Final Websites are due. Please come with your live site and URL, ready to present your website to the class.
Tell us what worked, what didn’t, what problems were solved and how? Also be ready to answer questions about your site and process in class.
Have fun 
… yes I know you’re being graded… but building websites is supposed to be fun.
The Site: You should be done with your css on a whole, start adding widgets additional menus, and looking for other things you may need to pull in to your site.. galleries, forms, flash. Is your information organized in such away that these things are possible? Start incorporating them in to the site. You should also now be adding actual client content in to your sites.
Your Client: Your client should have content for you at this point. If not… be really specific about information you need from them. Make a list for them to fill out. Are there things you can figure out on your own? (phone numbers, e-mail, facebook links etc…) It’s a pain to do there work for them, but reality is it will make your job faster if you can get actual content. Worst case senario, start filling in dumby content. But try and make it look as close the the real thing as possible. For example: put numbers in for phone numbers, not Latin text. Will help you insure your formatting is correct.
Blog: I’ve been noticing not everyone is keeping up on these… I am watching, don’t kid yourself, it would be a pitty if lack of rambling effected your grade. We’re going to start working on JavaScript next week. So you’re 5 min job is to find an intresting Javascript effect that you like. Can be simple, complicated, menus, graphics. Provide a link to it…. this means not only type in the url… but ALSO actually use “insert link” button in your editor (looks like chain links) to make a link to that place. Hint: Web design students should actually know how to make a working link 
Finish the CSS for your site. Finish…like really. Text, formatting, rollovers, menus, backgrounds…. Everything.
Bring the URL to class, and your files to work on, in case changes need to be made.
If your html/php (Aside from widgets) is not done yet, bring questions, and issues to class.
For those of you working on creating themes with image gallery of some sort (even if they are product shots for example). I would take a look at the “Format” options of your posts.
When you are creating a new post, on the right hand side you have a “Format” option.
They include:
Standard
Aside
Image
Quote
Gallery
Video
Status
These formats when incorporated in to your theme, can give you different functionality, or simple a different class name, so that the page acts appropriately depending on the format of the post. There is an intro tutorial here:
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-themes/what-whys-and-how-tos-of-post-formats-in-wordpress-3-1/
and more info in the Codex:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Post_Formats
Bring to Class
Finished Photoshop or Illustrator mock up of site design.
Links to your current development site.
You should at the very least have a layout and text styled in your site at this stage of the game.
Your Client
Touch base with your client about content… remind them of content submission dead lines. What do they need on the site? phone numbers? addresses?
Blog
Bring me Questions for next class, about what you are struggling with. Please be specific. What are you trying to do that isn’t working? What Plug-ins are you trying to implement? I can’t….. please help me with…….
Thursday night I manged to take down my demo site. It was because I overwrote the “header.php” or “index.php” file in the main folder instead of my template folder. Ughhh. Fixing it the next morning was only a matter of minutes because
I HAD A BACK UP FILE!!
worth repeating:
I HAD A BACK UP FILE!!
It’s easy to over write existing files, and super easy with a slip of the keyboard or mouse, to overwrite the WRONG file. So every once in a while, copy all of your files locally (on to your own machine via FTP), so you have a backup. As embarrassing as it is to screw up in front of kind students, much worse when you’ve been spending days and days working on a client’s site and have no way to get back to where you were. OH, man and trying to get that egg off your face….
This has documentation, and articles & tutorials pertaining to WordPress:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Main_Page
The Loop, is used to go through all of your post files and display them on a page:
http://codex.wordpress.org/The_Loop_in_Action
http://codex.wordpress.org/The_Loop
These are functions you can use inside your php code, to modify & adapt your template:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags
Articles and Information as to how to work with and adapt your menus if needed:
http://justintadlock.com/archives/2010/06/01/goodbye-headaches-hello-menus
http://codex.wordpress.org/Navigation_Menushttp://codex.wordpress.org/Navigation_Menus
XHTML & CSS File
Create a .html file, and accompanying .css file. In the file place text you would expect to see on your wordpress site (Yes you can copy and paste from your own blogs). Think comment forms, article headings, Page heading… take note of some of the classes, and id’s used in other WP sites. Style your text… pick fonts, colors, rollover effects.
Client
Create a Mood Board for your client, Outlining site colors, typography… get it approved by your client.
Blog
Find a WordPress site you are impressed with, tell us what you like & why. What would you improve?
Theme Frameworks are very flexible themes, they allow you to create “child themes” based on the functionality of the theme framework. So you don’t have to spend so much time coding your theme. Some Frameworks are so flexible, that all you need to change is the CSS, and you’re off to the races. The trick is finding one with features you desire.
(Warning to my Students: don’t get sucked in to the lure of never looking at the code, the more you know the more flexible & tailored you can make your theme. By all means stand on the shoulders of giants, but be sure you know enough to whisper in their ear, and get them headed in the direction you would like to go)
Hybrid: http://themehybrid.com/
Thematic: http://themeshaper.com/thematic/
WPFramework: http://wpframework.com/about/
Whiteboard: http://whiteboardframework.com/
Carrington: http://carringtontheme.com/
How To Create a WordPress Theme: The Ultimate WordPress Theme Tutorial
http://themeshaper.com/2009/06/22/wordpress-themes-templates-tutorial/
Creating a WordPress theme with WP Framework:
http://www.position-relative.com/2009/07/creating-a-wordpress-theme-with-wp-framework/
How to make a child theme for WordPress: A pictorial introduction for beginners
http://op111.net/53/
Every so often I find a few helpful books. I like books, I can thumb through them, dog ear them, highlight them here are a few you might find helpful:
WordPress 2.8 Theme Design, by Tessa Blakeley Silver
While this is not a beginners guide, with a little XHTML, and CSS knowledge this book can take you a long way. I also like some of her suggestions on workflow.
How to cheat in Adobe Flash CS5 by Chris Georgenes
I LOVE how this author shows you how to use the flash drawing tools and interface. It’s colorful, heavy on images and illustrations, showing you lots of great tips, ideas and ways to improve workflow as an illustrator. Not so helpful I find when it comes to scripting. A chapter devoted to simple button and movie clip action script would have been really helpful, even if that actionscript was timeline based.