Take-away photo and image positioning CSS styles for blogs — idea for a plugin

January 28th • 5 Comments • Under: Design Suggetions, WordPress • Tags: css, WordPress

After reading Kim’s comment regarding the Morning Racer theme, I had an idea of how to achieve a consistent image and photo placement in a WordPress blog even if you decide to change the theme.

The solution would be a plugin which would provide a “standard” set of CSS classes for styling different image (and other element) positioning.

The great thing is that you could use these CSS classnames with any theme you like as long as you have the plugin enabled. It would be also possible to specify a prefared classname prefix (for example, kd-wide, mo-withborder-a or pa-image-a) so that the plugin’s CSS doesn’t mess with the theme’s CSS. It could also contain CSS styles for lists (like the “flat” and “spaced” ones used on this blog), “important” messages, etc.

A kind of a portable image positioning thing. And you wouldn’t have to learn new CSS classnames or image layout ideas offered by different theme authors.

What do you think? Maybe you have a suggestion of other items (apart from images and lists) that you would like to have special styling.

Say Hello to Morning Racer

January 16th • 9 Comments • Under: Sidenotes • Tags: WordPress

Just a quick note — this blog now has a new look. I call it the Morning Racer WordPress theme, which will be soon released public. Here’s the Morning Racer’s wiki page. What do you think?

Screenshots of a new 2-column WordPress theme

December 18th • 1 Comment • Under: Sidenotes, WordPress • Tags: WordPress

Here are a few screen captures of the theme I am currently working on. Notice the home page layout for the older posts, and how easy it is to adjust the header and the main color. Read more »

Updated AdSense Manager Plugin: Ad Slot IDs and Rounded Corners

December 8th • 24 Comments • Under: WordPress • Tags: adsense, plugin, WordPress

The latest version (2.5) of the very popular and useful AdSense Manager plugin for WordPress by Martin Fitzpatrick doesn’t allow you to use the new ad management features that were recently implemented by Google. Previously you could track the ad performance only by their channel IDs.

Since the November 2007 an additional identifier is available for each of the ad units to which you can assign an explanatory title (for example, 200×200 ads, below article, etc.). These slots are also automatically given a 10 digit ID (like 6567667845) which is assigned to a new variable google_ad_slot inside the ad code.

Theoretically, for displaying an ad you now have to know only your publisher ID and the slot ID, while the rest of the ad’s look and feel can be adjusted through your AdSense account without ever touching the JavaScript which you have placed inside the HTML. Read more »

New WordPress Theme: Sans–serif Racer

November 14th • 24 Comments • Under: Design Suggetions • Tags: design, WordPress

While tweaking the Times Racer theme which is currently used in this blog, I was fascinated by how the sans-serif typeface and the aligned positioning of different elements made it look really harmonic and solid.

After hours of PHP, HTML and CSS trickery, the new theme was named Sans-serif Racer and ready for the release. It features unique border elements, light background shading and, similarly to Agneka Simple, one base color which can be easily adjusted. Read more »