site, and better still, the new Page Options will give you total control over all these details and more on your Category and Tag archive pages! Optimize everything, because that’s how you win on the Web, and that’s what Thesis is all about.
Options Manager: If you’ve ever delivered a Thesis site to a client, then you know what a pain in the butt it can be to go into a new site and set every single option by hand. With Thesis 1.7, you’ll be able to save and restore the Thesis Options without having to be woefully inefficent. Oh, and skin developers? You’ll be able to use this new functionality to share font and design settings, and this will make it easier to help people set up your awesome skins on their sites!
Completely reorganized options pages: The more I organize the underlying code, the more I’m able to organize the controls you use to unleash Thesis’ potential. In version 1.7, you’ll find five main pages under the Thesis Options: Site Options, Design Options, Page Options, Custom File Editor, and Options Manager. These pages are all leaner, faster, and more sensibly-arranged in 1.7; simply put, my efforts here are designed to make it easier for users to do more with Thesis.
Increased efficiency from every angle: Quite literally, every single page load is faster with Thesis 1.7. Whether you’re browsing your site or navigating the reorganized Thesis Options, you’ll notice snappier interface behavior that can be attributed to two main things. First, I improved the way each page is generated by implementing smarter, more efficient PHP object modeling. Second, I changed the way options are delivered throughout the theme, thereby reducing the overall page load thanks to fewer function calls. These improvements also allowed me to eliminate the antiquated header.php and footer.php files, and now Thesis can deliver your site’s pages faster than ever before.
Include a slew of JavaScript libraries!: Pretty much everyone can benefit from having Javascript libraries at their disposal, and with Thesis 1.7, you’re just a click away from the most popular ones. Add jQuery, jQuery UI, Prototype, MooTools, and others with a single click, and kiss those old JS library folders goodbye!
New home page controls: In the new Page Options, you’ll find a section dedicated to your home page. In previous versions, Thesis offered some home page controls, but the SEOoptions were somewhat insufficient. Now, you’ll not only have complete SEOcontrol on your home page, but you’ll also have granular control over JavaScript libraries and post display (with more to come here in future releases).
Flexible new comment system: In previous versions, Thesis didn’t give you a choice here, and everybody’s comment areas were rendered in the same order: trackbacks, comments, and then a comment form. In 1.7, you’ll not only be able to drag and drop the display order, but you’ll also have a few more fine-tuning display options that are sure to please. Look for these new controls in your Design Options.
New hooks: The .post_box now contains hooks inside its opening and closing
tags—thesis_hook_post_box_top and thesis_hook_post_box_bottom. I also added similar hooks to the #content_box—thesis_hook_content_box_top andthesis_hook_content_box_bottom.
New headline filter: This one’s a bit technical, but I’m using (and loving) it on my newly-relaunched version of Pearsonified, which is running on a pre-release version of Thesis 1.7. Basically, this simple filter will allow developers to show/hide headlines, and you’ll be able to use this to create more diverse post styles on your site. I’ve used it to create “asides,” which are a little less formal than my normal posts—here’s an example (note the absence of a headline and byline). It’s just a little thing, but oftentimes, things like this bring the most joy to people who like to customize their sites!
Beefed-up internationalization: Thanks to the help of our fans in other countries, I’ve been able to identify certain parts of the code that were not so translation-friendly. To fix this, I’ve gone through every single string in Thesis and made sure that everything is up to spec for internationalization. Now, it will be easier than ever to use handy translation software to translate Thesis into different languages!
Improved core element defaults: This one is best explained by way of example. Take, for instance, the comment links that appear after each post on your home page—you know, the ones enclosed in the curly braces like this: { 0 comments }. Those curly braces are nothing more than typographic embellishments that are native to the default Thesis skin, but in the past, I had mistakenly included these braces in the core code for this element. In version 1.7, I removed the braces from the default code, and I used filters to add those braces to the default Thesis skin instead. Ultimately, moves like this will give skin developers more flexibility and allow them to modify Thesis’ look and behavior with less resistance.
Dramatically improved code quality: I’ve touched on the subject in earlier points, but seriously—Thesis 1.7 is head and shoulders above previous versions in terms of the quality and efficiency of the core code. Ultimately, this results in a better Thesis experience no matter how you interact with the software, and in my book, that’s a huge win!

Why Favicons and how to create them

admin — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 16:07:29 +0000

Favicons are tiny touches to your website that say you care about the details. It’s also important for branding. If you’ve already got some form of brand identity, why not put it everywhere you can?

Favicons are typically 16×16, 32×32 favicon.ico files that show up in your browser address bar, tabs, as well as bookmarked pages.

If you already have a simple image you can convert one easily with many favicon generators such as this

You can also design your own pixel-by-pixel from scratch through sites like this.

If you have the wordpress thesis framework you can easily add it through

1. Save it to the root directory of your blog.

2. Open WordPress dashboard and select Thesis options.

3. Scroll down to Header Scripts and copy-paste the following code in text field.

Thesis 1.7 WordPress Framework is coming

admin — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 14:45:23 +0000

This is from Thesis wordpress theme creator Chris Pearson

First, I’m going to release Thesis 1.7 over the next couple of weeks.
Developers will get a beta version, and then everyone will get the final
release once bugs are squashed (I like to think there won’t be any bugs,
but then again, I WOULD think that ). Our last release, 1.6, was biased
toward design, but 1.7 is going to bring you more technical detail that
will further improve on our world-class SEO framework. Here’s what’s new:

— Options Manager. If you’ve ever delivered a Thesis site to a client,
then you know what a pain in the butt it can be to go into a new site and
set every single option by hand. With Thesis 1.7, you’ll be able to save
and restore the Thesis Options without having to be woefully inefficent.
Oh, and skin developers? You’ll be able to use this new functionality to
share font and design settings, and this will make it easier to help people
set up your awesome skins on their sites!

— Insane New SEO Controls and Detail. Thesis has always been optimized
and
ready to perform in the search engines, but there were still some areas
where exacting, precise controls were lacking. Not anymore. Version 1.7
contains a totally redesigned document that allows for SEO customization
at a level that no one has ever seen before. You’ll be able to supply
details, and even control the indexing (noindex, nofollow, noarchive) on
every stinkin’ page of your site. Better still, you’ll find a new page in
the Thesis Options panel that will give you total control over all these
details on your Category and Tag archive pages. Optimize EVERYTHING because
that’s how you win on the Web, and that’s what Thesis is all about.

— New Headline Filter. This one’s a bit technical, but I’m using (and
loving) it on my newly-relaunched version of Pearsonified
(http://www.pearsonified.com/), which is running on a pre-release version
of Thesis 1.7. Basically, this simple filter will allow developers to
show/hide headlines, and you’ll be able to use this to create more diverse
post styles on your site. I’ve used it to create “asides,” which are a
little less formal than my normal posts—here’s an example (note the absence
of a headline and byline):
http://www.pearsonified.com/2010/01/web-publishing-2010.php. It’s just a
little thing, but oftentimes, things like this bring the most joy to people
who like to customize their sites!

— Beefed-up Internationalization. Thanks to the help of our fans in other
countries, I’ve been able to identify certain parts of the code that were
not so translation-friendly. To fix this, I’ve gone through every single
string in Thesis and made sure that everything is up to spec for
internationalization. Now, it will be easier than ever to use handy
translation software to translate Thesis into different languages!

Building traffic on a new blog

admin — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:42:12 +0000

There’s a lot of talk about the ability to reach thousands through a blog and earning money at the same time, but the reality is it can be incredibly difficult to get going.

I put my skills to the test recently and started a fresh niche blog and it’s been going fairly solid so far.

Without any real credibility of any type I built a great community around a fresh blog in a matter of weeks. There was about 40,000 hits last month, averaged maybe about 10 minutes a day on it, and I didn’t pay 1-cent for any form of advertising.

Here are some tips from my recent experience

1. Blog about something you’d enjoy spending time on anyways. Preferably something you’re an expert on or something you’re passionate about. The right ideas at the right time can be a powerful force. I started http://monopolyhq.com simply because there was a lot of hype around the fact that it was integrating the monopoly board game with google maps and I personally love the game.

2. Get a memorable domain name. This usually means as short as possible, but there are plenty of remarkable long domain names. Try and get a keyword people would be searching on in there.

3. Build your site. I can’t recommend wordpress enough. Google loves content-focused blogs in general, but it loves wordpress even more.

4. Thesis. If you’re using wordpress, why not complete the awesomeness with the Thesis Framework. It’s a dynamic professional theme that is built on rock solid search-engine-optimized code. There’s a great user community around it and you can design it just about any way you want while keeping your content as clean and search-engine friendly as possible.

5. Create valuable content. As long as it’s discoverable – content remains king. Make it as clear and readable as possible. While they might not admit it, people love lists, rankings, charts, bullet points, etc. I typically keep posts below 300 words. If you’ve got a lot to say, break it down into a series of posts people can track with.

6. Design. Your site ought to leave an impression. Without reading any of the content, within the first five seconds without going below the fold of your site, a person ought to know what your site is all about. ie. for the monopoly site I branded it with similar monopoly colors and included a pair of dice slightly off the grid of the page just so readers know you’re not just scraping together content, but that you care about what you’re writing about.

6. Be a collaborator not a competitor. Especially if you’re new, build contacts, partnerships, links with other sites and blogs of similar interest. Leave useful comments on their posts (not spam!) and refer people to them as well if they’re offering something of value.

7. Find what’s giving your competitors traffic. Is there a certain forum or hub or tool that’s giving them the edge? You ought to be using at least that to give your unique content a chance. Tweak your title/description to keywords that people might be searching for rather than whatever terms you think might be unique or cool. ie. I originally had titled the blog ‘monopoly headquarters’ – but no one actually searches for that – they search for tips, hints, tricks, guides, etc.

8. Twitter. As over-hyped as it is, social media is still huge. However I’d recommend being highly strategic about it. If I had a really solid and important post I submitted it to digg. I didn’t just add anyone to twitter, each day i spent a minute following people who were using related keywords and hashtags. Your most passionate users will not only follow you back but refer others to you.

9. Community building. Respond to people’s comments, invite and affirm the contributions of others, share tools and unique insights, create a space for people to connect with one another rather than just you, etc. Think through why you’d personally return to your site as a user.

10. Enriching content.

Timely – post really hot content that you’ve just discovered that others can retweet and spread. Use link shorteners to make it concise and trackable.

Interactive – Use some form of comment subscription ((ie. subscribe to comments plugin, or intense debeate / disqus)

Automate – Use your sidebar to pick up other relevant content. ie. have a live twitter hashtag feed or create a google-alert so your site can be a portal to similar content elsewhere.

11. Tools. Make sure you’re using all possible tools at your disposal. While I didn’t use this, sometimes when you purchase a domain or hosting account they provide some google/yahoo ad credits. Use free tools like feedburner, popular posts and similar post plugins, and make translations easily available with tools like global translator. Use google analytics to find who your top referrers are and what key words are hot.

I hope these tips help. I’ve been blogging for a number of years so there are probably other more nuanced tips that I can’t recall at the moment. Right now the monopolyhq site is so fresh I’ve yet to get a pagerank which is really the next goal. Many people are saying page-rank isn’t as important any more, but even so, the principles behind a solid page rank will always remain important.

Do you have other tips for building traffic on a new blog?

Change Category Order

admin — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:06:58 +0000

Ever get stuck trying to change the way your categories are ordered, especially in the navigation bar?

I just found a very simple way of changing the category order. I’m using it right now on the menu for this thesis powered site as well.

Category Order Plugin

There are other ways through making custom pages, but if you don’t mind the plugin this makes it so easy.

Rounded Corners in WordPress / Thesis

admin — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 15:01:49 +0000

Rounded corners are extra sexy these days. Here’s how you can get it on your wordpress page without using transparent image icons.

It’s really simple, except that it’s a function of css3 that only works in firefox/safari, but not IE, so it’s not perfect.

Here’s all i did in my custom.css

.custom #page {
/* rounded corners */
-moz-border-radius: 20px; -webkit-border-radius: 20px;

the radius number determins how round of a corner it is, you can use 5px for a very small curve, or a larger number for something more curvy.

For example if you want to change the nav menu (like seen above) you can try this (btw this is for the new thesis 1.6 navigation menu)

.custom .menu, .custom .menu a, .custom .menu li ul {
-moz-border-radius: 10px ;
-webkit-border-radius: 10px ;
border-radius: 10px ;
}

Easy.

Thesis Framework 1.6 Guide

admin — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:54:16 +0000

This site is now on the brand spanking new Thesis 1.6. Here’s everything you need to know:

Quick Overview of Thesis 1.6 Features

Design & Color Option Changes – That’s right now instead of taking the time to edit the color of a font or a background by editing your custom.css file, now you can do it directly from your design panel in Thesis. There is also an option to automatically throw a cool shadow effect on the body of your theme just by simply checking a box!

Integration of Dropdown Menus – This has always been a big request of Thesis and now it’s finally here. I’ve not had a chance to experiment much with it yet, but you can now create your CSS only dropdown navigation from within the Thesis design panel. Another feature is the fact that you have to full ability to edit the anchor text of all your links in the menu and also easily change colors and fonts.

Custom File Editor – Thesis now also has a built in custom file editor with syntax highlighting so that you can now custom edit your files right in the admin area without having to change a file and then upload it to your site.

Other Changes – The IE only specific styles are now cache friendly where they haven’t been in the past. The frames around post images and thumbnails have been fixed so that they actually work. Finally the image rotator folder has been moved from the root of Thesis directly into the custom folder.

There’s a lot more finer details in making the product rock solid and completely awesome that you can find on the development blog here.

Upgrading Instructions – If you’re upgrading from a previous version best instructions (with screenshots and code snippets for the new nav menu) I’ve found so far are by Greg.

Overall, the upgrade is well worth it… I’m already looking forward to Thesis 2.0 now!

Discount – If you have yet to purchase Thesis or are looking to upgrade to the developer package, my thesis discount is still on if you’re interested.

Removing the Smiley Face from your footer

admin — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:52:51 +0000

For the longest time I thought that even though I had a developer edition of the Thesis framework and had removed the attribution from the footer, it was still forcing me to have an annoying little smiley face icon at the bottom of my customized theme.

Turns out it’s a function of the wordpress.com stats plugin.

Simplest way to remove it is to go into your themes stylesheet (style.css) and put the following code snippet:

img#wpstats{width:0px;height:0px;padding:0px;border:none;overflow:hidden}

If you’re using thesis, just head to custom.css and paste in;

.custom img#wpstats{width:0px;height:0px;padding:0px;border:none;overflow:hidden}

Problem solved, easy eh?

Thesis WordPress Theme Discount

admin — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 18:23:11 +0000

This will probably be the last time I ever mention it on this particular site, and I’m not sure how long I’ll run the promotion for…

but if you don’ t have thesis already, you can head to click for a great Thesis Framework discount / rebate offer and follow the instructions.

Hopefully you don’t need any more convincing that Thesis is the ultimate theme/framework for all your needs (Goodness, even Google’s SEO guru Matt Cutts uses it), here’s a quick video introduction.

Why WordPress | Thesis | Design ?

admin — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:03:16 +0000

WordPress. Quite simply it is the blog platform of choice. I believe in allowing every voice to be heard and wordpress is designed for writers. It’s great for businesses and non-profits as well because search engines like google and bing always love fresh and current content. Having a blog using wordpress allows you to maximize your current skill sets and passions and gives you a great opening to planet online. WordPress has also evolved to a broader CMS / content management system that can match just about any other site you’d find online.

Thesis. What’s the point of great content if no one sees it? Thesis has rock solid search-engine-optimization handled behind the scenes. The code is crisp and clean and allows you to customize it without ruining the perfect code behind it all. Thesis helps eliminate weighty plugins and also has an incredible community-base that is all about customization and effective designs.

Design. If you’ve got great content, and someone manages to find it… will it stick? Is it compelling and inspiring? Will it draw people back or turn people off? What technical limitations can you push to wow your readers and viewers? Design matters. The medium quite often is the message.

My hope is to tackle all three of these spaces… especially as someone who is continuously learning myself. Stay tuned for the road ahead, lots of good stuff coming.