Archive for August, 2009

Web Design Course

Tuesday, August 25th, 2009

Guelph-HumberI’ll be teaching Web Design at the University of Guelph-Humber again this fall. In addition to the in-class lectures and hands-on lab work I’m also going to be posting content here for both my in-class students as well as other people who might be interested in learning the basics of web design.

I’ve had almost 40,000 people view the first DreamWeaver tutorial I posted on YouTube and have had a lot of requests to continue posting more, so this fall I’m hoping to make more of the topics covered in class available as video tutorials that anyone can follow along with.

If you’re one of my students, or would just like to check out the books I’m going to be using in class the course textbooks we’ll be using are:

Creating a Web Site in Dreamweaver CS4: Visual QuickProject Guide by Nolan Hester
Creating a Web Site in Dreamweaver CS4: Visual QuickProject Guide by Nolan Hester

It’s similar to the book I’ve used in previous years but more focused on DreamWeaver which should be more helpful for the later section of the course where some students had challenges in the past. It’s a relatively small + inexpensive book.

Photoshop CS4, Volume 1: Visual QuickStart Guide by Elaine Weinmann and Peter Loureka
Photoshop CS4, Volume 1: Visual QuickStart Guide by Elaine Weinmann and Peter Loureka

I’ve had numerous students ask for an additional book to help with PhotoShop. This one is a bit more expensive, but still not nearly as much as many University textbooks.

Both books should be available at the Guelph-Humber bookstore in early September. They’re for the current versions of DreamWeaver + PhotoShop (CS4) which is what students would be downloading from Adobe and/or buying from any stores. That should be the version we have in the labs as well.


Domain Coupons which Make your Website Name Affordable!

Sunday, August 23rd, 2009

Using search engine analysis software and keyword trackers you will manage to find out that domain coupons and registrar coupons are very popular key phrases in web. Nevertheless, according to the data provided by recent independent researches, most webmasters have never heard about domain coupons, specials, promo codes registrars usually issue to provide webmasters with various discounts.It should be noted that registrar coupons can give a good chance to economize and find really affordable registration services. In this article readers will be provided with detailed information on domain coupons and their usage. Simply go ahead and read the story carefully from a very beginning to the end! Actually, all registrar coupons or domain coupons are easily divided into the following categories:- Purchase registrar coupons. The codes providing one time discount to order affordable services. It is possible to save a few dollars or just have one year for free.- Renewal coupons. These codes are usually applied when renewing an existing domain name.- Transfer coupons – domain coupons applied to transfer websites either to a new registrar.- Additional services – together with registrar coupons website owners can be also get the discounts for the following services: internet marketing solutions, website updates, SEO services, free webmaster tools, PPC management service, etc.- Specials.- Free SSL certificates, free privacy protection for domains, dedicated IP addresses, bandwidth, traffic and many other competitive advantages.- Exclusive coupons – these codes are usually issued by companies for VIP customers and bulk domain purchasers. So, there are the special registrar coupons which allow webmasters with more than 100 domain names to get the best discounts for ordering new or renewing existing services.- Temporary coupons – these codes are issued temporary and valid within the certain period of time. Such a well-known company as Name Cheap often provides temporary domain coupons which are replaced by new ones each month. Just check them from time to time to order really cheap services.- Permanent coupons – these promo codes are valid for life and never expire. Most people are usually puzzled on how to find the best domain coupons and select a reliable company. For this reason we have decided it would be nice to share the best methods to help our readers search and use discount codes and select registrars effectively:- First of all we would advise you to consider all available registrar coupons provided by the company you are currently interested in. Then research all of them properly and select the most suitable one. Try to take into account both purchase and renewal coupons your favorite company can provide for its affordable web hosting services;- Visit a popular registrar coupons website to consider other companies offering similar packages and compare their discounts for ordering affordable domain registration services;- Remember that a good webmaster forum is a helpful informational resource for people who are searching for the best hosts, registrars and independent customer reviews and also considered to be the most suitable place to discuss the latest valid domain coupons;- Once an affordable registrar is selected don’t hesitate to ask customer support provide you with the best registrar coupons and other beneficial specials before begin submitting an order. In order to simplify this procedure we would recommend you to subscribe RSS and receive all important news on domain coupons and discounts in the nearest future. Make sure that when acting in such a way it will be possible for you to find the best registrar coupons and buy affordable and reliable domain registration services quickly.- You can use search engines and specifying such key phrases as domain coupons and registrar coupons. Make sure that you will simply find a lot of good websites and resources to go and find the best deals!Article Source: http://www.webdesignarticles.net.

Mosaicus – Ultimate Blogger Template (Updated)

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

Hello everybody! Today I bring you Mosaicus, it is really a ultimate Blogger template like you have never seen before! Last week I fell in love for this template, I thought it was an awesome design, So I decided to get inspiration from it, giving my own touches to create my new template.

I got many great feedback regarding to Photoplus, I thank you all for that! The good news is that Mosaicus is like a “upgrade” for Photoplus, I took note of almost all recommendations you guys gave me, and added some new features to it, including a white and minimalistic design.

This template has a premium jQuery feature called FullSize to show up a bigger version of each photo.

Now you can show your photography, images or whatever you want even better, I have added post pages, so you can write descriptions of your work! The Fullsize feature goes on the post image, not on the main page thumbnail.

How to post on Mosaicus


Your posts on Mosaicus shouldn’t be only an image tag, now you have to include a thumbnail of each image. For better understanding, look at the following post model:

Here’s the post model:

<span class=’thumbnail’><img src=’THUMBNAIL_URL’/></span>

<img longdesc="FULLSIZE_IMAGE_URL" src="POST_IMAGE_URL" />

Note: The thumbnail size should be 229×158 pixels.

I recommend you guys to save it as post model, it will make your life easier.

Features:

  • Minimalistic
  • White, Clean
  • jQuery Premium Features
  • Easy to customize
  • Gallery Style
  • Ultimate Blogger Template

NOTE: I JUST FIXED THE LINKS ON IE, IT’S NOW WORKING FINE ON ALL BROWSERS, PLASE DOWNLOAD THE TEMPLATE FILE AGAIN.

Do you like this blog? Spread the word!

Saturday, August 8th, 2009

Spread the Word!

The social media is the most powerful tool to promote a website nowadays. Besides a great content and usability, a sucessful website should have a good comunity of loyal users that help a lot when it comes to spreading the word.

If you really enjoy this website, If I make your life a bit easier with my services, support and templates, please take a look on this post, and find out how you can help me spreading the word around, so many people will visit my website, and that will encourage me to make even better posts and templates for you guys!

1. SUBSCRIBE!

I provide you 3 easy-to-acess links to the most used kinds of subscription, RSS, email and twitter. By subscribing you guys will never miss out and will always be in touch with all the stuff happening here every day. And c’mon guys, who doesn’t have a twitter account ? Follow me on twitter!

2. FOLLOW!

I would love to your face on the Google Followers widget, it encourages me to keep helping and supporting people here everytime I see my followers number growing. I would like to build a really strong community of blogger users being helped and helping out other users every day! It would be a dream.

3. TWEET!

Twitter is the most powerful thing that could happens on internet. It’s everywhere and everybody has a twitter account. So please, no matter how many followers you have, try to click the "retweet" button, I promise it won’t take you 2 seconds to spread the word, and that will help this blog grow a lot!

4. SHARE!

Please use the sharing links, they are not there just for nothing. If everyone who gets help from me use at least one time the sharing and subscribing buttons, I would get even more happier, and believe me, when I am happy, I love to make templates, and love to help people. So that’s what you want right ? :)

Photoplus – Free Premium Blogger Template

Thursday, August 6th, 2009

Photoplus is a great theme for photographers that want to use Blogger as a portfolio. It is really a premium template. I came up with this idea after looking trough the feedback I get from you guys. Many people ask me to create templates like this, and here is one more. This template has a premium jQuery feature called FullSize to show up a bigger version of each photo.


This template is for photography only, so if you need to show texts or anything else, It will not work.

I also would like to thank CSS Reflex for this great tutorial.

How to post on Photoplus

Your posts on photoplus should be only an image tag. This means that the title will not be shown on the main page, it has only SEO purposes. Same thing with Labels, It will serve you only to organize the main menu.

Here’s the post model:

<img alt="A description of the image goes here." longdesc="LINK_TO_THE_FULLSIZE_IMAGE" src="LINK_TO_THE_THUMBNAIL" />

Note: The thumbnail size should be 187×128 pixels.

I recommend you guys to save it as post model, it will make your life easier.

Features:

  • Photography
  • jQuery Special Feature
  • Web 2.0
  • Easy to customize
  • 3 Column Footer

Tagland – Free Premium Blogger Template

Tuesday, August 4th, 2009

TagLand is a well designed Blogger template, It is also very organized and it’s fast loading as well. Amazing for showing media content such as videos and pictures. The dark colors gives TagLand a serious looking which can be used to corporate blogging as well.


Features:

  • Well Designed Graphics
  • Red, Dark Gray
  • Cool Search Widget
  • Easy to customize
  • Left Sidebar
  • Fast Loading

How to fix the search bar problem

Go to your Dashboard > Page Elements, CLick to edit the search widget, and paste this code inside:

<p align="center"><form id="searchthis" action="/search" style="display:inline;" method="get"> <input id="search-box" value="Type Keywords Here" name="q" size="25" type="text"/> <input id="search-btn" value="Search" type="submit"/> </form></p>

Save it, and you are done.