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Tag: Framework

Excellent Grid Based Web Design Tools And Frameworks For You

The world of web which we know has taken huge plunge up in recent past, result of which now more and more people are interested in different graphics components. One such component is grid-based web design tools and frameworks. Here in this article, we have rounded up an excellent grid-based web design tools and frameworks collection for you. Hope you like them all.

Grid Pak

Grid Pak

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Modular Grid Pattern

Modular Grid Pattern

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Guide Guide

Guide Guide

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Responsive Photoshop Template

Responsive Photoshop Template

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960px Grid Templates

960px Grid Templates

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Frameless Template

Frameless Template

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3 x 4 Grid Builder

3 x 4 Grid Builder

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Tiny Fluid Grid Generator

Tiny Fluid Grid Generator

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Responsive Grid PSD

Responsive Grid PSD

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Reviewed: Startup Design Framework For WordPress

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How often has it been that you have come across a neat and responsive website and wished that your clients’ websites looked like it too!  For web designers and developers, getting a website up and ready is a tedious task.  There are so many factors such as your client’s vision, his target audience, his budget for the project etc. that determine how the final product of your hard work looks. But what if we told you that getting a great looking website was as easy as making a cup of soup? Well, guys at Designmodo have made this possible.

Designmodo is a popular name in the web designing industry for the well-crafted designs and extremely attractive website components that they make. Based in New York, the company is the go-to store for web designers and developers for innovative ideas and some of the greatest user interface packs that you might have come across. Startup Design Framework is Designmodo’s latest offering that is aimed for helping start-ups come with unique as well as good looking websites easily. The Framework can be used by designers, developers or businesses themselves to come up with a neat website that can not only be set up quickly but also looks attractive and proudly displays it content. Since most developers prefer using WordPress for content, Designmodo also offers a special suite of Startup Framework for WordPress.

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The Framework for WordPress is not just some new theme designed by Designmodo. It combines the goodness of WordPress with some great front end tools to deliver a splendid looking website for you. Unlike an ordinary theme, you are not required to remain bound to the rigid design that it comes with, rather you can customize it to your heart’s desire. What is even better is that the Framework makes the designing part also extremely easy by incorporating simple visual editing and an easy to use drag and drop editor. So, you can try out multiple combinations at the pace of snapping fingers and finally settle down on the one you like most.

Startup Framework consists of a multiple components that you can mix and match to make your final product. The design always follows grid system rules so any components you would like to put together is bound to look nice on your site. The most interesting part is that Designmodo has taken care of all the coding bits so that you can concentrate on the looks and features of the product. No more spending late nights to iron out tiny glitches in the code that make the website behave erratically. You can rest assured that the product you have delivered to your client will always work to perfection.

As your clients warm up to the idea of better looking and more responsive websites, you can use the block model as a starting point to add and remove components to match the idea you have laid out. The block model suggests the best places on the site to place components and you can vary them to suit the requirements of your clients. The Framework for WordPress contains 100 of blocks to get you started and offers you the option of creating thousands of designs using the same set of components. So, you could actually use the same components and still come up with very different looking sites for various clients.

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Startup Framework for WordPress is available for purchase on a licence basis. A single licence works for 1 website, comes with a year’s email support and updates and costs $149.  You can also buy licences for 3 websites or 5 websites, depending on your requirement and would cost $249 and $349 respectively. All packages come with free upgrades for up to one year and tech support over email. While you can save money by buying more licences up front, if you would like to give this a try Designmodo also offers a demo, where you can fully test the Framework for yourself. Simply click on the link and enter your email address to receive a personalized URL for the demo website.

Startup Design Framework is the quickest and simplest way to make a great looking website and we recommend that you give it a try!

55 Most Useful Resources For WordPress Developers

I have been working on WordPress content management system from a pretty long time – then whether it would be for the development of mine own company brands or working on clients projects – I always opt WordPress platform on others. But, in all these years, the things that wondered me that collectively there are plenty of resources for WordPress developers are available on internet – but what are the BEST of them – although almost every single resources speaks its own story and they all have been worked and stand very properly. In this article, I have compiled the 55 most useful resources for WordPress developers.

WordPress

Starter Kits, Plugins, Widgets, Frameworks

When you planned on to develop a WordPress theme, widget or plugin, the best bet is to start by using a “blank” template file which not only save your time but also will give you a solid foundation. For this, the following are the best resources:

  • WP Starter Kit: WP Starter-Kit is a development template for rapidly building WordPress plugins. The framework provides some useful services and a clean way to structure your plugin while allowing you to build libraries of small functional components.
  • Plugin Starter: Plugin Starter is a new framework to help make WordPress plugin development easier. It is not a boilerplate or template that acts as a starting point for a plugin.
  • WordPress Widget Starter: The WordPress Widget Starter will let you create your own new widget with the help of the sample widget starter code.
  • Threaded Comments: It lets you do basic CSS styling for threaded comments.

WordPress Hosting

Since thousands of web hosts available out there offering Free, Shared, VPS, Dedicated as well as Managed WordPress hosting but the question at the top which one to go with. Although we strongly recommend anyone to go with Hostgator but still there are also secondary options available. The priority wise we recommend:

  • Hostgator: This is what our brands are using, all of them. We have been with Hostgator now for over three years and they are very good. They are available 24 by 7, round the clock. Details
  • BlueHost: Another good WordPress hosting provider. Offers number of options. Although we had not tried it directly yet but with having number of clients / past customers websites are on BlueHost. Details
  • DreamHost: DreamHost is good but in our list stands at third position. Having a hold on n number of customers around the world. Tried thrice but still it does not able to make a place in our heart and brain which say us to go with this hosting company. Details

Related Article: Comparison Of WordPress Hosting Providers

Free Themes Vs Premium Themes

On starting with your WordPress website development, this question strikes your head many times. Which one to go with – Free themes or Premium themes and the answer of this is in question itself? If you have good knowledge and understanding of coding and know that you can manage all the updates (which is require to fuel up your theme from time-to-time), then free themes will be the right choice for you. But, if you are interested in having someone who can help you whenever required and keep the track of all technical areas of your WordPress themes, then it would be better to opt for premium themes. In either option there are thousands of themes available in both categories.

Other Useful Resource:

Plugins

Plugins can extend WordPress to do almost anything you can imagine. There are not one, not two but thousands of useful plugins available – both free and premium in nature. The plugin will either be for anything, ranging from social media to commenting to security and lots more.

Tutorials Sites And Blogs

While during and after completion there would be n number of time you would be requiring tutorial sites and blogs, which helps you time-to-time.

  • WP Tuts+: Interesting WordPress Tutorials collection site.
  • WP Engineer: Huge collection of coding tutorials, tip and tricks.
  • Smashing Magazine: Offering some very in-depth tutorials and articles about WordPress.
  • JustWP.org: Sharing huge collection of tutorials, talks about themes, plugins and lots more.
  • WPMU: A multi-author site, bringing variety of useful stuff.

Snippets Collections

The number of websites (including ours) is offering useful snippets (the short codes) which you can use in your WordPress website to ease the job.

Other Valuable Resources

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Frameworks Which Can Help You To Create Your Custom WordPress-based Websites

Tired of using other’s licensed WordPress themes for your projects and now thinking of choosing a way further in building your own new WordPress-based website. But, what exactly you would be requiring in order to build the one. Is it just a process constitutes of few processes or is it something really a big game? What options are available in front of you? The possibilities, the problems and many more things can come in between in the process, but if you think that you are really to take the next step then this is the time.

For a beginner theme, you would be requiring theme framework which will work as a solid code foundation for whole of your website which will come with built-in generic features. Making a WordPress theme or website with the help of framework is the most efficient way of today’s world of website development as it guarantees that you will get stable end results. Not only this, but also using the framework will help in saving your time.

Here in this article, I have included five of top frameworks, sharing their features with which you can create your custom WordPress-based websites:

HTML5Reset

HTML5Reset WordPress Framework

  • Standards-compliant HTML5 and CSS3
  • Includes Modernizr the library
  • Very clean and detailed code, focus on CSS optimization
  • Complies with hNews microformat
  • Cross-browser compatible with easy browser-specific classes
  • Widget-ready

More Info

The _s Theme

The _S Theme WordPress Framework

  • Backed by the experience of the WordPress creators
  • Standards-compliant HTML5 and CSS3 code
  • Minimalist and well-commented templates
  • Easy to add and remove capabilities
  • Custom header implementation
  • Custom add-on functions, or “tweaks”
  • 5 ready-made CSS-based layouts
  • Custom template tags to optimize your code and prevent duplication
  • Sample theme options panel
  • Mobile-friendly, with smartphone-optimized drop-down menus
  • Open source

More Info

Hybrid Core

Hybrid Core WordPress Framework

  • Modular structure for maximum flexibility
  • Supports breadcrumbs, galleries, pagers, drop-down menus, etc
  • Custom theme settings UI
  • Search engine optimized
  • Translation-ready
  • Widget-ready, includes 15 custom widgets
  • Easy layout creation and per-post layout control
  • Offers a wide variety of child themes

More Info

Whiteboard

Whiteboard WordPress Framework

  • Widest choice of dynamic classes and IDs
  • HTML5 and CSS3 with seamless degradation
  • Supports menu, background, and header management, several widget areas, etc
  • Easy to remove unneeded parts
  • Built-in Less framework for full mobile support
  • Lightweight and well-structured code
  • Compliant with WordPress development standards
  • Compatible with older Cross-browser compatible
  • Search engine optimized
  • Supports multi-lingual capabilities
  • Open source

More Info

Bones

Bone WordPress Framework

  • Standards-compliant HTML5 and CSS3
  • Extremely detailed, clean, and well-commented code
  • WordPress header optimized for speed and performance
  • Mobile-first approach
  • Graceful fallbacks for older browsers
  • Easy to add and remove features
  • Supports custom post types
  • Custom dashboard functions included
  • Open source

More Info

How To Speed Up Your WordPress Website?

WordPress is a great platform – yes, it is – that’s why hundreds of thousands of different websites running on WordPress around the world, but experiencing a slow speed on your WordPress website is common especially when you are using shared hosting. Still what, you do not want it to remain the same. I know you want your site running but what, unless and until you take proper measures in consideration.

Without taking the proper precautions and measures you could be end up with nothing but a sluggish site which will not be a hassle for visitors but also keep them away. You certainly lose your visitors, clients, potential customers as well as subscribers. Even, this is not it, as Google may also penalize your site and throw your site such far that you can’t even able to find on it.

Here is a breakdown on what all you require:

A Solid Framework / Theme

Framework

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The time when you have your WordPress installed, you did notice that you have got two themes pre-installed in it: the Twenty Ten/Twenty Eleven. Now, what makes you surprise is that these both default frameworks aka are the default WP themes are quite speedy framework to use. They are the light frameworks which in turn will let you to have a speedy site.

Secondly, do keep a note that themes are something that either can make or break your WordPress installation. You do want to have something stylish theme install but also remember technical wise it remains simple. Always try to choose themes with fewest possible images and a CSS-based design. You might want to choose a minimalist theme and modify it according to suit your needs. To check on various theme clubs collections, check on the following link.

A Good Web Host

Hosting

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You do often notice while on hosting provider websites that almost every other is offering Unlimited bandwidth, Unlimited storage offer and probably the first thought comes in your mind is WOW!!! It is certainly a jackpot but remember since it’s a shared host, your site would be running on same IP just like other 4099 sites are running.

Selecting the right host means more than just buying internet storage space for your site. A lot of hosting providers offer lucrative discounts from time to time, in which most of them are nothing but to fool you around, so it’s always better to have a check on what you are buying. You do take proper care of bandwidth, processor speed/type, databases allowed, domains allowed, which versions of PHP, MySQL are installed i.e. in short is your hosting provider matching up with WordPress minimum requirements or not.

Our Recommendation is HostGator as they are good both in product wise and customer support, details of which you can check at the following link.

Using A Content Delivery Network

CDN

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You might while researching heard the term “Content Delivery Network,” but still a large number of people either does not know or get confused while understanding it. You won’t be surprised over learning the fact that majority of sites these days using the CDN’s as they help in reducing page load times of your site.

Understanding more, a CDN takes all your static files i.e. CSS, Javascript and images and will serve to your visitors by letting them download in faster possible manner by serving these files on servers which are close to them as possible. Selecting a CDN provider often sounds as a huge decision as there are many CDN’s providers out there. In order to help you out, we have detailed out the list of the entire best content delivery network around the world, details of which you can check here.

Plugins

Plugin

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You often notice in your plugin list that you do have a collection of those plugins that you are either not using or are inactive. Such plugin also take part in lowering your WordPress site speed. It is always advisable or even recommended that you remove all those plugins that you don’t actually using as WordPress loads all of your plugins, including those inactive ones.

You need to take a special care of fact that you would be always running the latest stable release of both WordPress and your plugins. The older version plugins will nothing but slow your website down. You need to have all your plugin upgraded while with WordPress 3.0+, there are a revamped plugin update feature, which allow you to update plugins faster, smoother and easier. It also offers you to have your all the plugins updated in one go.

Optimization

Optimization

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There are three things in your WordPress site that you need to optimized from time-to-time: images (which can be done automatically), your homepage and your WordPress database. For the images, you can use this amazing free plugin called WP-Smushit which will do the optimization process automatically for all your images as soon as you upload them.

For optimization of your homepage, you have to make sure that you show excerpts instead of full posts, reduce the number of posts on the page (better if it would be between 5 and 7), remove all unnecessary sharing widgets from the home page as well as remove all inactive plugins and widgets and always make sure your homepage as minimal.

You can optimize your database by directly using phpMyAdmin by selecting all the tables followed by clicking on “Repair” and then “Optimize.” You can also scan for outdated tables which still making its place even after removing old plugins. If you think you are not technically able to do the job, then there are plugins also available which can help you make a fix in friction of seconds. You can simply use either of these plugins: WP-Optimize, WP-DB Manager, Optimize-DB or WP-DB-Optimizer plugin for optimizing your database.

Things To Know About WordPress Theme Frameworks And WordPress Child Theme

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You have been using WordPress from quite longer time, but question somewhere in your mind making you doodle that which WordPress theme are you using through? i.e. Does the website you are having built with the help of child theme or it’s just another WordPress theme.

Other set of questions also heading your way, includes that what actually is a WordPress theme framework? As well as what is a WordPress child theme? With this article we try to make you understand better differentiate between the two – the theme framework and the child theme, their pros and cons and last not the least why people want to opt for child theme.

Introduction

WordPress Theme Frameworks: Starting with understanding the basics, the word framework often refer to a code library which being used to facilitate development of a theme. The time when whole of WordPress development was in early days, it happen mostly that while using themes or people try to maintain it up, people do often lose all the custom styling options.

The problem at that time stands strangled and no way coming out to make this prevent from happening. Then, the time comes when core team and community together come into picture and decided to fix the issue permanently that is when the concept of Parent Theme and Child Theme introduced.

With ever soon the issue got its permanent fix, developers’ starts creating a child theme with adding their own selected custom styling while without feeling the need to leave the functionality aspects to its framework. In simple words, the way things developed by both of core team and community, it now allows you to keep the framework as remain the same without letting you modify anything over on the way the theme looks.

WordPress Child Theme: If go by simple words, then a WordPress child theme can be simply defined as a WordPress theme which inherits the functionality from the parent theme. The purpose to have the child theme on board because it gives you authority to customize your existing WordPress theme the way you want it without even losing the ability to upgrade the theme. Further, the move stands now so high that it protects your WordPress website to fall into chaos and without any losing of ability to get updated from the parent theme, you can change the styling now freely.

Why To Use?

WordPress Theme Frameworks:  The answer lies beneath; the common ground of choosing the theme frameworks is to speed up the development process. Using the WordPress theme frameworks offer you great functionality and customization option i.e. giving users the freedom to not to get involved in coding themselves and instead of starting creating a theme from starting-up or modifying all the files, user need to create a new style.css file and customize a few functions using the functions.php file.

WordPress Child Theme: The first thing first, the purpose to opt for child themes because to speed up the development process. Using a good parent theme itself result in reducing the time which it takes you to create or built a WordPress site as you as a user got huge functionality and customization options, letting you not to code everything. Creating a WordPress child theme requires you to create a one line in your new style.css header which defines the template.

Pros and Cons

WordPress Theme Frameworks: Ease of development, Built-in functionality, Code Quality, Regular Upgrades and Community to speak and discuss the issues all together makes it a perfect choice, while Unnecessary Code, Limitations in Framework and high pricing often results in keeping the people away to choose the WordPress Theme Frameworks.

WordPress Child Themes: This brings Safe Updates, Extendable in nature as well as help users’ the time when if fallback condition comes into stand added as benefit of opting for Child Themes, while biggest cons counted as the investment of time you require to learn about the parent theme.

(Image Credit / Source: Flickr / huasonic)

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