Articles

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.

How to organize and edit your CSS painlessly

It is very common to have to change CSS codes midway through a design at some point or another. Because of the way most CSS codes are structured, it is usually painful to sieve through the whole code and look for the particular area you would like changed.

Whats more, if colors or text sizes have to be changed, it can be disastrous if you miss out on a few elements and an absolute headache if you can't find where they're located

In this article, I'm going to introduce one simple add-on that really helped me with organizing and changing my CSS codes.

Make your website more professional with 1 simple step

One of the blocks I had while I designed my first website was how much space should I leave after my headings or paragraphs. Along the same question, how much space should I give within the line of text themselves. My first approach to this whole process was to eyeball it. You might have done the same

There's nothing wrong with eyeballing the amount of space and setting it according to your gut feeling. However, there is a much better approach to setting this amount of space and we're going to cover it in this article today.

Creating a clean and simple website (Part 3 - Style the content and 6 items to take note)

Now that you've managed to create the layout and header sections, its time to move into the meat of the series. In this article, I'll discuss how I styled the content section on my blog and also mention various elements that are easily overlooked by first time designers. If you're working on your own blog, this would be a great post to pick up important design considerations and to see if you missed anything out.

Creating a clean and simple website (Part 2 – Styling the header)

Continuing the series on creating a clean and simple website, I'm going to share with you how I coded my blog from scratch. In this article, I'll discuss how to go about first creating fixed width layouts using pixels. If you're new to this, you might want to check out the previous article on [writing HTML][1] for the website that we're creating

II'll try to explain everything clearly and simply in a way that you should be able to follow even if its your first time looking at CSS. My blog design definitely doesn't have the bells and whistles around the internet, and thats why I think its such a good place to start from.

9 Important CSS Properties You Must Know

CSS can be seem to be difficult at a first glance when you're new to it. You may be confused about the different CSS properties, what they do and what they are for. Don't worry, I got you covered.

Have you heard of the 80/20 rule where 80% of the results come from 20% of the effort? Its the same in CSS. Which is why in this post, I'm going to talk about the most highly used CSS properties you will definitely need to know.

Its going to be a post packed full of information. Lets dig in.

Creating a clean and simple website (Part 1 – HTML)

After getting to know the structure of the website look like, its time to create them. In this article, we're going to explore how to create the HTML content of a website.

The Layout of a Website

Websites have a structure, just like houses have pillars. Understanding the structure of a website and how it is made up is an essential first step in creating a website. Today, I'll dive into the overview of what a website structure look like, and how planning this structure in advance can really help you learn to create a website.

Why I started learning about web design and how you can do it too

Until a few months ago, I always thought programming was something that I would never venture into. I really see the value, yet, I never really dared venture into the massive lines of code.

Honestly, I was afraid. I was afraid of the thought of giving up halfway because the workload was so tough. I gave up along the way a few times, but managed to pull through till today. It wasn’t as bad as I thought after all. People have the misconception that you have to be damn smart to program, but it really isn’t the case.

If you feel the same, this post about my story could give you something to think about.