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Blog Development: A Complete Theme Redesign by TRH Development

By LifeNo Comments
people-per-hour-logo Over the years my blog theme had become out of date and the CSS had been cannibalised. So I was looking for a WordPress expert to do a complete redesign of the current theme. I found Tia from from TRH Development on people per hour.

I explained to Tia what I wanted, we agreed a price and she got to work. My role was to give her feedback as we went along. Here’s a list of work Tia did for me:

  • Complete redesign of my blog using a child theme of Twenty Fourteen (to allow for theme updates).
  • Coded to the highest HTML5 and CSS3 standards. This CSS3 was essential as the style sheet on my old theme had been cannibalised over the years and was full of conflicts.
  • WordPress Menu Functionality – including support for sub-menus. A major reason for this update was to allow me to use the added functionality features of WordPress.
  • A mobile/tablet version of the site.
  • The ability for the reader to Switch between the Desktop/Mobile versions, which is possible by using a link in the footer.
  • Removal of the ‘Go’ button with the search input field.
  • Archives expand to include post titles.
  • Photo caption boxes have been slimed down at the sides, making them stylistically look better.
  • Various minor tweaks based on my feedback to make the theme’s look as close as possible to the old theme.

Tia also added two great new features:

  • Pagination – which is the page bar under the blog posts on the home page. I really like this page browsing experience for readers.
  • Lightbox image viewer with play/pause slideshow. I love this. I have some great photos. Now if you click any image on a photo post or page (such as Photos) it brings up the image full size without leaving the page and allows you to play/pause a slideshow.

To follow on from Tia’s superb work, I also made a few minor tweaks to the blog myself:

  • Changed the font from Arial to Verdana.
  • Removal of the large Amazon banner on the sidebar.
  • Added book cover thumbnail images on the I’m Reading and On My Bookshelf sections on the sidebar.
  • Changed UL in style sheet to square.

Tia at TRH Development was awesome. I intend on using her again, probably later in the year, to design me a WordPress theme for my professional writers website. My feedback for Tia on people per hour really says it all:

Awesome. Brilliant. Excellent Communicator. Job done to the highest standard. I can’t heap enough praise on Tia for the expert knowledge & skills along with her professionalism. Am already planning my next project with her.

So if you need a Developer for a website, I highly recommend Tia from TRH Development.

Blog soon,

Antony

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Friday 1 August 2014

Minor Tweaks

By The Web, ThinkingNo Comments

The internet giants like Amazon, ebay & Google only make small tweaks to their sites, rather than design overhauls. The reason for this, is that it gives visitors a sense of familiarity. Over the years my blog has had many designs (see Geeky Post: Website Development). I love the current site design of my blog, but like any design their are flaws and things that could be improved.

So here’s a list of minor tweaks I’ve recently made to the design and functioning of the blog:

  • WordPress Menu functionality added.
  • Booklist pages now have book image covers, along with a link to Buy The Book on Amazon. Pages include: Book List 2014 & Book Lists.
  • Older Book Review blog posts now all have had image book covers.
  • Rearranged layout of comment form, including: changing title to ‘Your Comment’ and adding ‘Name:,’ ‘Email:’ & ‘Website:’ labels before respective textfields rather than after.
  • Removed spam-stopper Plugin, which required an extra question on the comment form to confirm that you’re human. This was removed as already have Conditional CAPTCHA for WordPress which is sufficiently effective. This overall makes commenting/interacting on my blog easier.
  • On comments, Authors websites (appear as link on their name) open in new window/tab.
  • On sidebar, added an Amazon banner that isn’t java based. This increases compatibility with Apple devices, such as the iPad and the iPhone.
  • On sidebar, shorted About Me section to less than 50 words (46 words to be precise).
  • On sidebar, added Book Chic Club and Urbangay under Blogs of Interest.
  • On sidebar, removed several blogs that haven’t been updated in sometime under Blogs of Interest.

I’ve got more small tweaks planned over the coming months, along with the usual reviews and other great content.

Write soon,

Antony

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Monday 21 April 2014

Four Hundred Posts

By The Web2 Comments

This is my four hundredth blog post since I went back to using WordPress about five years ago, before then the site existed in other various formats see Geeky Post: Website Development for previous formats. Whether you’ve been following my blogging for the last five years, had a browse through the archives or are a relatively new reader I wanted to use this post to reflect on some of my life experiences and my growth as a person in this time.

I’ve had many Good Times some of which have been watching various comedians and musical performers. I’ve seen Dylan Moran, Russell Howard, French & Saunders, The Feeling, Tina Turner, Pink, Kylie, John Barrowman and Steps. These experiences have been shared by the most important people in my life my friends and family.

At the beginning of this WordPress blog I wrote about people that inspire me, explaining how my friends and family inspire me. It’s as true today as it was then. Among my close friends I’ve wrote about good times with Simon & Chrys, Sye, Steve, Jayne and Kay. A few recent good times that spring to mind are a trip with Simon & Chrys to Liverpool and visiting Anglesey with Simon.

There have been a few new additions to the family including Shaun the long lost brother, his wife Sarah (see The Wedding of the Year) and their family unit. Dylan and Russell, my two gorgeous bengal kittens have been brought home and added to my family unit. I’m so thankful to have the love and support from my friends and family.

My love life has included dates, relationships, relationship problems and break ups involving several different men. I’ve moved to Spain to start a new life with someone and then moved back when it didn’t work out. I’ve learned from the relationships and although I’ve not yet found that someone special to spend my life with; I’m sure I’ll meet my Mr. Right eventually.

I made the choice to go back to University to complete my Nursing Degree, successfully being awarded a BSc Nursing Hons Upper Second (2:1). I’ve moved out of Nurses accommodation to a grotty house-share and then bought my first home.

Happy times have to be balanced with sad times; saying goodbye to M and experiencing grief after my younger brother Alex passed away are among the few truly sad times in the last 5 years. These events in my life along with others have helped my paganism and spirituality flourish. This has been seen with my Reiki One qualification, my work with Apollo and through me fully embracing pagan festivals such as Samhain.

My writing has developed with changes to subject matters, style, editing, grammar and spelling. Subject matters have changed, from writing purely about me and my life to an increase in reviews of books and films. I feel I’ve managed to keep a careful balance between writing about my life and reviews. I have retained and continue to retain that this is a personal blog, that I write more for me than anyone else. A place to write about experiences I have, memories I want to keep and thoughts that I want to share or reflect upon.

My own individual writing style seems to be unfolding although I’m not sure quite how, or what it will look like when it’s fully formed. I do know my writing is increasingly descriptive and seems at times to have a voice. I used to a write blog post and hit the publish button, whereas now I spend more time editing the post than writing the first draft. This has hopefully led to better grammar and spelling – although I don’t claim these to be perfect. In the past my blogging was a spontaneous event, now I try to write a little each day and this change has probably led to the improvement in my writing.

As I have continued to experience life I’ve certainly grown and developed in many different ways. Life’s events have influenced the way I think, feel or act in situations as they do for everyone. I have enjoyed writing about these events and continue to do so, so here’s looking forward to the next four hundred (plus) posts.

Write soon,

Antony



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Sunday 14 October 2012

Geeky Post: Website Development

By Technology, The Web3 Comments

This is a Geeky post and in it I’m going to show you how my website has developed over the years.

Version 1
My first version was created in HTML and looked like this:

It had sections to it: Personal, Carrer and Occult. It had Quick Links News on the home page.

The Navigation was simplistic as was the site as a whole. This first version of the site was online when I was 16 years old and at that time I didn’t have the domain antonysimpson.com.

Version 2

Version 2 was designed with sidebar Navigation in order to allow me to populate the site with much more content. It again was designed in HTML using tables. It contained much more photos than Version 1 including a photo’s section.


New features included a News page that had paragraphs of my news including Site Updates to let the visitors know what had been developed and updated. The Occult section of Version 1 became religion as I accepted Paganism as part of my religion. This version of the site was online around the time when I was 18 years old.

Version 3

Most significantly in Version 3 was the new blue design. I kept the sidebar navigation as I liked that it allowed me to populate the rest of the site with more content. The site used a combination of HTML and PHP, using Iframes. Removed the Site Updates but added on a Last Updated sentence on the home page so that people know when it was last updated.


The news section (above) had a page per news entry and an archive like a blog.

Version 4

Kept the same blue colours design. Kept the last updated sentence on the home page. Moved the Navigation to the top of the page. The main feature of this site was a wordpress blog which unfortunately I deleted being unable to pull off the posts and saving them. This was probably the shortest version of the site ever online, really I only focused on the blog.

Version 5

Again I kept the blue design (look above). It was the most advanced coding I had done so far. I liked the photos and had more of them to use as technology developed. I kept the Last Updated sentence and added a hit counter.


I created a windows-style little windows for the content. For the first time I had a guestbook.

Version 6

The major change in this design was the colours, using oranges and reds. The site design was the same, but I uploaded much more content.

Version 7

Easier on the eye colours were used. Advanced PHP coding used. Meta tags added so that I would appear in search results. For the first time I used an RSS feed. This was probably one of the longest sites online.

Navigation returned the sidebar with little yellow star bullet points! I discovered photoshop and used it to make my own banners. Put news on the home page. Kept expanding the site adding new sections and pages.

Also added Coming Soon – so that visitors would know what new content was to be added and Site Updates makes a return so visitors know what’s been recently updated.

Version 8

My friend Sye designed this site for me. I asked him to design it after seeing his cartoon artwork (see Funny cartoons from a friend and More funny cartoons from a friend). The idea was to create a noticeboard with a piece of paper pinned on to it. The Navigation was cartoon images that changed on mouse over at the top of the page.

The site was designed in dreamweaver using tables in a blog style. I also had a cartoon logo designed by Sye. I decided to have a wordpress blog for the home page and made some minor changes to the design to accommodate this to the version you see today:

So that’s how my sites developed over the years. Do you think I should make some changes to the current version or create a new version? Post a comment.

Antony

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Saturday 20 February 2010
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