It takes a while to make me angry. Normally I´m a straight guy who keeps cool blood. But I am getting angry if someone with obviously very little knowledge of web development first takes my work for her own benefit and then starts trying to damage my reputation such as Aisling D´Art tries to do with her website she formerly called “The UN-Official BranfordMagazine Website“.

Facts and Fictions

Some years ago when I released the first version of BranfordMagazine Mrs. D´Art was a big fan of it and started to write and sell an ebook that was kind of a “how-to” for my theme. That was OK and I promoted her book on my website as an affiliate partner. But I didn´t stopp my continuous development and released new and better versions.

Then came the day when Mrs. D´Art didn´t want to continue updating her ebook anymore. She started to provide old versions of my theme on her website which was ok with me as well (although she never asked or at least informed me). But she also started to run a campaign against me telling people only the old versions of my themes are stable ones and the newer ones are buggy and cause errors. This is obviously driven by missing knowledge and a lack of information because it´s simply not true.

In one of her articles she tells people why she wouldn´t buy a PRO version of my theme. She claims it uses faulty code but she…

• Never tried a PRO theme (so how can she judge?)
• Compares an older (non PRO) version again (4.x)
• Gets error messages that are based on her own mistakes when installing the theme

Since a few days her site quit using the old BranfordMagazine version since it doesn´t seem to be compatible with WordPress 3.0. This is also not true. I tested several versions from 2.0 to 2.6 (the latest version Mrs. D´Art reccommends) and they all work without any issues. In fact she really reccommends not to upgrade to WordPress 3.0!

[...] ignore the “Update to WordPress 3.0 now” messages. Unless WordPress comes out with a patch for the problem affecting Branford and several other themes, updating means breaking your theme.

Source: http://branfordmagazine.com/how-to-continue-using-branford-magazine-wordpress-themes

In this article she really blames WordPress for not working with some (potentially old) themes and expects a “patch for the problem”. I just can´t believe this. How can she dare to claim the issue is up to WordPress? Come on Mrs. D´Art…times are changing and the web is not a static place. It continues developing and sometimes old stuff needs to be deprecated. You don´t use an Internet Explorer 5 or Netscape Navigator 4 anymore, don´t you? And if, at least you don´t complaint about it does not support CSS3.

Final Thoughts

Well to me it´s an incredibly cheeky and unreasonable attitude if somone never has developed something on her own, benefits from the work of others and then starts to trash them. When I first released BranfordMagazine I took “Mimbo” by Darren Hoyt as a coding basis. I also took elements from the former “Revolution” Theme by Brian Gardner and combined them to one new theme. I never made a secret out of it. I also mentioned that always in the themes footer and credited Darren and Brian. That´s the least I can do. And the least I expect if someone who benefits from the work of another.

The fact that she seems to have issues with the old themes versions and the new WordPress (and potentially some of her users as well although the themes did not cause issues on my testsite) is another good example why you should always check out the original source of a theme or plugin to avoid trouble. Only at the original authors website you can be sure to get the original stuff and professional support. Even if it might cost some money, at the end it´s less expensive then dealing with issues and unexperienced supporters.

And as I already mentioned in a comment on Mrs. D´Arts Site: “You do your job and I do mine”. But please Mrs. D´Art, stopp telling things that are based on ignorance and a huge lack of knowledge…and are simply not true!

Further reading

• Downloading a Premium Theme from the Wrong Site can be Expensive

After you purchased SpiegelMagazine you can´t wait to get your site up an running?! With the themes optionspage, setting up SpiegelMagazine for the first time is as easy as 1, 2, 3. This is a step-by-step instalation guide.

Download, Unpack and Upload

After you downloaded and unpacked the zip-archive, you have a folder called PRiNZ_SpiegelMagazine_pro. This folder contains two more folders, the readme files in English and German and a logo.

Now take only the folder spiegelmagazine-pro not the whole PRiNZ_SpiegelMagazine_pro folder and upload it to your WordPress themes folder which is normally located at /wp-content/themes in your servers WordPress installation. If you upload the whole unpacked PRiNZ_SpiegelMagazine_pro folder you might encounter several issues. You will need an FTP program to do this.

You can not use the themes installation function within WordPress because that would use the whole zip-archive instead of just the theme folder.

Setup the Theme Options

Now go to your WordPress admin and open the themes options under Appearance > SpiegelMagazine Options.

At this options page you need to make some settings to make the theme work properly. To be very explicit on that: The theme works, there are no known bugs or major issues. If something doesn´t work double check if your settings are correct. In most cases it´s a users failure and not a themes issue. That´s the truth

Setup the Header

Choose if you like to use a Logo or your Blogname and Description in the Header. By default the Logo is used. You can change the Logo in the “Header” Section of your WordPress Administration (WordPress 3.0 or higher required).

Setup Pages and Categories Menue

Here you can setup the top menu bars. It is reccomended to use the WordPress custom menu functionality.
You can exclude pages and categories from the main horizontal menue bars on top of the page if you use the default menus. Enter the IDs of the pages and categories you want to EXCLUDE from the top menue bar. Enter the IDs separated by comma. If you don´t know how to find the IDs, have a look at this tutorial. If you don´t enter any IDs, every page and every category will be displayed here.

Categories that don´t contain any posts will never be displayed. So if you can´t see a specific category you should check if there is already at least one post in that category.

You can also specify if you want the pages- or category menubar to display or not. And you can tell the theme to use a WordPress custom menu instead or additionally. If you want to use the WordPress custom menu (Introduced in WordPress 3.0) you need to set it up under Appearance > Menus. I reccomend to use the custom menus because they offer much more flexibility.

Setup the Image Slider

Spiegelmagazine comes with a nice build-in image slider. This image slider shows a number of images with links to internal or even external ressources. At this point you just need to check the box to use the image slider. if the box is not checked the leadarticle will be used (see next headline).

Before you can use the imageslider you need to upload images under Appearance > WP-Cycle. Here you can also define whether an image has a link (to a page, post or even external). You can do some other settings as well like the transition effect. By default the trasition effect is “fade” which I think is the nicest. Always make sure the images have the right dimensions which are 940×350 pixels. Otherwise they will look ugly.

I will provide an extra detailed tutorial for the image slider in a few days. Meanwhile you may check out the page of the author of this nice plugin.

Setup the Leadarticle

The leadarticle can be used instead of the image slider. It provides a headline an image and some text. You should create a specific category for the leadarticle but you don´t have to. Just select the category from the dropdown select-menu. The theme will then display always the latest article from this category. When you write a post in this category you must use the “more” tag or fuction when you write a post. It will not produce an automatic excerpt.

Setup the featured Articles

The featured articles are the three articles that apear below the image slider or leadarticle on the homepage. They are taken from one specific category you may call “featured articles” or whatever you want. If this category already exists, you can select it from the dropdown selection menu. And remember: If there is no article assigned to this category, nothing can be displayed.

Setup the homepage bottom columns

In the lower area of the homepage two columns (left, right) with different categories are displayed. Here you can define which ones. In every column you can define as many different categories and number of posts per category as you like. Just enter the IDs of the categories seperated by commas and the number of post taken from each category. I reccommend one post per category.

Setup the Image Dimensions

Here you can define the dimensions (width and height in pixels) of the various images on the homepage and the archive pages. This is a very powerful feature that allows you to change the image dimensions whenever you like. Thanks to the TimThumb image script all images are croped and scaled “on the fly” and can be changed as often as you like. Imagehandling has never been so easy. The settings effect the images of the leadarticle (if you don´t use the image slider), the featured articles (only the height because of the layout), the hompage bottom colums and the archive (category overview) pages.

Setup the 3-colum page template

The 3-column page is a special template to display content from three different categories in a very prominent way. Take a look at the demo and see how it can look like. All relevant settings can be made here. See the tutorial to this template (it´s the same for all PRiNZ Pro Themes) for more details.

Setup the Footer

Choose if you like to use the alternative Footer. You will get an additional 4-column widgetized area on the bottom of the page that you can use for various purposes.

Google AdSense and Analytics Code

Here you can put your Google AdSense code for the Leaderboard advert on the homepage and the code for Google Analytics (or another tracking code). If you leave that empty just nothing will be displayed.

Troubleshooting

No Categories

Make sure you use correct category IDs otherwise you will see “no categories” where you expect the name of a category (e.g homepage bottom column articles)

Image Thumbnails do not show up

If you have issues displaying the image thumbnails on the homepage have a look at this tutorial that shows you how to use images. Another tutorial which can be found here, deals with potential issues with the image handling script. Don´t worry: there is a solution in 99,9% of all cases.

Slider shows no images

Make sure you have uploaded images under Appearance > WP-Cycle and also make sure they have the right dimensions (940×350 pixels).

No articles appear

The reason why no articles appear for example in the featured article area is because you have no articles in that category. Once you write an article it will apear. So always make sure your categories have articles.

It´s quite a good helper to write e.g. 3 testarticles and assign them to each category. That gives you a good overview how it works.

Further Readings and Tutorials

• How to use images on the homepage
• Use Widgets in the Sidebar
• More Tutorials

This premium magazine style WordPress theme is the third in my “Jazz Musician Series”. After a sax-player (BranfordMagazine) and a trumpet-player (WyntonMagazine) I thought it was time for a guitar-player. So I dedicated SpiegelMagazine to New York based jazz-guitar-player Russ Spiegel. I know Russ personally from the days when he used to live and work in Frankfurt/Germany. The theme requires WordPress 3.0 or later.

SpiegelMagazine is an amazing and feature rich magazine style theme. It comes with lots of great options such as an nice image slider, an admin interface (options page) for easy setup as well as lots of great custom widgets for individual customization (e.g Twitter, Newsleter, More from this category etc.).

Theme Features

• Outstanding magazine style layout
• 960 grid system
• Integrated WP-Cycle image slider
• Auto prettyPhoto integration
• Automatic image handling and resizing
• Options page for easy setup without coding
• WordPress 3.0 features like custom headers, backgrounds and menus
• Three additional custom page templates
• Ten widgetized areas
• Eight custom widgets
• Prepared for localization. Default language English. German language file included.
• W3C valid code works in all modern browsers

Demo, Support and Purchase

WordPress Theme SpiegelMagazine PRO
A premium Magazine Theme for Wordpress with multiple Functionalities, custom Widgets, an Options Panel and additional Page Templates.
Price: €29.90

Multisite

The theme was not build to be used with the multisite (former WordPress MU) feature. There might occur issues when using it on a multisite installation.

Installation

Please read the readme.html file contained in the downloaded zip-archive before you start.

Change Log

Version 1.0 (released 14.03.2010)

Initial release

As all PRiNZ Pro Themes, SpiegelMagazine is an amazing and feature rich magazine style theme. It provides lots of great options such as a nice image slider, an admin interface (options page) for easy setup as well as lots of great custom widgets for individual customization (e.g Twitter, Newsleter, More from this category etc.).

Demo, Info and Purchase

You can grab your copy of SpiegelMagazine right from the shop here at DER PRiNZ.

WordPress Theme SpiegelMagazine PRO
A premium Magazine Theme for Wordpress with multiple Functionalities, custom Widgets, an Options Panel and additional Page Templates.
Price: €29.90

When you goolge for “WordPress Themes”, “Premium WordPress Themes” or even “Free Premium WordPress Themes” you will get a huge result list with hundreds of websites. Because WordPress is such a popular plattform with a huge community there are so many people providing Themes and plugins for free or even paid. There are also some sites that provide premium themes you normally have to pay for for free…but beware of the shadows.

Worst Case: Malicious Code can Kill your Site

Most people are unaware of the dangers in using sites that provide pirated software (a theme or a plugin is also a piece of software). An example from Intego, an internet security firm, reported alerts about Trojan horses in pirated copies of both Apple iWork-09 (Jan 22, 2009) and Adobe Photoshop CS4 (Jan 26, 2009). Trojans and other viruses can seriously damage your system. But we don´t talk about iWork and Photoshop, we are talking about WordPress themes. Who would infect a theme with a virus? To be honest: I don´t know but it´s the cruel truth that such things do happen. Your home PC might be secured by an anti-virus software (which is never 100% save) but what about your webspace?

If it is too good to be true, it probably isn’t…

I have seen WordPress sites crashing because there was malicious code in a footer or header file. It was encrypted and an unexperienced user would never recognize it as malicious code. Sometimes it “just” displays “buy Viagra” Links all over your site and sometimes it saves lots of data to your server and exceeds your quota. Your site will go down.

Missing Functions and no Support

These examples are really the worst case and although they happen they don´t happen too often. What is much more annoying and may be more expensive at the end is missing functions and support. Imagine BranfordMagazine. This theme used to be available as a free theme for some years. But when I developed it further and it became more and more professional and popular it simply was not possible anymore to provide a theme and an outstanding support…all for free.

Well I could have continue providing the theme for free and stopp providing support but I feel that´s bad practice and I like to support people with the advanced functions and features of my themes. I´m always proud when someone was able to launch a great looking website based on my themes and I´m happy when my customers are happy. In order to keep the good support (or even make it better) and contiue development I decided to charge money for my themes.

Also very important is continuous development. The web is no static place. It´s moving all the time. Recently WordPress 3.0 was released and it comes up with a whole bunch of fantastic new features. If the development wouldn´t continue, my themes were still usable with the new WordPress version but they wouldn´t make use of the new features.

You still might find places where you can Download copies of my themes, especially BranfordMagazine, for free. But be aware that these are older versions that are missing great functionalities and are not supported by me.

Support the Authors because they support You

Theme and plugin authors – no matter if paid or free – contribute their piece of the cake to the WordPress community and that´s an important piece. Authors of premium (paid) themes and plugins usually put more effort into the design and development of their product. And they usually provide a much better support via email, comments or support forums.

Free themes are absolutely OK and there are many good ones out there. But if you find a premium theme for free that is usally a paid theme, you should be on your guard.

If you are a private blogger you might use a free theme and customize it by yourself because your requirements are not so high and you like to customize it on your own because you have time to do it. But if your requirements begin to grow – maybe because you are running a business – you may ask for seomething that stands out of the crowd and is well supported because you can´t wait for weeks until a problem is solved. If you then have downloaded a “premium” theme from a source that was not the original author because you wanted to save a few Euros or Dollars (or Shekel or Yen…) you might find yourself in a situation that can become much more expensive because you need to hire someone to help you.

Final Thoughts

I think it´s just fine to pay a fair ammount to get a great product and support. So you always should make sure you get a premium product form the original source to avoid issues. When you decide for a free theme or plugin you should always pick them up at the WordPress theme directory or plugin repository. Always think twice before downloading software, themes or plugins from a source that is not the author or WordPress.org and always remember:

If it is too good to be true, it probably isn’t…

Further Readings

• Article at Themelab
• Article at StudioPress
• Web Amateur tries to damage my Reputation