Jay Hoffmann | Torque

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April 16, 2013

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About a month ago, I asked for feedback on a project I was working on. I originally began to build a WordPress code library after I had been using Dan Ciederholm’s Pears theme which encourages modular, object oriented, front-end development. I began to work on something that would do the same for WordPress patterns. But I had a bit of trouble figuring out exactly what that was. Thanks to your incredible feedback and a couple of supporters pushing me along, I have officially finished Version 1.0 of Looplet.

Getting Involved with Web Standards

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April 2, 2013

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As a WordPress user, it is fantastic to see so many people contribute something back. It is so easy to find help and support, we can take it for granted. But let us not forget the larger web community. After all, WordPress was built on web standards. It may have even been the reason some of us even started using CSS and HTML the right way. And now more then ever, with responsive design and a plethora of devices and browsers, standards need our help. So let’s use our community spirit to help a build a better web.

Building a Useful WordPress Code Library

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March 14, 2013

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Something I have noticed when I am developing WordPress sites is that I very often find myself coding up the same Loop patterns again and again. How many times have you developed a magazine style layout with a grid of posts, each with a post thumbnail, title, author, date and small excerpt? I know I have – countless times. It’s like I’ve got my own personal “loop” going on myself. It might look something like this:

Write More, Help Others, Take the Plunge

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February 27, 2013

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Last month, Cole Henley wrote a brief thought on The Pastry Box Project. I know we’ve only just met but in 2013 I want you to promise me something. Write more, help others more, be confident that you know more than you think because I guarantee there will be people who can learn from your experiences and knowledge. I bet you know more than you think. That simple thought really resonated with me. In particular, I found the same phrase bouncing around in my head. Write more, help others more. As members of the WordPress community, this is our mantra. […]

New Tech, Blog Monetization, WordPress and You

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February 7, 2013

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The unfortunate truth is that most blogs make money from ad revenue which are inflexible, ineffective, and intrusive. Some people have come up with interesting solutions, such as the concept of sponsorship or subscriptions, but we are far from a solution. There have also been other, less beneficient, solutions out there. Championed by individuals like Darren Rowse, new tips and tricks on how to “monetize your blog” exploded on the Internet. The premise was fairly basic. You should provide a “value” to your audience other then your writing. Rowse used his own blog, Problogger as an example. The value that […]

jQuery Website: Now Powered by WordPress

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January 29, 2013

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Last week, the folks over at jQuery announced that they have open sourced their entire website, including content, and made it avaliable on GitHub. And even more exciting, the jQuery website now runs on WordPress! Of course, being the creative hackers that they are, this is no ordinary WordPress install. The jQuery team sought out a way to make it easy for people to edit content without having to awkwardly access the admin panel or download the entire site for local devlopment. jQuery.com content exists in static form for the most part, in either Markdown, static HTML or XML format. […]

Build Your HTML Prototype First, Then Move to WordPress

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January 18, 2013

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There are many different ways a website can get made. Ideally, a designer will work alongside a front-developer to get a working prototype ready, and a backend developer will adapt this to a CMS like WordPress. But the nature of our business often dictates that you will be balancing a couple, if not all, of these duties. And clients expect us to move quickly. It is very tempting to just start developing a theme on top of some framework and come out with a finished product. But next time you are in this situation, take a step back. Then create […]

Contributor Handbooks Are Upon Us: Help Us!

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January 10, 2013

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It’s all hands on deck for the Documentation team at WordPress! On Tuesday, the WordPress documentation team met to discuss the brand new creation of contributor handbooks. The Contributor Handbooks are being put together by the Make Documentation team, spearheaded by Siobhan McKeown and with the help of the WordPress community, myself included. The general purpose of the handbooks is this. To provide step by step guides for users who want to get involved in developing and contributing to WordPress, no matter how they choose to do so. Each handbook will cover a specific area of WordPress contribution and walk […]

5 of My Favorite WordPress Plugins in 2012

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December 21, 2012

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Plugins come and go, but some have real lasting power. With the perspective of 2012 behind me, here are a few that made my life much easier. I hope they can help you too. A small note: I like to code most of my front-end effects myself. I don’t usually rely on plugins for galleries, carousels, tabs or the like as I find they usually make a mess of your otherwise perfectly semantic front-end code. Just one man’s opinion. But anyway, you won’t find anything like that on this list. Here’s my favorites of 2012:

Code Poetry

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