WordPress

Site Redesign

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You’ve probably noticed the site is changing—again. I’m experimenting with using AI to help with design, and this site has turned into my testing ground. It’s been both fascinating and occasionally frustrating (sometimes very frustrating).

Some pages are still broken—I just haven’t made it to them yet. The biggest challenge right now is mobile. The site does include mobile support, but what I’m discovering is that AI only knows what you explicitly tell it… and I don’t always know what to tell it. My design process evolves as I go, and that makes things a bit messy when the AI doesn’t quite keep up.

So if you’re visiting on a phone, thanks for bearing with me. The desktop version is my first focus, and mobile improvements (like a working nav menu) will follow once the main structure is solid.

Appreciate your patience while I figure this out.
– Nal

Another Photoshop 2020 Thing

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There are a number of things in the new Photoshop. This is one I don’t remember seeing mentioned by others. I think it is handy for making pattern backgrounds.

While I am pointing out somewhat ignored features I’ll include this WordPress-Facebook feature.

In WordPress when posting there is a feature section labeled Open Graph and Twitter Card Tags. You may have to go into WP’s settings and enable Open Graph display on the editor. Whether in the Classic or Block editor the section will appear below the bottom of the editor.

There are two fields in the section, Use this image and Use this description. These are for automated systems that pick up on articles in your blog. The image field needs to be set to avoid Facebook, aggregators, and other automated systems grabbing the first image they find to use with their display of an article on your blog. If these systems comply with web standards they will use these two fields, if available, in whatever they post.

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WordPress Annoyance

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If you have found the new WordPress panel for editing URL/Links annoying join the crowd. Add your voice to the thread at: New WordPress URL Popup Causes More Work.

Annoying new popup url panel
Annoying new popup url panel

This change is a serious annoyance.

Lots of people do not want the links leading off site to replace their page with the destination page. I’m one of those. So, I have do a bunch of clicking to tell the link to open a new tab. It was bad enough with the previous panel/popup. Now it is way worse.

If you too are annoyed, please drop by the WP site (link above) and add your voice.

WordPress Site Icon 2015 Tutorial

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This month WordPress added Site Icons. I saw this when I updated my site to the latest release of WordPress and in looking at what is new, I saw the Site Icon feature. I lost my site icon when I moved my site from a Windows server to a Linux server. So, I have needed to redo it for some time. So, I figured this might be a quick way.

New WordPress Site Icon Setting - 9/2015
New WordPress Site Icon Setting – 9/2015

Prior to this a site owner could only use the Windows Favorite Icon and the Mac equivalent to create an icon that can be used with bookmarks. Not an exactly a user friendly thing. With release 4.3 I thought adding the site icon got easier. But, the feature isn’t what I expected or what I think most of us will expect. So, here is how to use a WP Site Icon and create a favorite icon that is used with bookmarks.

The WP Site Icon feature is for theme builders. It doesn’t do much for site owners that aren’t into coding. Konstantin Obenland, release lead for 4.3, says,

This v1 marries Jetpack’s Site Icon module with the Media Modal, reusing code from the Custom Header admin. For now, the core-provided icons will be limited to a favicon, an iOS app icon, and a Windows tile icon, leaving .ico support and additional icons to plugins to add.

So, as best I can tell, implementing the feature on my site did nothing. That means the favorite icon I lost moving my site from Windows to Linux still has to be redone. At some point the WP peeps plan to add favorites icon support. 

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Flickr Image Embed Code Change

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Flickr™ has changed the embed code they provide people for displaying Flickr images. That meant I had to change how I embed their images in the blog. I’ll explain some of what you can do with the new embed code. There is a discussion at Flickr about the new code here: New version of Flickr’s embed code.

City of the Ancient Gods
City of the Ancient Gods

Surely, you have noticed I use more Flickr images these days. It saves me time and there are so many gorgeous images from Second Life™. Taking the time to find gorgeous places and get great photos… it was becoming work. Embedding an image is easier. 

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WordPress Updating 3.9

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WordPress has been releasing several updates. Today I see they have released version 3.9. If you are a WordPress user, this is an interesting update for you. This update has lots of improved editing features. There are lots of people writing nice reviews of this release. So, I’ll only link to those:

If you use Ultimate TinyMCE, you won’t like the new editing window. Version 3.9 basically trashes its interface. 3.9 does not provide all the bells and whistles that Tiny MCE has. So, Tiny MCE users lose some functionality.