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44 Websites to Find Free Fonts

Jennifer Moline — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:38:26 PDT

If you’re a graphic designer who can’t bear to see Helvetica used for one more postcard or Times New Roman on another newsletter, then it’s time to expand your font library. But what to do when you’re a freelancer on a budget? Find free fonts!

League Script #1, from The League of Moveable Type

I racked the brains of designers as well as scoured the web in search of free fonts. I then compiled a list that includes popular go-to sites such as DaFont as well as lesser-known pages and even nondesign websites that just happen to provide free fonts. The fonts you’ll find on these sites include calligraphy, stencils, military, children’s themes, handwriting, graffiti and comic fonts. You’ll find inspiration for wedding invitations, business cards, scrapbooks, marketing postcards, kids’ parties and more.

A caveat: Not every font on each site listed here is free. On some sites, every font is free of charge, and on others, perhaps just one is.

I have a request for typography fans: Which free font sites am I missing?

Johan Cedmar-Brandstedt

The League of Moveable Type

Philip Norton's Blog: Netscape HTTP Cooke File Parser In PHP

(author unknown) — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 07:09:00 PDT

Philip Norton has shared a script he's created in a new post today that lets you read from a Netscape-formatted cookie file (as outputted from a curl request).

This file is generated by PHP when it runs CURL (with the appropriate options enabled) and can be used in subsequent CURL calls. This file can be read to see what cookies where created after CURL has finished running. As an example, this is the sort of file that might be created during a typical CURL call.

The file is structured, plain-text content with information on the domain, path, security, name and expiration details of each cookie. His script parses out these details and pushes them into a basic array, prime for searching and sorting (and reuse) in your application.

HOW TO: Land a Job at Google

Lauren Indvik — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 11:56:50 PDT

Google is having a big hiring year — its biggest ever, in fact.

This week we spoke with Bryan Power, a people operations manager at Google, for advice on getting hired by the tech giant.

Power oversees sales hiring in the North and South America regions. Previously, he led recruiting for the product management and engineering groups, giving him familiarity with hiring practices in multiple areas of the company.

Paint a Picture, Concisely

Power suggests job seekers — at Google and elsewhere — begin by presenting a picture of what they’ve done in their careers as concisely and precisely as possible. Every word on your resume or profile should count, he says, and job applicants need to understand the difference between responsibilities and accomplishments.

Too often Power receives resumes that describe their previous roles, but don’t talk about what they did in those roles that would distinguish them from the 10,000 other people in a similar role. Be precise, he says. If you were in a sales management position, don’t just say you led the sales team, talk about the amount of revenue you brought in, or the specific degree to which you surpassed your sales quota.

“Too often [applicants] leave out the numbers because they’re worried they are too low, but without those specifics you don’t stand out; you look like everyone else,” he explains.

“There’s also a temptation to be exhaustive when you put your resume together, but a resume that is really tightly written and represents your big accomplishments stands out more than an encyclopedia of everything you have ever done. Be judicious about what you put on there,” he advises.

Talents, Not Skill Sets

Unlike many other companies, Google is more focused on hiring for talent rather than focusing on specific skill sets, Power says.

“Google knows the world changes quickly and we need people who can adapt and take on different challenges,” he adds. “A lot has changed in the last five years, and the next five years will [change] too. We need people who can adapt and take on different challenges.”

Consequently, Google’s recruiters don’t just look at career achievements; they also are keen to know what applicants are accomplishing at school and outside of work. “We’re really looking for people who can make a big impact and do interesting things,” Power says.

When asked if there was a type of person who didn’t fit in at Google, Power noted that applicants who are more concerned with their titles and the number of people they will manage — in essence, those who more concerned with what Google can do for them, rather than what they can do for Google — did not fare as well as those who are interested in the challenges the company is facing and how they can help.

“Google is a very cross-functional, collaborative company. [Those who are concerned with] the territory they are going to own and manage has at times been a signal that they are not going to fit,” Power says. “We’re looking for people who are attracted to the long-term mission at Google, not a stepping stone to the next level in their careers,” he adds.

The Interview

Google’s interviewing process begins with a phone interview, sometimes stretching into several phone calls. Successful candidates are then invited on-site for a set of interviews with four to five members of the group they’re applying for.

Google’s interviewing style is different from most other companies, in which applicants come in and expound upon their resume and experience. That’s part of the interview process at Google, Power says, but applicants should expect to have a more open dialogue about the company and its future, and to engage in intellectual debates that will illustrate their problem-solving abilities.

“Some people [leave the interview] feeling like they’ve had a 45-minute conversation about where the Internet world is going, which feels different when you’re used to coming in and showing yourself,” Power explains.

There’s no standard dress code for interviews. “I’ve seen people come in in board shorts and a T-shirt and blow [us] away with their intellect, and I’ve seen people dressed to the nines who were unprepared,” Power recalls. “If you come in, be prepared and dress however you feel comfortable.”

If a job application is unsuccessful, Power suggests candidates continue to build relationships with recruiters.

“Sometimes you might be in a conversation about a role and it doesn’t work out, but things are dynamic, and six or 12 months from now things might shift so that you’re a match,” Power says. “You’re in a better position if you maintain that relationship instead of moving on from that opportunity. [Plus] recruiters are highly networked people, and recruiters know recruiters at other companies. Building that relationship could never hurt.”

Further Resources

To learn more about Google’s culture and available positions, and to submit an application, see google.com/jobs. You can also follow @googlejobs on Twitter to learn about new positions and engage in live chats with recruiters and other employees.

Images courtesy of Google

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Freebie: 3D Explosion PS brushes

wegraphics — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 14:33:19 PDT

Download this set contains 11 particle explosions created with Cinema 4D. The brushes are fantastic for adding a touch of 3D art to your designs with the click of a button.

10 Must Haves For Your Ecommerce Site Design To Ensure Sales

admin — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 03:53:57 PDT

Designers, no doubt need to be creative to come up with unique designs but at the same time they must remember the basic purpose a website is meant to achieve. An Ecommerce site is which is specifically created to sell products or services and attain profits through online sales must realize its objective. It must facilitate the buyers to find information and make a transaction.

Therefore a designer while formulating a design for an ecommerce site or an online store must bear in mind the interest of the users and should include those features that offer a friendly experience.

In this write-up, we are going to mention some important points that should always be remembered while designing a commercial site to increase its effectiveness.

Essentials for Your Ecommerce Site

Organize the Site to Present a Clear Picture to Buyers

The site must allow the buyer to easily understand the offerings as well as enable him/her to find the desired information or product without much effort. The various features of the site should be organized in a way which offers clarity and easy comprehension. This helps the users/buyers to take quick decisions. On the other hand if the layout is too cluttered with various options, it only confuses the visitor who might leave the site without reaching a conclusion as to what and how to do. Thus every element on the site be arranged to increase the understanding of the user.

Buyers Love to See the Shopping Cart -Make it Noticeable

A visible Shopping Cart instills confidence among the buyers while they are adding purchase items to the cart. They can see whether the item has been added or not. All through the shopping process till they checkout, they can keep a check on the list of items and other related information if the cart is visible to them. Therefore it is important that users are easily able to locate the Cart on the page.

Effective Call to Action Buttons

Action buttons are the driver of sales and therefore it is highly important to design them in accordance with users’ point of view. They must match the buyer’s thinking and prompt him to take an action. Call to action buttons can be made effective by:

Selecting the Appropriate Words – For an ecommerce site, “Add to Cart”, “Click to buy” are suitable rather than words like, “Know more”, “Get details”, etc.
Color – Colors do play a crucial role and should be selected to enhance the appearance of these buttons and help them stand out. Also color of the action button must compliment the overall design.
Positioning & Size – It is also equally important to choose the right place and size for call to action to get maximum sales. Both these factors should be made to draw users’ attention.

Search Box with Auto Complete Function

Let the visitors find the product/service with the help of Search box. As the users type their queries, Auto Complete function by making suggestions enables them to get relevant results and it also saves their time.

Simple Navigation Path

For sites dealing with multiple product categories, a navigation path which makes it simple for buyers to move and forth to find the various products and buy them is a prerequisite. It will prevent them from being lost on the site and will ease out the buying process.

Let Buyers Personalize their Shopping Experience

It is beneficial for an ecommerce site to allow its visitors to shop the way they want. Every buyer has his/her own set of requirements or preferences and if a site offers ways to meet them, it gains favorability. Thus buyers should be given the option to personalize their experience and search for items by Price, Brand, Reviews, Bestsellers, Color, Gender, etc.

Product Pages – Quick Preview Option + Images + Apt Description

Adequate attention must be given while designing Product Pages as they are the most significant part of the site. Providing the option to quickly preview a product aids the shoppers to smoothly browse the site for what they are looking for, without consuming much time. As visitors first wish to see the product, it is vital to use appealing images along with displaying a suitable description.

Display the Price of the Product and Availability

Price is the major factor that determines the buying decision and most shoppers wish to know the price first. It helps them make a quick comparison with other options and reach a conclusion. Another aspect which should be made known to customers is availability. If a visitor knows that the product is currently not available, he/she will move on to search for another, saving his time and effort.

Enable Fast Checkout

Often the long and tiring Checkout process where they have to go from one page to another to complete a transaction compels shoppers to make a move which adversely affects the sales. Therefore it is necessary to simplify the whole process and allow the customers to have a fast checkout. It is advisable to restrict the checkout to single page.

Ensure Fast Loading

A buyer would not wait for a long time for the pages of the site to load and will move back to some other site which offers him a quick shopping experience. An Ecommerce site thus needs to have a high speed and enable fast loading for users to collect information and then buy products/services.

These are some of the useful ways that assist in designing an effective Ecommerce site which can drive sales and turn out to be profitable.

Share/Save

jRumble – Rumbles, Vibrates, Shakes, And Rotates Any Element With jQuery

Mufti Ali — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 11:27:53 PDT

jRumble is a jQuery plugin that rumbles, vibrates, shakes, and rotates any element you choose. It’s great to use as a hover effect or a way to direct attention to an element. You can control the X, Y, and rotation range, the speed, and event trigger for the rumble.

jRumble is currently a little buggy in Internet Explorer. A rumbleSpeed of 0 seems to break the rumble. Also, there is currently no rotation on any objects in IE.

Requirements: jQuery Framework
Demo: http://jackrugile.com/jrumble/
License: MIT License

Incoming search terms for the article:

jquery element rotate

3D buttons

Paz Aricha — Sun, 06 Mar 2011 21:20:17 PST

8 Free Placeholder Image Services For Instant Dummy Images

Umut M. — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 02:30:10 PST

When designing websites, images-to-be-used usually doesn't exist at first as it is the layout that matters the most.

However, the sizes for the images are usually pre-set and inserting some placeholder images help us better seeing/analyzing the layout.

Rather than creating these placeholder images manually, there are free to use services which can automate the process and save us time.

Here is a list of 8 free placeholder image services for instant dummy images:

Flickholdr

As the name tells it, Flickrholdr fetches images from the huge database of Flickr.

Besides the size of the images, it is possible to mention tags in the URL which is great for using related images in each spot.

Placehold.it

The service is full-featured with the ability to mention sizes, image format (.gif, .jpg, .png) and can also display text.

The size of the images generated are displayed on them as well.

{placekitten}

Placekitten is thematic placeholder service that can display any size of kitten images.

There is also a jQuery plugin for dynamically changing any or all of your images to placeholder kittens with just a single line of code.

Dynamic Dummy Image Generator

DummyImage.com is a placeholder generator with a huge set of customization options including size, colors, text, multiple file types and preset sizes.

And, it is an open source script.

nosrc.net

A simple generator where you can only define the width and height. Also, the source of the script is shared as well.

FPOImg.com

Again a simple service where you can mention a text to be displayed besides the sizes.

IpsumImage

IpsumImage is a Google App Engine hosted, open source placeholder service (built with Python).

It is possible to customize the sizes, background-foreground colors and text to be displayed.

lowersrc

The service follows a different approach than others and requires a JavaScript to be installed and works without defining "image sources" but simply adding a specific class to each.

Other than sizes, colors and text, you can also set whether the image will be rectangle or a circle.

Special Downloads:
Ajaxed Add-To-Basket Scenarios With jQuery And PHP
Free Admin Template For Web Applications
jQuery Dynamic Drag’n Drop
ScheduledTweets

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8 Excellent WordPress SEO Plugins

Jacob Gube — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 05:00:02 PST

WordPress is one the most popular tools for publishing content on the web. Everything from e-commerce websites to blogs can be developed using WordPress. Additionally, the WordPress community has built up a huge offering of free themes and plugins to make it easy for newcomers to get content published on the web quickly and easily.

However, just posting content on the web isn’t enough for many; attracting people to your site is part science, part art — and many WordPress plugins help you do just that. This is a listing of top-notch WordPress plugins for SEO to improve your WordPress site’s search engine rankings.

1. SEO Rank Reporter

This WordPress SEO plugin allows you to track certain keywords in your site, and then issues you a report every 3 days (with all sorts of pretty graphs to boot). The plugin will also notify you via email whenever certain keywords experience major changes in search engine ranking.

2. All in One SEO Pack

Any basic research on SEO plugins for WordPress will lead you to All in One SEO Pack. It is the most popular solution for your WordPress site’s search engine optimization. This plugin automatically optimizes your WordPress site for search engines by generating meta tags and helping you optimize web page titles. Advanced users are given the ability to customize post titles, descriptions, URL structures and tags for each post.

3. SEO Ultimate

SEO Ultimate is a suite of tools for, well, ultimate SEO. It has a feature called Canonicalizer, which extends WordPress’s native canonical features to ensure that web spiders are pointed to the primary post in the case of web pages with the same content, but different URLs. It has a built-in robot.txt editor (one of the five web files that will enhance your site) that will allow you to easily set up this file for optimal search engine indexing. It works well with All in One SEO Pack, allowing you to import meta-data from it if you wanted to switch to SEO Ultimate.

4. SEO Content Control

This nifty plugin helps you identify weak content in your site. For example, many WordPress owners forget to include descriptions of their categories, which is a potential point of improvement for enhancing your search engine rankings. SEO Content Control helps you easily identify these potentially troublesome areas.

5. SEO Friendly Image

Optimizing images for search engines is often neglected; but when done right, you increase their semantic value, accessibility, and search engine indexability, especially for image searches. This WordPress SEO plugin automatically updates your images with alt and title attributes.

6. SEO Smart Links

SEO Smart Links is a WordPress SEO plugin that automatically links keywords and phrases in your blog posts based on previous pages and posts. SEO Smart Links gives you the ability to set up your own unique keywords and sets of matching URLs. It also allows you to set nofollow attributes and open links in new browser windows or browser tabs. A very convenient way to save time, learn a bit about SEO best practices and interlink blog posts.

7. Google XML Sitemaps

This WordPress plugin is able to generate an XML sitemap that will assist search engine spiders in crawling and indexing your WordPress site. XML Sitemaps reveals the structure of your site’s content in a transparent way for search engines. Google XML Sitemaps also includes support for Bing, Yahoo!, Ask.com, and MSN, notifying them every time you create a post.

8. Platinum SEO Pack

This SEO plugin for WordPress is loaded with plenty of features, including automatically generating meta tags, helping you optimize page and post titles for search engines, and aiding you in avoiding duplicate content (one of the ways to improve SEO of sites you design).

Conclusion

These WordPress plugins will give your WordPress site a complete SEO overhaul. Installing them and getting to understand each plugin’s inner workings may take some time, but it is worth it to know how each plugin can benefit your site. When used correctly, your content will be more visible, potentially attracting additional traffic consisting of your target audience.

About the Author

Matt Krautstrunk is an expert writer on document management software based in San Diego, California. He writes extensively for an online resource that provides expert advice on purchasing and outsourcing decisions for small business owners and entrepreneurs such as payroll services at Resource Nation. You can follow him on Twitter @Mattbill.

10 Things You Can Do to Become a Better PHP Developer

Jacob Gube — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 03:00:53 PST

PHP is probably the most popular web development language right now. At least 20 million domains use PHP and it’s the language used on major sites such as Wikipedia and Facebook as well as in some of the world’s biggest open source projects like WordPress and Drupal.

In this article, I’ll share with you ten things I wish I was told when I was just getting started with PHP development, and I’m hoping you’ll be able to learn a thing or two if you’re just taking your first steps into this awesome web development language.

1. Use PHP Core Functions and Classes

If you’re trying to do something that seems fairly common, chances are, there’s already a PHP function or class that you can take advantage of. Always check out the PHP manual before creating your own functions. There’s no need to create a function to remove the white space at the beginning and at the end of a string when you can just use the trim() function. Why build an XML parser for RSS feeds when you can take advantage of PHP’s XML Parser functions (such as xml_parse_into_struct)?

2. Create a Configuration File

Instead of having your database connection settings scattered everywhere, why not just create one master file that contains its settings, and then include it in your PHP scripts? If you need to change details later on, you can do it in one file instead of several files. This is also very useful when you need to use other constants and functions throughout multiple scripts.

Using a config file is a popular web application pattern that makes your code more modular and easier to maintain.

3. Always Sanitize Data That Will Go into Your Database

SQL injections are more common that you may think, and unless you want a big headache later on, sanitizing your database inputs is the only way to get rid of the problem. The first thing you should do is learn about popular ways your app can be compromised and get a good understanding of what SQL injections are; read about examples of SQL injection attacks and check out this SQL injection cheat sheet.

Luckily, there’s a PHP function that can help make a big heap of the problem go away: mysql_real_escape_string. mysql_real_escape_string will take a regular string (learn about data types through this PHP variables guide) and sanitize it for you. If you use the function together with htmlspecialchars, which converts reserved HTML characters (like <script> becomes <script>), not only will your database be protected, but you’ll also safeguard your app against cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks when rendering user-submitted HTML (such as those posted in comments or forum threads).

4. Leave Error Reporting Turned On in Development Stage

Looking at the PHP White Screen of Death is never helpful except for knowing something is definitely wrong. When building your application, leave error_reporting and display_errors turned on to see run-time errors that will help you quickly identify where errors are coming from.

You can set up these run-time configurations in your server’s php.ini file or, if you don’t have access to override the directives in this file, set them on top of your PHP scripts (using the ini_set() function to set display_errors to 1, but it has its limitations when done this way).

The reason behind turning on error reporting is quite simple — the sooner you know about your errors, the faster you can fix them. You might not care about the warning messages that PHP might give you, but even those usually signal towards a memory-related issue that you can take care of. When you’re done building out your application, turn error_reporting and display_errors off or set their values to a production-ready level.

5. Don’t Over-Comment Your Code

Proper documentation of your code through comments in your scripts is definitely a good practice, but is it really necessary to comment every single line? Probably not. Comment the complicated parts of your source code so that when you revisit it later you’ll quickly remember what’s going, but don’t comment simple things such as your MySQL connection code. Good code is self-explanatory most of the time.

Good Example of Commenting

<?php

	/* CONNECT TO THE DATABASE */

	$hostname = "localhost";
	$username = "";
	$password = "";
	$dbname = "";

	$connectionStatus = mysql_connect($hostname, $username, $password) or die(mysql_error());
	$selectionStatus = mysql_select_db($dbname) or die(mysql_error());

	/* END DATABASE CONNECTION */

?>

Bad Example of Commenting

<?php

	/* DEFINE THE CONNECTION VARIABLES */
	$hostname = "localhost"; // Hostname
	$username = ""; // Username 
	$password = ""; // Password
	$dbname = ""; // Database name
	// Connect to the database or display an error
	$connectionStatus = mysql_connect($hostname, $username, $password) or die(mysql_error());
    // Select our database here	
    $selectionStatus = mysql_select_db($dbname) or die(mysql_error());

?>

6. Keep Favorite Code Snippets Handy

You’ll be coding a lot of the same things throughout your PHP development career, and keeping code snippets always available will help you save a lot of time. There are several apps that can keep and sync your code snippet collection for you, so no matter where you are, you can always have your snippets available. Some apps you can use to corral your code snippets are Snippet, snippely, Code Collector, and Snipplr (web-based).

Most integrated development environments (IDEs) such as Eclipse (which can store code templates) and Dreamweaver (via the Snippets Panel) may have built-in features for storing code snippets.

Even a simple and well-organized directory called snippets that contain text files (or PHP scripts) — and possibly synced in the cloud using an app like Dropbox if you use multiple computers — can do the trick.

7. Use a Good Source Editor to Save You Time

Your editor is where you’ll spend the majority of your time, so you want to use something that helps you save time. Syntax highlighting is a must and definitely something you should be looking for as a software feature. Other bonuses include code hinting, code navigation and built-in debugging tools. All of these features can end up saving you massive amounts of time. An example of a source code editor/IDE for PHP is phpDesigner.

Take the time to get familiar with your source code editor’s features by reading the documentation and reading tutorials online. A bit of time investment in this arena can really streamline your coding workflow.

Check out this list of source code editors for developers as well as this list of free text editors for coders to discover popular code-editing applications.

8. Use a MySQL Administration Tool (Like phpMyAdmin)

I know some crazy hard-core developers who like working with MySQL (the popular Database Management System pairing for PHP) via command line, which, to me, is inefficient and just, well, crazy. It’s a good thing to know how to administer your MySQL database using mysqladmin, but afterwards, you should use a graphical user interface like phpMyAdmin to speed up database development and administration.

phpMyAdmin, in particular, is an excellent open source database viewer/manager that allows you to view your MySQL databases graphically so that you don’t have to waste time doing things via the command line. You can quickly build databases and their tables, export your databases into SQL files, run SQL queries, optimize tables, check for issues, create MySQL database users and set up their privileges quickly, and much more. There is a good chance your web host already has phpMyAdmin installed, and if not, it only takes minutes to install.

Check out this list of the best MySQL database management tools and this list of MySQL apps for alternatives to phpMyAdmin.

9. Use a PHP Framework

It took me a really long time to accept the fact that using a web application development/rapid application development framework would help me out. You have a small learning curve in the beginning, and there will be a lot of reading to do to learn how the API of the framework works, but you get amazing productivity and efficiency benefits later. Using a framework forces you to use better web development patterns that you might not be using right now.

Using a PHP framework pays off big time when you have to share your code with others later on or when you have to work together with someone; it gives you a standardized platform for building web applications. I learned the importance of this the hard way when I had to start hiring other developers.

Some popular PHP frameworks are CakePHP, CodeIgniter, symfony, and Zend.

10. Connect with Other PHP Developers

You don’t know it all. And even if you think you do, there are thousands of others out there that know how to do something better than you do. Join a PHP community like PHPDeveloper and interact with others. By connecting with other developers, you’ll learn better ways of doing the things you’re currently doing.

About the Author

Raphael Caixeta is a PHP and iOS developer and co-founder of Grip’d. He likes to blog about web and iOS development at raphaelcaixeta.com. If you’d like to connect with him, you can follow him on Twitter @raphaelcaixeta and add him on Facebook (raphaelcaixeta).

LANVA

(author unknown) — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 00:00:00 PST

blake.lt |facebook | Užskaitau!| Komentuoti

Facebook Hacker Cup 2011 Qualification Round: the PHP code - Mark Karpeles

(author unknown) — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 02:57:08 PST

I wrote about how I completed the 3 exercices of Facebook’s Hacker Cup 2011 qualification round in my previous posts (Double Squares, Peg Game and Studious Student) and now I’ll provide the code I wrote. Since the Facebook qualification round ended, I guess it’s safe to post, and will allow people who have kept their input and output to really confirm if they won or not (it seems some people receive mails saying they do, then saying they don’t… looks like the Hacker Cup was hacked together a bit too quickly).

As I said previously in the Double Squares post, the concept was not to make nice code or think for a long time, but complete the exercices as fast as possible to have a correct output before everyone else. Instead of optimizing the code and write nice long comments, I wrote code that would provide the correct output with the minimal amount of coding efforts (which was achieved by being brutal). Because of this the code is almost not commented. If you want to understand what you see, you’d better look at the appropriate posts.

The code is meant to be run from PHP command line, using the php interpretor, or using php’s cgi binary (with flag -q). It should work with PHP 5.1+ (I use PHP 5.3) and will produce the output for the .txt file with the same name.

Instead of reading the number of entries in the file (first line) I ignored it and will just read each file until I reach EOF, ignoring empty lines (like the final line). There might be some ugly hacks, but it wouldn’t be a Hacker Cup without some hacks.

The code, in a 23kB .zip file

Remember that this was written as fast as possible. The goal was not to make nice code, but to make code quickly. It will work and produce correct output given any valid input data.

I’ll be back next week!

Symbian Mobifactor PowerMP3 Ultra v.1.18 S^1 by Léo Symbian (New icon + 28 skins exclusives)

Luter95 — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 23:40:07 PST

After more than a year when he released version 1.17, the version PowerMP3 wins a "Ultra"with several new features!

PowerMP3 is a music player with smart and user friendly interface.
It has everything you need to enjoy your favourite music and helps to organise your music library the best way.

PowerMP3 turns your phone into a high quality audio player that supports most popular audio formats,
has fully customizable user interface and perfectly integrated with your phone.

Features :

* Play audio in MP3,OGG, AAC and M4A audio file formats
* Download album images from the Internet
* Stunning music library to eassily organize your tracks
* Support of many headsets
* Create custom Playlists to organize your music
* Support of M3U format for playlists
* Color themes
* Customizable Skins
* Graphical Equalizer
* Graphical Spectrum analyzer
* Support language: UK English, German, Spanish, Russian, Hugarian, Ukrainian, Vietnamise and Brazilian Portuguese.

What's new version PowerMP3 Ultra S^1:

1 - New icon.
2 - New translation.
3 - New issues included exclusive and made by me. S60v5 (Theme Black Simple, Transformers, Shadow, Sonic, Bumblebee, and Classic Black).
4 - Separate files, now users download the player solely for your device.
5 - New colors to customize your theme.
6 - More than 28 themes for S60v5.

Notes:

* This version is only for S60v5 (S^1).
* Uninstall the previous version to install this.
* Thanks to the developers of the Skins.

http://www.4shared.com/file/ivlRlp6R...raS60v5Mu.html

Exclusive Freebie: 27 High Resolution Watercolor Textures

Stefan Surmabojov — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 07:00:13 PST

Are you looking to add a splash of color to your latest project? We have the perfect freebie for you. Today, we are releasing a set of 27 high resolution textures for you to use in your work for free.

27 High Resolution Watercolor Textures

This set includes 27 high resolution textures at about 2400 x 3500 pixels wide and can be used to easily add a splash of color to your designs.

This set of exclusive watercolor textures was created by Stefan Surmabojov. We are pleased to partner with him on this release.

MAXIMA

(author unknown) — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 00:15:04 PST

10 Fresh High-Quality Free Fonts

Henry Jones — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 21:29:47 PST

This year we plan on finding plenty of freebies to share with our readers, just like we did in 2010. We may even step it up a notch. So to kick things off, we’ve found some really nice free fonts. In this collection you’ll find a variety of styles, including hand-drawn, script, and modern. We believe you can’t have too many fonts at your disposal, so take a look at these and grab the ones you like.

Hyperbola

HERO

GOTA

Bigmouth

FF Basic Gothic

Five Minutes

Alt Vxtr11

Copse

League Script #1

Linden Hill

WordPress Shortcodes: The Right Way

Siddharth — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 09:27:33 PST

One of the primary reasons why WordPress is the most popular CMS platform available is the sheer level of customizability that it brings to the table. Today, we’ll review the process of integrating one of those popular features, shortcodes, in the most user friendly way possible, into our theme.

A Visual Crash-Course in Shortcodes

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A Word From the Author

Even though there are a few trillion options to choose from, WordPress has comfortably taken the crown as the king of CMSs and blogging platforms with its incredible flexibility. A shortcode is one of those features that ratchet up the user friendliness of the system.

However, most implementations still require you to remember the shortcode itself. When you’ve created a masterpiece of a theme, the usability shouldn’t really lag behind. I’ll show you how to create shortcodes and then integrate it with the editor itself, so the user doesn’t have to go poring through your docs just to remember the correct syntax to embed a button. Intrigued? Let’s get started right away!

What Are These Shortco-whamathingies?

It’s called a shortcode and it has been part of the base WordPress installation since it hit version 2.5. Basically, these are similar to the bbcodes used on popular message board software: lightweight markup used to format content.

Here, you can define your own codes to use within your theme. Unlike BBCodes, though, shortcodes are primarily used to shield the user from tedious markup and possible errors. By using a shortcode, for say, a button, the user doesn’t have to remember the complicated markup that needs to be input to create the button. Overall, it’s quite a boost to a theme’s usability and possibly, noob friendliness.

ShortCode Variations

If you’re unfamiliar with the concept of a BBCode, and by extension, shortcode, this is how the simplest version looks:

[my-gallery]

If you’ve ever embedded a gallery with WordPress, you’ve already used a shortcode!

There are two more variations you should also be familiar with.

 [button]Content[/button]

 [link to="www.net.tutsplus.com"]NetTuts+[link]

We’ll implement each of these variations first before moving onto other, busier things.

Each shortcode implementation requires a two-step process:

1: Create the primary handler method
2: Hook up the handler to WordPress

Regardless of the complexity of the shortcode, the core steps remain the same.

Take 1: Replacing Strings

We’ll first learn how to implement the simplest shortcode possible. As a use case, let’s say you end each post with some common signing off text. Copying and pasting might be a simple approach, but you may feel like a luddite doing so. Let’s fix this with some WP niftiness!

Unless otherwise noted, all of the code below goes into functions.php

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

The primary function takes care of the core logic of your shortcode. We’ll need to create this first before proceeding.

 function signOffText() {
    return 'Thank you so much for reading! And remember to subscribe to our RSS feed. ';
}

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

The next step, as you may assume, is to hook into the WordPress system to associate the shortcode with this text. This is done using the add_shortcode method.

add_shortcode('signoff', 'signOffText');

Yes, a single one-liner is all it takes. The first parameter defines the shortcode you’ll be using in the editor, while the the second points to the function we created a moment or so ago.

Note: The add_shortcode method always comes after the handler method.

That should do it. Just type [signoff] into your editor and WordPress will dynamically replace the text as needed.

Take 2: Wrapping Content

Next up, we’re going to take a look at another variation: wrapping some content with some markup. You’d have to use it like so:

[quote]Some text[/quote]

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

The primary function has to be modified a little here. We’re noting that our function receives two parameters: attributes through the atts variable and the content itself through the content variable.

The next step is simply to return the markup wrapped around the selected text.

function quote( $atts, $content = null ) {
	return '<div class="right text">"'.$content.'"</div>';
}

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

This step remains the same:

add_shortcode("quote", "quote");

I like to name my shortcodes exactly the same as the primary functions unless the naming gets unwieldy. You may have your own styles so feel free to change the naming scheme. There’s no accepted best practice.

Take 3: Adding Attributes

Finally, we’re going to take a look at adding attributes to the mix as well. You’d have to use it like so:

[link to="www.net.tutsplus.com"]NetTuts+[link]

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

The primary function needs to be refactored to handle all the new functionalities we’re bringing in. First up, we merge the attributes passed in with the shortcode and the attributes we’re expecting. You can read up more on the process here.

The final step, as always, is simply to return the markup we want after filling it up appropriately. Here, I’ve used the data sent with the shortcode to fill in the anchor’s href attribute as well as content.

function link($atts, $content = null) {
	extract(shortcode_atts(array(
		"to" => 'http://net.tutsplus.com'
	), $atts));
	return '<a href="'.$to.'">'.$content.'</a>';
}

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

This step remains unchanged, but essential. Remember, without this, WordPress has no what to do with the shortcode.

add_shortcode("link", "link");

Kicking Everything Up a Notch

This is where you’d expect this tutorial to end but no, you’ve guessed wrong. As I mentioned earlier, shortcodes take away a lot of pain, but there are few gotchas. For one, the user has to remember the shortcodes he has at his disposal to make meaningful use of them.

If you have just a couple, it’s all good, but with feature laden themes, remembering each one becomes a chore. To rectify this, we’re going to add buttons directly to the TinyMCE interface, so the user can simply click on the button to get it all done.

As an example, I’m going to teach you how to add the second variation to the editor. I’m hoping you can extrapolate this information for the specific functionality you have in mind.

Step 1: Hook into WordPress

The first step in the process is hooking into WordPress and adding our initialization code. The following snippet takes care of that. Remember, all of this needs to be in your functions.php file.

 add_action('init', 'add_button');

We’re asking WordPress to run the function called add_button when the page is initially loaded. add_action is our hook into WordPress’ internals.

Step 2: Create Our Initialization Function

function add_button() {
   if ( current_user_can('edit_posts') &&  current_user_can('edit_pages') )
   {
     add_filter('mce_external_plugins', 'add_plugin');
     add_filter('mce_buttons', 'register_button');
   }
}

This tiny snippet of code will be executed when the page loads. Above, we’re checking whether the user has the necessary authorization to edit a page or a post before proceeding.

Once that’s done, we hook up two of our [to be written] functions to specific filters. Both of these actually hook into TinyMCE’s front end architecture through WordPress. The first is executed when the editor loads the plugins while the second is run when the buttons are about to be loaded.

In the example above, we proceed regardless of which mode the editor is in. If you want to display it only when the editor is in, say, visual mode, you’ll need to perform a quick check. If get_user_option('rich_editing') evaluates to true, you’re in visual mode. Otherwise, HTML mode. I typically tend to add these buttons only under visual mode but feel free to mix and match here.

Step 3: Register Our Button

function register_button($buttons) {
   array_push($buttons, "quote");
   return $buttons;
}

The function merely adds our shortcode to the array of buttons. You can also add a divider between your new button and the previous buttons by passing in a | before.

Step 4: Register Our TinyMCE Plugin

function add_plugin($plugin_array) {
   $plugin_array['quote'] = get_bloginfo('template_url').'/js/customcodes.js';
   return $plugin_array;
}

The snippet above lets TinyMCE, and WordPress, know how to handle this button. Here, we map our quote shortcode to a specific JavaScript file. We use the get_bloginfo method to get the path to the current template. For the sake of organization, I’m keeping my tinyMCE plugin along with my other JS files.

Step 5: Write the TinyMCE Plugin

Now onto the final portion of our endeavour. Remember, the following code goes into a file called customcodes.js placed in the JS directory of your theme. If you thought it went into functions.php like all the code above, no cookie for you!

(function() {
    tinymce.create('tinymce.plugins.quote', {
        init : function(ed, url) {
            ed.addButton('quote', {
                title : 'Add a Quote',
                image : url+'/image.png',
                onclick : function() {
                     ed.selection.setContent('[quote]' + ed.selection.getContent() + '[/quote]');

                }
            });
        },
        createControl : function(n, cm) {
            return null;
        },
    });
    tinymce.PluginManager.add('quote', tinymce.plugins.quote);
})();

Looks a little complex but I assure you, it’s anything but. Let’s break it down into smaller section to make it easier for us to parse.

First order of the day is a quick closure to keep from polluting the global namespace. Inside, we call the create method to create a new plugin passing in the name and other assorted attributes. For the sake of brevity, I’m just going to call my plugin quote.

Once inside, we define the init function that’s executed upon initialization. ed points to the instance of the editor while url points to the URL of the plugin code.

Most of the attributes should be fairly self explanatory. Note that the image you pass in is relative to the parent folder of the JS file that holds the code. Here it’d be theme directory/js.

Next up, we create the event handler for this button through the onclick function. The one-liner it contains essentially gets the selected text, if any, and wraps it with out shortcode. setContent and getContent are helper methods provided by tinyMCE to manipulate the selected text.

Finally, in the last line, we add the freshly created plugin to tinyMCE’s plugin manager. Pay attention to the names you’re using in each step. It’s error prone if you’re not paying attention. And that’s about it! We’re done! Load up the editor and make sure your spiffy new button is working.

Conclusion

And there you have it. We’ve successfully integrated shortcodes into a WordPress theme in a very user friendly manner. Hopefully you’ve found this tutorial to be of help. Feel free to reuse this code elsewhere in your projects and chime in within the comments if you need any assistance.

Questions? Nice things to say? Criticisms? Hit the comments section and leave me a comment. Happy coding and thank you so much for reading!

How to Maintain Your Personal Brand as a Corporate Employee

Jeff Gothelf — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 03:48:14 PST

A strong personal brand is beneficial on many levels. At the core it differentiates the designer, developer, marketer, etc, from the rest of the pack within crowded disciplines. It functions as a self-promotion agent that works for the practitioner 24/7/365 ultimately ensuring this person becomes a magnet for new and interesting work opportunities.

The foundation of a personal brand is initially created by consistently doing good work. From there, commenting, interacting and reacting in public discussion forums, blogging, Twitter, Facebook and the publication of articles and even books further solidify an individual as a thought leader.

However, “the idea of personal brand is often associated with independent practitioners”, as David Armano puts it. And for independents there are typically no conflicts as they are in the business of promoting themselves, their skills and knowledge. However, for practitioners working within corporations and interactive agencies, the challenge becomes balancing their personal brands with the corporate brand.

Many opportunities for friction

As a corporate employee you don’t represent “you” out in public — you represent the company. The opinions, theories and expertise you present publicly all get attributed to your employer. If you say something controversial, the story that will propagate is not “John Smith said…” but “John Smith, Lead Developer for Company X, said…” Add to this the risk of disclosing proprietary or sensitive financial information and it’s no surprise many corporations aren’t interested in promoting individuals (outside of C-level executives) externally.

These same corporations are only now beginning to comprehend the power of the social web and don’t understand the need for external “corporate ambassadors”. Colleagues within the organization can also be points of friction as they begin to question whether the now-public practitioner is actually a “work horse or a show horse”, as Christian Crumlish, Director of Consumer Experience at AOL, puts it. If it’s not clear that the company is getting more benefit than the individual, resentment can build causing the individual to start defending their activities.

Crumlish also suggests some companies are concerned that making their star employees visible exposes them to competitive employers looking to poach talent. This alone may make an organization reticent to promote individuals externally.

Finally, if the practitioner works for a less-established brand, there is a risk the personal brand will ultimately outshine the corporate brand. While this is certainly not an issue for global corporations, start-ups who have one or two star employees could face this challenge.

Overcoming these hurdles

The challenges may seem risky but there are some specific ways to mitigate these risks. By following the guidelines featured below, you will be able to convince your employer to not feel insecure or threatened about you strengthening your personal brand and encourage you to participate in public events.

Make your employer the star

To alleviate any concerns that you are attempting to promote your brand more than your employer’s, make it obvious who that employer is and that you’re speaking on their behalf. Any public facing documents you present must have company branding. This includes white papers, conference posters and slide decks. In addition to branding your thought leadership, all online profiles (Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, et al) and blogs should clearly disclose where you work. Finally, all client associations should also be disclosed to minimize the risk of perceived conflicts of interest or favoritism.

Luke Wroblewski, former Chief Design Architect at Yahoo! and Lead Designer at Ebay, who is a popular speaker at many design conferences, ensured all his presentations were branded with the Yahoo! and Ebay logos. Like Wroblewski, Crumlish, a mainstay on the design conference circuit, also made sure he was seen as a “Yahoo! Person” in all of his public efforts.

Participation in conferences is a good way to strengthen your personal brand and solidify yourself as a thought leader. Image source: Fronteers conference

Make your colleagues smarter, bring back learnings

Conferences, meetups and other professional extra-curricular activities provide tremendous learning opportunities. As much as you are a presenter at these events, you must also be an attendee. The opportunities for learning and growth are tremendous. It’s important to capture that knowledge and bring it back to your organization to share with your colleagues.

This shared learning can take two forms. The first is sharing the specific things you learned while at the event. What did the other presenters discuss? How does it relate to the challenges you face as a team? How can it be applied? These are the domain-specific elements you picked up from the other presenters.

The second is sharing with your colleagues how to become more successful and active within these external communities. You’re likely not the only person in your organization who is interested in furthering their personal brand. Bringing this education to your colleagues who did not attend the conference and sharing your techniques on how to become more active on that front helps minimize any jealousy that may develop in your colleagues and positions you as a mentor.

Your employer is now a thought leader

When attempting to convince your superiors to allow you to participate in public forums on behalf of the company, it’s imperative to remind the organization the benefits the corporate brand gets from this exposure. Active engagement in industry-specific forums and conferences gives the company the chance to stand in front of peers as a thought leader and, in many cases, frame the conversation on a particular topic. Brand perception of your employer improves as adjectives like cutting-edge, innovative and supportive (of new thinking) are associated with it.

In addition, both your business development and talent acquisition departments benefit from the corporate brand enhancement you’re facilitating. Every interaction that is publicly available from the employees of a company provides an opportunity to strengthen that company’s public persona. Tweets and blog posts about the kind of work or processes taking place there humanize the company and increase the attraction of higher caliber employees as well as potential new customers.

This may not be obvious at first to your employer. It’s imperative that you showcase these successes internally. Positive mentions for the company in tweets, blogs and post-conference meetings should be forwarded to the organization’s management. When employment candidates express interest in the company, try to make sure that they are asked how they heard of the company. Each time a candidate mentions a public appearance or some thought leadership showcased in an industry forum, make sure your superiors are aware. If possible, quantifying (in dollars) the value of these appearances should further your cause.

High-level talent that is acquired through word of mouth is significantly less expensive than talent acquired through staffing agencies. Also, have your business development team assess the source of new leads and customers to see how many were driven by the company’s public presence. Each one of those leads and customers has a monetary value which, when tallied, can justify the expense of sending you to the next event to present.

Be bold, yet humble

In some companies, your superiors may not see the immediate value of your personal brand. In these situations it may prove more successful to ask for forgiveness rather than permission. Write a blog post on an industry or domain-specific topic and share it publicly. If it drives discussion and positive perception of your employer, tell someone.

Attend the next local meetup and present a quick deck on your latest thinking. Did someone tweet about it? Share that with your boss. Was there a strong discussion on your blog that reflected well on your employer? Point your PR person to it. Showcasing the success of a low-profile activities or blog posts should engender some level of support from your boss. One word of caution though: ensure that you’ve consulted your company’s policies on such activities, as Crumlish advises. You don’t want to end up violating corporate policies that could put your job at risk.

Choose the right employer

If creating and maintaining a personal brand is something you value then it’s imperative to view your employer through that lens to understand if your goals align. As your personal brand has been developing and growing, has your employer been supportive? Is there a broad corporate understanding of the benefits you can bring through promoting your thought leadership externally? If the answer is ‘No’ then it may be time to evaluate new opportunities.

Becoming an independent practitioner is the easiest option but may not be viable for everyone. In that case, how much do prospective employers “get” the concept of employee empowerment? This is a discussion that should be clear from the outset with a potential new employer. Set the right expectations in your interviews and, if possible, have public-facing activities that grow both your personal brand and the corporate brand written into your job description. There’s no more effective way to balance your personal brand as a corporate employee than to actually have it as one of your position’s responsibilities.

Conclusion

Ultimately, for the personal brand to grow, the “company should get more value than the individual”, as David Armano said. If that balance is off, then you should consider becoming independent. That doesn’t mean that you cannot create, cultivate and curate a personal brand within a corporation. In fact, a personal brand can be crucial to your continued success and career progression. Be respectful of your employer and their policies but find creative ways to promote yourself while promoting your company at the same time. Personal branding enhances corporate branding. It makes the company appear more “human” and approachable. It makes people want to work there and it attracts good press. If balanced correctly, this is a win-win for all parties involved.

(sp) (vf)

Kalėdos 2.0 [video]

Darius — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 00:35:04 PST

Kristaus gimimo istorija perteikta per socialinius tinklus.

[via: @kranux]

Panašūs įrašai:

iconSweets2 – 1,000+ Free Vector Icons

Mufti Ali — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 08:49:36 PST

Previously blogfreakz has review about iconSweet, free icon set containing 60 vector Photoshop shapes, influenced by icon sets such as Glyphish and Pictoico. Recently another iconsweet, iconsweet2 was released. IconSweets was great, but too limited, so they designed more! iconSweets2 contains 400+ icons both in 64×64 and 32×32 and 292 16×16 icons, all created as vector Photoshop shapes.

This icon set containing over a 1,000+ icons, all in a vector-shaped Photoshop format. iconSweets2 will crunch your icon thirst for all of your iPhone, iPad & Android apps or new web projects!

Requirements:
Demo: http://iconsweets2.com
License: Free License

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WordPress Shortcodes: The Right Way

A Visual Crash-Course in Shortcodes

A Word From the Author

What Are These Shortco-whamathingies?

ShortCode Variations

Take 1: Replacing Strings

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

Take 2: Wrapping Content

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

Take 3: Adding Attributes

Step 1: Create the Primary Function

Step 2: Hook into WordPress

Kicking Everything Up a Notch

Step 1: Hook into WordPress

Step 2: Create Our Initialization Function

Step 3: Register Our Button

Step 4: Register Our TinyMCE Plugin

Step 5: Write the TinyMCE Plugin

Conclusion

How to Maintain Your Personal Brand as a Corporate Employee

Many opportunities for friction

Overcoming these hurdles

Make your employer the star

Make your colleagues smarter, bring back learnings

Your employer is now a thought leader

Be bold, yet humble

Choose the right employer

Conclusion

Kalėdos 2.0 [video]