Crenk » Blogging

Free Slide Gallery Plugin To Showcase Your Images

Steven Finch — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:55:05 +0000

slideGallery is a MooTools plugin for creating customizable image carousels easily & quickly.

It converts any given unordered list into a slider & can be styled with CSS.

The plugin can display any defined number of images horizontally or vertically, auto-play them, have prev-next buttons and these functions can be configured more with:

setting the class of prev-next elements
speed and duration of slides
transition to be used
direction of the transitions
& more..

slideGallery works in all major browsers including IE6.

Upload Videos To Your Tumblr Blog

Steven Finch — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 09:43:16 +0000

Tumblr, the most beautiful blogging platform, just got a little more powerful.

You can now upload videos files as large as 100 MB directly to your Tumblr account. The cool thing is that, unlike Youtube where you to wait for the system to finish transcoding, videos uploaded to Tumblr will instantly show up in your blog.

This feature was needed on Tumblr for quite a while now and its great to see that they are listening to their users, but I would have liked to see them add this feature a little faster.

Official YouTube Buttons For Your Blog or Website

Steven Finch — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:47:40 +0000

If you looking for buttons and banner images to promote your YouTube channel, just head over to this page and download the ones that will look good on your website or email newsletter.

The graphics are available in all popular sizes so you may even use them as stickers or print one on your business card.

Pure CSS Social Media Icons

Steven Finch — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 09:20:01 +0000

This is an experiment that creates social media icons using CSS and semantic HTML. It uses progressive enhancement to turn an unordered list of text links into a set of icons without the use of images or JavaScript.

Take a look at the CSS social media icons here.

Burnt Wood: Free Social Media Icon Set

Steven Finch — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 15:59:12 +0000

Burnt Wood is a collection of wood-tiled icons branded with various social media network logos that are perfect for your next grunge-styled web design.

The package contains 12 icons for many of the popular social sharing sites. Each icon is a 420×420px PNG file that can be scaled down to any size needed.

This set was designed by Chris Thurman of Visual Swirl exclusively for the readers of Six Revisions. It was inspired by a burnt wood text effect tutorial and created entirely in Photoshop.

Download the Icons here.

CSS3: The Cross-Browser CSS3 Rule Generator

Steven Finch — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:03:21 +0000

CSS3, Please! is a web-based & simple-yet-effective cross-browser CSS3 rules generator.

As every browser may require different prefixes for the CSS3 properties, this tool makes it so easy by providing them all with an editable & well-commented way where the output can be seen instantly.

Currently, it helps you write the rules for: border-radius, box-shadow, linear-gradients, rotation & @font-face. Some other transforms like skew & scale will be added soon.

For some transforms, that Internet Explorer can support via IE filters, they are mentioned too.

1 Bit Audio Player: Free Wordpress Music Plugin

Steven Finch — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:01:26 +0000

1 Bit Audio Player is a very simple and lightweight Adobe Flash MP3 player with automatic JavaScript insertion. It’s main purpose is to act as a quick in-page preview for audio files you link to from your website or blog.

The player can be easily installed as a WordPress plugin or used stand-alone in any website. Small audio players will than automatically appear next to any MP3s you link to. There’s also a bookmarklet version of 1 Bit available that can be used to apply 1 Bit to any web page from your browser.

b5media Restructure and Sack All Blogger and even Problogger, All in Favour of Glam Partnership

Steven Finch — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 06:26:37 +0000

b5media have been is the news a lot lately but for all the wrong reasons. It seems as though b5media has dropped all of its women bloggers from contracts.

Inquisitr also reported that b5media has also dropped their most popular sites owned by Darren Rowse (b5media co-founder) Problogger and Digital Photography School.

The new b5media strategy seems to be with former Gaweker editor Elizabeth Spiers and it seems to be focused around celeb/fashion with Crushable and The Gloss. After inspecting both sites it seems as though b5media has partnered with Glam for advertising, which based around the fashion industry will bring in decent eCPM rates. These new fashion eCPM rates are going to be a lot higher than their current sites, so in theory they only need to receive lower traffic numbers.

ECwid: Create an eStore in Minutes!

Dean Sherwin — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 07:16:56 +0000

ECwid is a web app which allows you to easily create your own store which you can integrate within your website in minutes. Basically, it’s like Amazon Associates (mostly because it’s powered by Amazon) except this has much better easy-to-use tools installed and is also easier to use for novice users when it comes to integrating your ecommerce store within your website.

Once you have created an account you just select what products you would like in your store, tailor the layout and colour scheme to your tastes and then click ‘Finish’. You’ll then be given HTML coding which you can copy and paste into a page on your website to embed the store. This will then act as your very own store on your website as though your developed and integrated it yourself.

The program also allows you to track invoicing, customers, accounts and other such important data to see how your store is getting on and how it can be improved.

Simple, Premium, Professional, Free 2 Column Wordpress Theme

Steven Finch — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 18:06:55 +0000

The team over at Blog Oh Blog have just released another amazing free Wordpress theme. This new theme is very simple and is called Ultima.

Ultima is a soft-coloured, rounded Wordpress theme which is focused completely around the content and nothing else. This 2 column theme is all about keeping it simple.

This is a plug and play theme. Nothing much to do except configure the subscribe form, twitter and facebook links. You can do this by editing the socials.php file in the theme folder.

You can Demo the theme here.

Also you can Download the theme here.

How to Find Your Computer IP Address (Windows)

Steven Finch — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 09:14:32 +0000

Finding a computer IP address may be extremely easy for many of us, but not necessarily to everyone out there.

Go to the Start menu, go to Run, and type “CMD” in the dialog box (without the quotes.)
Without the quotes, type “IPCONFIG” and press ENTER.Now you should see a dark (DOS) window that looks just like the picture on the left of this article step.
Now you should see some network information, along with the IP ADDRESS of your computer listed.
If more information is needed, other than the IP address, type the following from the same DOS box described in step two: IPCONFIG /ALL

This will provide you with more network information on your computer. Its purposes may vary.

The following steps are OPTIONAL:

There are also websites available that can provide your computer IP, such as www.whatismyip.com.
If you have a router/network set up, please note that the initial steps above will only show you the network’s IP from the router. For example, if you have a Linksys router installed, and perform the IPCONFIG command, it will show you something like “192.168.1.x” as opposed to your computer’s local/root address. For this reason, following STEP 5 above may be useful.

Top 5 Web Proxy Sites to Hide Your IP Address

Best Sites To Look For Free and Stunning Twitter Backgrounds

Steven Finch — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 21:45:58 +0000

Twitter has become one of the worlds largest sites overnight and a lot of people are trying to jump on the bandwagon. Here is a collection of the best free sites that focus on Twitter backgrounds. Im sure that out of this list you will find the right Twitter background for you.

1. Twitter Patterns

2. TwitterBacks

3. TwitBacks

4. Twitter Gallery

5. Tweet Style

6. Twitter Backgrounds From LimeShot Designs

7. My Tweet Space

8. Twitter Image

9. Twitter Backgrounds from Webdistortion

10. Tile Backgrounds from Colorlovers

11. Create your own check tile background for twitter with TartanMaker

12. Some cool tile backgrounds from BGpatterns!

Headway: Create Your Own Wordpress Theme Design Simply and Cheaply

Steven Finch — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 03:26:17 +0000

Headway is perfect for both developers/designers and the average do-it-yourself-er. Easily rearrange a layout or change a setting in a jiffy. With Headway you can stop worrying about the monotonous tasks or the technical stuff, and just get down to creating great content for your blog. Headway makes designing your blog the easiest thing about blogging.

Using the Headway Visual Editor, you can do anything from a standard blog, to landing pages, to membership sites, to e-commerce sites. For non-technical folks, Headway’s “Easy Hooks” let you insert custom content at will wherever you like on any page without messing with PHP or CSS. For hardcore developers, Headway has heaps of actions and filters (or hooks) to take customization even farther.

Headway has its own built-in search engine optimization (or SEO) settings. Simply having Headway will help your search engine optimization, even if you don’t use any of its manual features. If you do use them (and we’ll show you how), you can enjoy a greater chance of moving up in search rankings.

How to Create a Cutsom Facebook Page with FBJS

Steven Finch — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 10:35:34 +0000

A Facebook Page is a public Profile that enables information about business and products to be shared with Facebook users and the public. An user should be able to create one in a few minutes. This article “Creating a Custom Facebook Page” explains how to add custom tabs to your Facebook page to make it do more. He has explained how to built a carousel, navigation tabs, forms, etc on your facebook page easily.

You will need to use FBJS (Facebook Javascript). This provides the functionality we need to develop custom facebook pages. This is also to protect other users privacy at the same time and restrict Javascript features that can be abused. This tutorial helps you cut short your search and gives you a head start in your quest to build custom tabs within Facebook pages.

iMaxell: Premium Corporate Wordpress Theme with 3D Slider

Steven Finch — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:27:02 +0000

iMaxell Premium Corporate WordPress Theme is a Portfolio and / or a Corporate template for companies, portfolios, webdesigners, eBooks sites, etc, to showcase your services and work. This theme comes with CU3ER a brand new 3D slider easy to customize, with 2 more sliders for your customization, s3Slider and jQuery innerFade.

Best Free Wordpress Christmas and New Year Theme

Steven Finch — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 01:37:21 +0000

It always amazes me that people come up with specific season related wordpress themes and icons. Here is a new set for Christmas.

The theme is decorated using Smashing Christmas Icon Set and its main goal is to give a blog a very festive, snowy, New Year’s atmosphere. The theme has no particular requirements, except that the WordPress 2.8.5+ should be installed.

The theme is free to use in private and commerical projects. It is released under GPL. You can use it for all your projects for free and without any restrictions.

Download The Free Christmas Wordpress Theme Here

iPhone Icon Pillows

Steven Finch — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 23:55:07 +0000

Each of these fun iPhone icon pillows measures 12 inches by 12 inches, and they are handmade from fleece, if you want one they are available for $14.99 each from Icon Pillows. Im not exactly sure what else I can say about them!

Free Photoshop Tutorial On How To Develop a Dark and Sleek Blog Design

Steven Finch — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 09:01:07 +0000

Over at Six Revisions they have created a great Photoshop tutorial to help new web designers make a dark and sleek blog design.

Click here to see full version of their tutorial.

Wordpress Authors Plugin: Showcase Information About The Author

Steven Finch — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 23:16:56 +0000

Author Exposed is a simple Wordpress plugin that allows your visitors easy and elegant way to see more details about the post author.

This plugin does the same thing as the_author() tag only this time it’s linked to hidden layer (div). By clicking on the author link the layer pop’s up with author info gathered from the profile page, plus gravatar photo, if author email is assigned with one.

Playtime: Premium Wordpress Video Theme

Steven Finch — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 18:04:29 +0000

Playtime is a new premium wordpress theme from Zidalgo. Playtime has to be one of the best premium video wordpress themes I have seen in a while. The theme is complete centered around the publishing of video content.

Features include:

Rotating Featured Article Header Section (can also be disabled)
Fully supports WP 2.x, including threaded comments
Custom widgets such as Flickr gallery display, top rated posts, latest tweets, recent acts, jump menu, more featured videos, sideblog, and live-search
User ratings system
Easily embed videos from YouTube (including playlists), Google Video, DailyMotion, Vimeo, Veoh, Viddler, Metacafe, Blip.tv, Flickr videos, Spike, and MySpaceTV. As well as these file types: Flash Video Files (FLV), QuickTime (MOV, etc.), Generic video files (AVI, MPEG, WMV, etc.)
Easy language translation
Smart jQuery integration for dynamic and impressive user interface features
Multiple theme layout options – choose between 1 or 2 column display.
Custom designed 404 page – Try it
Tons of awesome extras!

Price = $75 personal license and $249 for a developer license.

Live Demo Here and Download here.

Three Widgets Every Professional Should Have On Their Blogger Blog

Dean Sherwin — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 22:32:34 +0000

It’s a well-known fact that employers tend to Google prospective job candidates’ names before they hire them. This is in an effort to weed out people who they may no want affiliated with their company. For instance, say you tweet all the time about how you’re out getting wasted and you’re hung-over every Monday. Do you think you’ll get the job then? No. So many professionally (especially web workers) are pimping out their online presence to make themselves look better. One of the most basic ways to do this is to spice up you blog and combine it with other areas of your social media.

Here are three widgets every professional should have on their blog:

1. A Twitter Feed. A real-time widget featuring your personal twitter account is definitely a good idea; it shows employers that you lead a good, lawful life (if you only tweet the good things, that is!). You can download one here.

2. A Summary Widget. These can be created using the text input features. While they’re not the most flashy – employers always read them. Details listed in a casual manner such as your previous employment, interests and personality are all great topics to summarize here.

3. LinkedInABox. LinkedIn is the professional social networking site which many use to house the best-of-the-best of their portfolios. So why not spread some of that love to your blog? Here is a link to the widget.

So do you think it’s time you gave your online presence a makeover?

Blogging Fight Back Against Twitter

Dean Sherwin — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 13:46:13 +0000

A few months ago, everyone was saying “Oh! Blogging is dying on its feet” or “This time next year blogs will be dead and gone”. For a second or two, I started to believe them. After all, micro-blogging was flying up like a firework and blogs were the first victim – no matter how hard bloggers tried to integrate them into their blogs. And for someone like me who just started up their own blog – this was bad news.

But it appears as though Twitter is slowing down and blogging is on the rise once again. The chart above illustrates the recent trend. The orange line represents Twitter and as you can see it grew alongside Wordpress (blue line) between February and June. Then it took off by itself leaving Wordpress in the gutter. But from September onwards, Twitter simple flattened out and Wordpress went back on the rise.

I don’t think Blogs and Twitter are really in the same league. After all, people like information and entertainment – and squeezing that into 140 characters is too much of a task. Looks like blogging will be around for quite a few years to come.

TIME Magazine launch TechLand

Dean Sherwin — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 14:06:01 +0000

The folks behind TIME magazine at TIME Inc. have just launched their new technology website dubbed Techland. The new website has many old faces from TIME on its masthead including their Tech editor Lev Grossman who’ll be a regular contributor.

They’ll cover the more ‘user orientated’ area of the market with much of their categories revolving around products and less about news. These categories include Gadgets, Gaming, Culture and Videos.

Overall, it looks like a good website from a reliable bunch however the design is a little sloppy and I’d imagine they’ll be tidying things up a bit as the site grows. The ties with TIME are still evident with many of their information pages such as ‘Contact Us’ leading directly to TIME’s customer services page.

Create Your Own Wordpress Theme

Dean Sherwin — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:12:04 +0000

Don’t like having the same theme as everyone else on your Wordpress blog and can’t find one just right for you? Well then just create your own – no coding necessary. WPTheme Creator is an online web app that allows you to generate your own custom Wordpress theme by simple entering in things like how many columns you want and what colours you would like certain aspects to be.

As you can see in the screenshot, the options are fairly basic but they return good results when you really put some thought and effort into creating your new Wordpress theme.

The generated themes will run on Worpress programs up to the most recent one – 2.8 right the way from the fairly ancient 2.1 Wordpress release. One you have finished creating your theme you simply click ‘Save’ and then download it as you would any other theme. Then, go to ‘the Appearance tab in the wp-admin screen of your Wordpress blog and upload the theme, then click Activate once it has finished installing. Your new generated theme will be active on your blog.

Feedly: The Best Browser RSS Reader

Dean Sherwin — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 10:22:24 +0000

I though I’d share with you guys an RSS reader that I started using recently called Feedly. Basically it’s and add-on for most browsers including Chrome and Firefox which combines all your RSS feeds into one incredible place that by far surpasses generic readers such as Google.

Here is a screenshot:

What I like most about is that it also combines other services such as GMail and Twitter into the same package so you’re getting all of your information in the one place instead of having several tabs open.

It’s free and its easy to set up once you have installed it as an add-on. Click here to download Feedly.