Articles

Neatly Organized Layouts with Sass Maps and Susy

Sometimes, there is a need to repeatedly declare new layouts as a project goes along. As more layouts gets declared, it can get quite difficult to manage and change these layouts when the need arises.

Because of this, I've been toying with the idea of consolidating different kinds of layouts into a sass map and calling the maps with Susy. Thankfully, I managed to hit onto something decent recently. This post shares my method for organizing layouts with Susy

Static Grids with Susy 2

There are times where you might want to use grids that break that certain points instead of using a fully fluid grid. Susy lets you do that easily as well. But first, you'll need to do a few quick configurations to get that to work.

A Complete Tutorial to Susy 2 (Part 2)

We went through the very basics of Susy 2 and how it could be used to quickly create very complicated layouts in the previous tutorial on Susy. In this tutorial, we're going to dive deeper into Susy, and explore how it can be used to develop responsive websites easily.

A Complete Tutorial to Susy 2

Susy is a helper tool that lets you created ultra customizable grids on the fly easily.

Its been a while since Susy 2 is officially released. If you loved Susy 1, you will definitely love to use Susy 2 because it offers so much more flexibility.

This is a two part tutorial for Susy 2, and in this tutorial, I will be sharing with you how to create the Complex AG Grid with Susy 2.

A Complete Guide to @font-face

Custom fonts changes how typography looks on your website. Using the correct font can be a super big impact on how your website feels to visitors.

You will have to rely on the @font-face if you want to use a custom font that is not hosted in any webfont service.

In this post, I'll share how to add your custom font to your website using the @font-face rule.

Along with it, I'll also share how to make slight adjustments to the generated css properties so you can easily use them on your website.

How to structure HTML for an actual website (Part 2)

This is a continuation of the series on learning to write HTML for an actual website for the first time. We have looked at how to write html structure for the big picture with wrappers in the previous section, and we will be diving into the smaller details in this section.

How to structure HTML for an actual website

One of the first few major hurdles to creating an actual website if you're just starting out getting clear how you should structure your HTML content. Today, we're going to do a dive deep into this topic.

Understanding and Using CSS Positions

CSS Positions allow you to manipulate how elements are positioned to achieve many different visual effects. In this post today, we're going a little deeper to understand CSS positioning.

How to use Mailchimp API in Wordpress

There may have been times where you had to update Mailchimp regarding changes in user particulars. Most of the time, a plugin like Autochimp works incredibly well.

Unfortunately, non of these plugins work exceptionally well if you need to introduce complex things like interest groups.

In this article, I'll show you how to set up the Mailchimp API with Wordpress, and how you can use it to update a user interest group when he changes his profile. You'll learn how to use the Mailchimp API for other purposes along the way.

Compass Vertical Rhythms

Vertical Rhythms are part and parcel of good web design. Although they are important, they can be an incredibly chore to calculate.

Luckily, Compass has a great vertical rhythm module that helps clears this mess up.

Understanding CSS Box Sizing Property

The box sizing property is the single most useful property I have found ever since I started making websites. Border-box is the key to most website layouts simpler, to the point that even frameworks like Boostrap, Foundation and Susy use it.

In this post, you'll get to understand what this property is, and how it might save you countless hours of frustrations for your next website.

Understanding Wordpress Actions and Filters

Wordpress action and filter hooks are what makes Wordpress incredibly extendable. These hooks are very easy to use if someone else has already wrote them, and you just had to hook something in. Understanding how they work is another matter entirely.

In this post, I'm going to walk you through my personal understanding of Wordpress action and filer hooks after a few hours of experiments.

How to find the Wordpress CSS File

A theme bought off the marketplace can never be 100% what you intended your website to look like. There are always small things that you want to change.

Travis asked me a question on finding out where to edit Wordpress theme's CSS files and I thought I'd just share it you.

If you had bought a Wordpress theme and wanted to change how the website looks in some areas, this post is for you.

How to Quicken Wordpress Development with Grunt JS

A couple of days ago Chris Coyier's post regarding Grunt JS on the 24ways blog got me interested in playing with Grunt JS again. I've tried tinkering with Grunt but I never gotten it to work correctly for me. After reading Chris's post and two more days of tinkering, I manage to come up with a configuration have helped hasten my wordpress development dramatically.

A Complete Tutorial to Susy (Part 2)

We have gone through the <a href="http://www.zellwk.com/blog/a-complete-tutorial-to-susy/">absolute basics to Susy in the previous week</a> and looked at how to create complete layout grids simply just by using the span column mixin.

In this post, we're going to explore other parts of Susy that lets you easily push or pull your content block left or right. I'll also share with you how responsiveness is built straight into the Susy framework.

Lets begin by looking at some of the padding and margins mixins available to us.

A Complete Tutorial to Susy

Susy is a plugin to Compass that allows you to create customizable grid frameworks easily. It makes responsive design extremely easy by removing the need to manually calculate widths.

If you need to create repsonsive websites do not want to constrain your design with available frameworks out in the open, Susy might be the perfect answer.

This is the first of a two part tutorial that covers the basics of Susy.

In this tutorial, we are going to install Susy, set up Susy defaults and understand how to create the <a href="http://susy.oddbird.net"> 10-column complex nested grid AG test </a> found on the susy website.

Tools I use for learning and using colors

I mentioned how I felt that <a href="http://zellwk.com/blog/why-color-pickers-and-palettes-are-bad-for-you/">Color Picker and Palette Galleries hinders our workflow process</a> in my previous post and I thought I'd just complement that post with a few tools that I find are exceptionally useful.

Why color pickers and palettes are bad for you

Color is one complicating element that is very difficult to get correct when designing. While scouring the web in search for methods to learn select colors for my designs, I inevitably find many articles about picking colors with tools such as Adobe Kuler, palette galleries like COLOURlovers.

While all these are great methods, they ironically may hinder our learning and workflow much more than they help…

Wordpress 101 – 5 critical things you need to know to use Wordpress effectively.

People who have used Wordpress for ages all say that it is extremely to use. Those who are new to wordpress, however, dont usually think that way when they first set their eyes on the backend.

I felt the same way when I first started with Wordpress. Stuff just gets easier and easier to do overtime and I learnt more becoming a theme developer.

In this post, I'll like to share with you the very basics of setting up a wordpress, and talk about 5 critical things you need to know to use Wordpress.

After knowing these, the things such as changing your navigation menu and creating a post would be a walk in the park.

Let's jump into this real quick.

5 things you can do to keep learning when things turn unexpectedly difficult

Learning anything from scratch isn't a problem. In the beginning, milestones between each difficulty level are small and it is easy to get a sense of accomplishment for each small step you take.

After one or two weeks, "reality" sets in. It becomes increasingly difficult to hit the next milestone. Sometimes people just forget the initial enthusiam they. Sometimes, they become "too busy". Most people give up on learning at this stage. Some persist for another month or two before giving up. Yet, others continue to learn and thereafter begin to excel in whatever they do. Is there a secret in learning?

Over the last half a year, I have gone from knowing nothing about designing and coding, to building two wordpress themes and I am still learning. My motivation is still strong.

In this post, I would like to share with you how I view learning after persevering for 6 months and how I kept my motivation levels up.