I suspect that I will use this in the future but not for full meaty posts. This app doesn’t support the landscape keyboard. It’s ok though, the iphone has decent presictive text. Hmm. Well, I did say decent.

I’ve also uploaded a plugin that will create a special CSS template for mobile browsers. It’s a text only templete at the moment, although in the future I expect to change the colors and maybe even add a small logo image.

The more I type on this thing, the faster I get. It’s pretty cool, but I wonder about adding images and links into the post. I’ll mess with it some more next time.

Thursday is Ciriana’s going away party. I have something special planned for her and I need to go work on it. I’ll he sending pictures to my Flickr in case you want to see her surprise. Also, if anyone wants to give her some words of encouragement, head over to the contact page and send her a message. I know that she’ll appreciate it. There’s an option to send her the message instead of me.

Wow. Look at all I typed with only my little iPhone! Man, this thing is awesome!

Update: I edited the format a bit.   The paragraph tag doesn’t seem to end with every paragraph when using the app, or I am not doing something right.   I also can’t rotate that image, which is good because now it shows what happens when you upload an image using the app.   This is still a very useful add-on to the WordPress bloggin platform, though.

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Evil

So… all you visitors still running IE6… um… sorry?   Yea.   Sorry.

I don’t know how long this has been going on, but a rogue script has been crashing the javascript runtime in IE6.   I found out today as I was changing some tiny bits of template code.   I was testing in IE6 when I recieved an Operation Aborted error.   Doh.

Ciriana actually told me a few weeks ago that she couldn’t see certain things on the site from work.   At the time, I thought they were blocking javascripts as a security measure.   Now I know that it was those little   social bookmarking buttons.

I’m not sure which link was causing the issue.   I ripped the piece of code off the templates as soon as I found out it was breaking IE (which doesn’t take much ).   I’ll test that code later, but for now, I removed the links altogether.   Which isn’t a bad thing since I don’t think they were being used anyway.

In my defense, I test all my templates in IE6 and 7, Firefox 2 and 3, Opera, Safari, and now Chrome.   Although the last three rarely give me any issues so I don’t always test with them.   Maybe when I made that change I forgot to test in all browsers.   I’m sure this is a big rookie mistake, and my punishment is loosing whatever readers come to my doorstep with IE6.   Since they can’t load any of the content, they probably just leave.   Sorry.   Gah.   I’ve had those buttons for a long time now.   That means this error has been happening for some time.   :/

Hmm.   On the other hand… why the heck are you still using IE6?   Seriously, now that you can load my site, read this.   If you’re forced to use it, that’s one thing.   All you other people?   You fail.

This is a good learning experience, though.   There is so much involved in designing and maintaining a website and on top of all that, a programmer needs to make sure every bit of code plays nice.   Tough work.   Glad I am more into design.  

You know, now that I think about it, this also explains why Google analytics shows a low visitor count with IE6 browsers.   Damn.   And here I thought I was making a difference.

XD

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Happy Holidays!

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Although, not a completely minimal design, the new layout is cleaner and intuitive.   My old logo is not gone, I just need to recolor and resize it so it will fit in the new area.

Some things I want to point out pertaining to design:

The first navigation you see is Pages at the top.   This takes you to my separate pages displaying specific content, like the Shop (working on that too – shirts and stuff) and Photo Albums.   This is laid out at the top in larger font to attract your attention.   I think it’s a very easy layout and I hoped that it wasn’t too confusing with the separate navigation on the right and below.

The right navigation is quick stuff.   You want to contact me, boom, there it is.   Search?   Right there.   Subscribing to the blog is MUCH easier with this new link.   It links to a page, which will also get changed around, that lists the different subscriptions available.   The point of this section is to provide fast and easy access to the entirety of the site without long lists of links.   The search function is a big help to giving readers quick access to content they want to read about.

Finally, the Category navigation.   This might be the straw the broke the camels back – for some.   I actually like it; it is a great way to discover new material on my site.   The search tool allows readers to find something they are looking for.   The category navigation provides readers with material they aren’t looking for.   This is important: if they aren’t looking for it, don’t make it obvious.   Make it available, but don’t force feed it to them.

The sidebars are a pain in the ass.   I want to display sooo much content there, but there is never enough room at the top.   When I browse other blogs, the sidebar is usually cluttered with so many widgets and lists that I just ignore them.   I am guilty of this crime, which is why I didn’t like the dual sidebar with the previous design.   I was trying to display too much info.

The sidebar should be for small bits of content or links.   If they’re too big, they take up lots of primo real estate.   I’m still struggling with perfecting my own philosophy on sidebars, but I think I am headed in the right direction now.

Lastly, the most important area, the content.   The content is why you come here.   This must be easy to read and easy to follow.   Nothing is easier to read than black text on a white background.   It can be boring sometimes, but it’s something that can’t be helped.   Sure, sometimes you can use contrasting colors effectively and still be aesthetically pleasing, but like I said, nothing beats black on white.

Also pertaining to the content layout is the meta data.   The title, date, comments, and tags all have a place.   Do you know where this place is?   It’s hard to figure out a good layout that isn’t the same old layout.   I tried for something different on my last design and I really liked it – it’s not perfect, but it’s a good start.   There may be too much going on – the Share This button may push it over the edge, so expect that to get moved somewhere else.

That’s about it. If anyone wants to use this theme for their blog, it will be provided free at FiveMediaDS.com later this week.   There are some finishing touches I need to go though in the code before I can put it up.   I am going to try and convert it so it can be used in a Blogger blog as well.

As always, let me know what you think.

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This crap is hard enough as it is.   Stop using Internet Explorer, use Firefox… or Opera… even Safari, I don’t care, just stop using IE, especially version 6!   Come on!   Version 7 has been out for months, and I still get hits from users stuck on version 6.   Double u, tee, eff.   Windows XP has auto updates, which means that it should have downloaded IE7 by now, that is unless you turned updates off!   Why would you do that to Windows?   It’s more vulnerable than a drunk depressed 21 year old college girl in a bar.   Turn that puppy back on and please do me a favor and stop using version 6, at least.   If you really care, use Firefox.

OK, rant over.   Go back about your b’ness.

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I am really excited; this is my first COMPLETE custom template for WordPress.   There are some tiny bugs here and there that I will get to when I feel like it, but for now, let us just marvel in my new favorite website.

There are some tweaky things right now, like the Projects and Album pages for example.   They don’t load the posts right now, but they will tomorrow.   It’s like 2 in the morning, and I need to go to bed, but I will be back on the keyboard later today!

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The new version does away with that light blue, which I never really cared for, but it went well together.   My logo gets a teeny little face lift, nothing big with it except the background.   The biggest gripe I have of the version 2 was the sidebar.   It really didn’t flow – it didn’t jive.   This new design contains each widget in the sidebar in it’s own box, and overall, it looks cleaner and spiff-y-er.

On the other hand, version 3 does away with much of the personal touches that made it our website.   I say our even though Ciri has only posted once, and I had to bribe her to do it too.   The point is that I removed all the little Mii’s of Ciri and myself.   I’ll find a new way to make it more personal again.   I don’t want to make it look like a typical blog design.

I’m also updating my templates.   The templates control how my posts and pictures show up on your computer screen.   I think I figured out how to show all my projects in a list form.   This way, any post I make for a specific project will automatically be routed to my Projects page in a nice, easy to read way.   Right now, the projects page is set to display any post I tag as a project related post.

I’ve finished building my server so I can test my new design before I actually implement it here.   One day, when you come back, BAM -

The Guamaso, Version 3.0

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The comic will be about our little lives and the workings of my mind.   Scary, I know, but I hope it will be at least a little funny.   That will be on BonsaiKitties.net, but again, it’s just a blank page.   I’ve been thinking about this for some time now, but I was too busy to really do anything about it.   Now, that I have dramatically improved my design skills, I think I will be able to handle it.

Lastly, all of those sites will be under my little web site hosting company called Cwazy Media.   I know, it sounds silly, but that’s me.   I figured the name was a perfect fit for the content it will be hosting.   Sarcastic, silly, and, well, insane.   That’s Cwazy Media.   Anyway, that will be at cwazymedia.com, but that’s a blank page too.

I will start with Cwazy Media, since that will hold everything, then work on The Roasted Market, and lastly, Bonsai Kitties.   It should take me a couple of months to get everything done, until then bear with me.   I have been taking a lot of pictures of Izzy lately, so I will at least start posting daily pictures of her and us.   We also have some big news, but I am at work, so I might not have time to post about it until tomorrow.   No, Ciriana is not pregnant again.   Jeez.   Ok, Juan out.

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It’s pretty much done, I am just working on the bugs now. Mammy knows about it, hopefully she will post to it with stuff and pictures. Anyway, check out my saaawweeet design at mammy.guamaso.com. I’m also designing a new site for myself but that’s for another post. In the mean time, check out Mammy’s site and let me know what you think below. Juan, out.

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Designer's Color Manual

My first query into the theories is about color theory. This is one of my favorite and toughest subjects. Every child learns colors in school and they learn what color is what; green is for the grass, blue is the sky and ocean, orange is the sun etc.. But what they don’t learn is the theory behind all these visible colors, like red, green, and blue are the primary colors of light. Even though we were all taught it was red, blue and yellow. I could go on forever about it and not make any sense… so rather then seem like an illiterate fool, I am just going to talk about this book: Designer’s Color Manual.

It’s pretty… with all the colors and pictures. Seriously, it is really well laid out, images and diagrams to explain the different concepts and ideas. There is a lot of information that a self taught designer should know and for me, it will help with designing our landscape too… silly reason to enjoy a book, but I am beginning to enjoy landscape design too now. I was afraid of putting together a mish-mash of colors in our yard, so now I am learning about color theory and soon I will be able to design a better web page and maybe even a landscape, since color is what we all recognize before text, right?

Want to support The Guamaso?   Want to buy this book?   Two birds with one click!   Buy it here and support The Guamaso!

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