Tek3D Weblog

Use Shortcodes in Elegant Themes

Tek3D — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 17:35:51 +0000

Today, Nick from Elegant Themes has announced the release of a comprehensive set of design shortcodes for all themes. This short code collection was developed in early August and many bloggers have expressed their desire for the design shortcodes since then. These shortcodes include design elements such as buttons, columns, tabs, sliders, galleries, social media and more. They will absolutely bring your WordPress experience to a whole new level.

For anyone who hasn’t heard about shortcode, it is a simple set of functions introduced in WordPress 2.5 and it could help you create macro codes for easy use in your posts. For example, if you want to use Gallery Shortcode in WordPress, you will need to add a code line like this:

[ gallery id="1" size="medium" ]

When your post is saved, WordPress will parse the content and automatically transform the shortcodes to perform its functions. It is that simple. Moreover, Elegant has made the work simpler by integrating all shortcodes into the WordPress visual editor, allowing you to generate the shortcode markup with just a click.

In this new release, Elegant introduces 11 great shortcodes in total. They will definitely make your life easier, you would save a lot of time and your blog will load faster as you could remove many plugins for decorating your posts. Check out the new shortcode collection:

Button Varieties

Content Boxes

Toggled Content

Tabbed Content

Slideshow

Image Slider

Easy Tooltips

Social Media

Password Protected Content

Author Bio

Column Layouts

If you are using a recent version of an Elegant theme and did some customizations to your theme, you can add this shortcode collection simply by re-uploading the epanel folder. Remember to backup your theme files before modifying anything. Now purchase 45 premium Elegant themes for $39 with my link and have fun with shortcodes.

Touch Screen Technology in 2014

Tek3D — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 13:36:39 +0000

In the next few years, people would be able to brush teeth and read the news displayed on the bathroom mirror at the same time, or use ultra-thin screen integrated devices that can be folded in half or into thirds.

The Astonishing Tribe (Sweden), a company specializing in interface design for mobile devices, envisioned magical steps of the touch screen technology in 2014. Stretchable and transparent screen technology, ultra-thin screen combining with color e-ink will change the way we interact with devices. This interesting concept video is the result of the Open Innovation experiment.

Day & Night – Latest Pixar’s Short

Ricky — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 07:39:00 +0000

Day & Night is a Pixar animated short combining 2D and 3D elements unlike any its previous films. It has been packaged to be shown in theaters before Pixar’s feature film Toy Story 3, and has been released to purchase on iTunes in the USA.

The film has a simple concept with great comic potential that made previous Pixar shorts so enjoyable.

When Day, a sunny fellow, encounters Night, a stranger of distinctly darker moods, sparks fly! Day and Night are frightened and suspicious of each other at first, and quickly get off on the wrong foot. But as they discover each other’s unique qualities–and come to realize that each of them offers a different window onto the same world–the friendship helps both to gain a new perspective.

Technology Highlights – Week 35

Tek3D — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 11:45:06 +0000

Steve Jobs hosts Apple’s music event, Microsoft Co-founder Sues 11 big tech companies, Samsung officially unveils Galaxy Tab. Those are the most prominent technology news of the week.

Microsoft Co-founder Sues Apple, Google, Yahoo

Many major tech companies including Google, Apple, eBay, Facebook, Netflix and Yahoo are targets of a multi-million dollar patent lawsuit being brought by Paul Allen, who was a co-founder of Microsoft. Paul alleges that those companies infringed on 4 Web technology patents held by his company Interval Licensing LLC in the early ’90s.

Interval said that the patents are the main factor for developing e-commerce and search companies. The patents described in the suit refer to technology used for things such as Web browsing and sending alerts over the Web.

Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes called the suit “completely without merit” whereas Google said the suit “reflects an unfortunate trend of people trying to compete in the courtroom instead of the marketplace”. They are giving evidences against these allegations.

Apple September Music Event

Steve Jobs held Apple’s traditional September music event, unveiling many good services and products such as a revamped lineup of iPods; Ping, a music social network built into iTunes 10; an updated Apple TV, with support for TV and movie rentals. Steve also introduced iOS 4.1, with a multiplayer Game Center, High Dynamic Range photos and HD video uploads over Wi-Fi.

Read this post for more keynotes of this Apple event.

Samsung Galaxy Tab

After being unveiled at the IFA conference in Berlin, Samsung Galaxy Tab has become the latest challenger of iPad in the tablet battle. Samsung calls its tablet a “smart media device” with advanced specifications:

Android 2.2 support
a Cortex A8 1 GHz processor
512 MB of RAM and 16/32 GB of internal memory expandable via microSD memory cards
7-inch TFT-LCD display with 1024×600 pixel resolution
3-megapixel camera with autofocus and LED Flash plus an additional front 1.3-megapixel camera for video chats
Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity
Dimensions: 190.09 x 120.45 x 11.98mm
Weight: 380 grams
Battery should last through 7 hours of movie playback.

iPad gets a worthy competitor now. However in a bustling market with an increasing number of cheap tablets, pricing will become the crucial issue.

Apple September Event 2010 Keynote Video

Tek3D — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 08:28:55 +0000

On September 1, responding to many expectations of Apple fanboys, Apple has officially announced the latest changes, updates that will be released in September and in the upcoming time.

1. New iPod Touch

The new iPod touch is much the same as iPhone 4, only lacks the phone functions. It is even thinner than the original and also has a 326ppi Retina display, Apple A4 processor, 3-axis gyroscope, back camera to record 720p high definition video and take photos, front camera to use FaceTime with other iPod touches and iPhone 4s. The new iPod Touch will be available early next week for $229 (8GB), $299 (32GB) and $399 (64GB).

2. iOS 4.1 for iPhone and iPod Touch

The purpose of this iOS 4.1 update is to fix proximity sensor issues in old version and provide some new stand-out features.

The most notable feature is HDR photo capture, allowing you to combine photos of varying exposure to create amazing composite images. In addition, iPhone 4 users can also upload their HD videos. iOS 4.1 also integrates Game Center with peer-to-peer multiplayer options and some other interesting features.

The 4.1 update will be available next week for iPhone and iPod touch.

3. New improvements of iTunes 10

iTunes 10 features PING, a social network for music lovers that allows you to follow friends, post videos, photos, comments, opinions or songs, and comment on all of those things, a lot like you can on Facebook.

“It’s like Facebook and Twitter meets iTunes” adding, “It’s all about the music”.

It’s available right now as a free download.

4. New Multitouch iPod Nano and iPod Shuffle

The iPod Nano has a significantly extreme makeover. The tiny, 1.54″ touchscreen iPod Nano is 46% smaller and 42% lighter than its predecessor. Apple has amazingly added a touch screen display with multi-touch interface with gestures quite effectively. It will come in 7 colours and 2 capacities: 8GB for $149, 16GB for $179 and ships next week.

After a generational absence, the click-wheel is back on iPod Shuffle and so is the square body. iPod Shuffle has quite handy buttons and increase usage time up to 15 hours. It will come in 5 colours, retail for $49 for the 2GB model and will also ship next week.

5. New Apple TV

If you are a movie fan, Apple TV is a remarkable choice. The new Apple TV will stream rental movies directly from iTunes, or beam videos from your own computer, bypassing local storage and the possibility of buying anything.

The new Apple TV is 80% smaller than the previous generation. All connection ports are placed behind, respectively: HDMI, USB, Optical, and Ethernet. Especially, the new Apple TV also includes the integrated 802.11n wireless.

In addition, as the iOS 4.2 is released in November, you can stream music and video from iTunes to iOS devices with AirPlay.

The price of Apple TV including an Apple remote is $99.

Technology Highlights of Week 34

Tek3D — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 10:33:36 +0000

Lady Gaga Becomes Queen of Twitter, the Vietnamese Youtube star Natalie Tran makes $US 100,000 from Youtube, Apple Special Event Takes Place on September 1st. They are events that have made the technology world in the last 7 days.

The Twitter Queen

On August 22, Lady Gaga officially passed Britney Spears to become the Twitter Queen with the most followers (5,777,492 and counting… while Britney is holding 5,721,702). There are currently just 5 people with more than 5 million followers on Twitter (Lady Gaga, Britney, Ashton Kutcher, Ellene Degeneres, and Barack Obama). Justin Bieber will soon join them.

Apple Special Event

Apple announced to hold the annual special event in San Francisco on September 1. Apart from the new iPod Touch with dual cameras and a Retina Display, more likely the 1 USD iTunes television show rental service will also be introduced here. The iPhone 5 and a new antenna is predicted to be not launched yet.

Vietnamese Youtube star Natalie Tran

Natalie Tran is one of just 10 independent YouTube stars around the world who earned more than $US 100,000 from the site last year. Tran creates her videos at her parents’ home in western Sydney, she said her skits were all based on things that happened in her daily life, “just a little bit exaggerated for comedy purposes”.

Samsung Galaxy Tab Preview

The official Samsung Galaxy Tab teaser video reveals a number of features such as Android 2.2 running on a 7-inch display, video calling, Swype messaging, HD movie playback, Flash support, GPS navigation, an e-reader, and plenty more.

How to Set Up WordPress Site for Mobile Devices

Tek3D — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 08:51:21 +0000

According to stats of Google Analytics, nearly 3% of visitors are accessing this site via mobile phones and among them, iPhone and Android devices are the most popular. This number is quite amazing but I think that it will continue to increase consistently as the number of people using mobile Internet is surging. About a month ago at the Guardian Activate Summit, Google chief Eric Schmidt spoke that the future of newspapers is mobile and mobile is the hottest area of computer technology. These information proves how important mobile web is to bloggers and publishers nowadays.

To grow traffic for your site, you should not only develop your main website but also create its full mobile version so that visitors do not spend too much money and want to come back in the future. I notice that in some developing countries, the fees for mobile internet services such as GPRS, 3G or 4G are quite expensive. Here in Vietnam, if you visit a post of my site, you will lose about $0.1. Mobile web version’s size should be only 1/10 as small as the main website, meaning that the cost is also reduced by the same ratio and users could save much time when accessing your site. The figure below shows estimated time to load my full website, what a nightmare for mobile phone’s users.

Currently, mobile web can identify the operating system, configuration, screen resolution based on the browser user agent provided by the device’s browser. Through those collected information, the web could calculate and display in full-screen, so visitors simply move the cursor up and down to see the whole page.

Estimate cost to hire a mobile web developer is from $100 to $500 depending on the content and structure of your website. If you need a mobile web for devices that have accelerometer sensors like iPhone, iPad, the cost will be higher than the device with fixed screen. However, you don’t need to spend that much money, there are many free and paid tools that could help you create mobile web version in the easiest way. You can make your website mobile-friendly in 5 minutes by using these great tools.

1. Wptouch

In my opinion, Wptouch is the best mobilizing plugin for WordPress platform (and it is only available for WordPress sites). Its features are just perfect, you can easily transform your WordPress blog into a slick, elegant and powerful mobile web with just a few clicks. Your visitors will experience a faster and smoother web browsing on your site when it is viewed from thousands of mobile phones including iPhone, iPod touch, Android, Palm Pre/Pixi, and BlackBerry Storm.

I am using the free Wptouch plugin for my blog and it really satisfies my needs. Although there are still some minor conflicts, I believe it will be resolved soon when I purchase the WPtouch 2.0 Pro. Its prices for Pro versions are very reasonable, from $29 for single site and $59 for 5 site pack. Compared to the free plugin, paid versions include many important features such as Adsense, Admob, custom ads support, web-app mode, threaded comments or custom theming. If you are still confused with tons of mobile web tools, Wptouch is my best recommendation for you.

2. Mofuse

I used Mofuse for a while when it was in beta phase 3 years ago. Honestly I had really loved it until its official versions released, it was a nightmare. The prices of Mofuse packages are too expensive and I can’t afford it at that moment or even now. To use Mofuse’s service, each month you need to pay $7.95 for jumpstart package (local & business use), $39.00 for basic (smaller groups), $89 for small business or $199 for ultimate package (larger groups). However, if you target mobile users, these prices are quite reasonable. That explains why Mofuse is now powering mobile versions for over 23,000 blogs including famous blogs such as Mashable. Besides, they have free WordPress plugin but it hasn’t been updated for 2 years and also does not give you enough freedom to customize your blog, so I don’t recommend you to use this plugin. If you can, just purchase the jumpstart package, it is worth your money.

3. Mippin

Mippin is a totally free service that can mobilize your site in 1 minute. This is maybe the fastest and easiest website content syndication on mobile phones. I have tried this tool for my site and the result is not too bad, however it doesn’t offer many options like Mofuse or Wptouch. Mippin also allow publishers to earn 100% of the revenue generated through ads within content at no hidden cost via Admob’s mobile advertising. This tool will be suitable for you if your needs are not so high and you don’t want to pay more money for mobilizing.

4. WordPress Mobile Pack

WordPress Mobile Pack is a complete toolkit to help mobilize your WordPress site. It has a mobile switcher to select themes based on the user agent that is visiting the site, a standard mobile theme, a set of advanced themes for Nokia and WebKit devices, a widget supports mobile ads with AdMob or Google’s Mobile Adsense, extra widgets, device adaptation and an administration panel allows access to the admin interface. This plugin is quite a surprising free plugin. Although the base theme is quite simple, it displays pretty well on Nokia and other old phones. You also can spend some time to extend the theme, but it should be done carefully to preserve XHTML-MP compliance within the markup. It is the best if you can use this plugin for old phones along with Wptouch for Wptouch or Mofuse for newer devices.

Apart from the tools I’ve mentioned above, there are bunch of other mobilizing tools such as Wptap, Winksite, Zinadoo, 2ergo or Wirenode. I don’t have time to review all of them, so if you have tried any others, feel free to share your experience with us. In regard to the 4 mobilizing tool in this article, which one are you using and are you satisfied with it?

Google is Testing Live Updating of Search Results

Mark Welsh — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 07:49:56 +0000

In recent days Google has been testing a new form of search result that will change as you enter a new letter into the search query bar.

The results are essentially a streaming search page that uses Google Suggest technology to change the search results as you change what you are typing.

For example, if you are to start typing something like “life i” it may show the search results for the search term “life insurance.” If you delete the “i” and start typing “life c” then it will show results for the search term “life coach.” This is all without hitting enter as you normally do when searching for topics on Google. Look at the video demonstration below:

Google is known to do a lot of testing with it’s search results and this is one of many recent steps towards delivering faster and more relevant results. According to a Google representative, Gabriel Stricker, the company can be running as many as 200 search experiments at a time and this is one of them.

The first person to take notice of this new SERP is Rob Ousbey, who mentioned it on his blog at Ousbey.com.

The story was later confirmed by TechCrunch after contacting the Google representative. Sources close to Google are apparently type lipped on whether they would be integrating this feature into the results in the near future. Because Ousbey is one of the very few people to notice this it is safe to assume it is being tested on a very small fraction of Google users.

It’s been suggested that limited bandwidth or CPU may cause issues with this new live search technology. There are also questions as to how this will integrate with Google’s Ad Words program.

Make Free Phone Calls from Gmail

Tek3D — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 19:03:33 +0000

This is an amazing news from Google. Google has officially launched the web based VoiP service that allows users to make international phone calls directly from Gmail inbox. Before today, Gmail voice and video chat helps us make internet calls with friends using computer’s microphone and speakers but this required both people to be at their computers and sign into Gmail concurrently.

From now, you can make a call to your friend’s phone right from Gmail inbox, and moreover, users of the new phone call service aren’t required to have a Google Voice account, and calls to U.S. or Canadian numbers are free. International calls to other countries will be charged at very low rates. You can check international calling rates here. Calls to the U.K., France, Germany, China, Japan and many more countries are as little as $0.02 per minute.

All you have to do is just installing the voice and video plug-in and you are ready. Dialing a phone number works just like a normal phone. Just click “Call phone” at the top of your contact list and dial a number or enter a contact’s name.

This new feature is rolled out to U.S. based Gmail users over the next few days, so you’ll be ready to get started once “Call Phones” appeared in your chat list.

Top 5 Email Productivity Tips

Jessy Troy — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 07:35:52 +0000

An average corporate (Blah! I dislike that word) employee who uses email to contact clients and for in-office exchanges will spend nearly half of the work day responding to or reading emails, stacking up 200 emails either sent or reviewed daily. That’s a lot of wasted time. Because of this, it’s important that email users can deal with their messages quickly without staring at them for too long or figuring out how to sort and manage them.

Filters

Many email services provide email filtering that allows you to sort and organize your emails more readily. This can mean everything from sorting your “immediate reply” emails from your “reference materials,” to throwing emails into the right folders, to forwarding misguided emails to the correct group. For the OCD among us, this is amazing. I know I have about 30 filters setup in my Gmail to make sure I don’t waste time moving and rearranging.

Labels/Folders

Depending on the email hosting you’re using, there will typically be some storage method that keeps all of your emails organized and tucked neatly away. Whatever method you use is fine, but you should follow a couple of basic rules. First, make sure your labels are appropriately descriptive. They should be specific enough that it’s clear where everything goes, but don’t make labels so specific that you find yourself with dozens of folders. Second, you should never, ever delete an email. As soon as you do, you’ll need it. Even free email hosting services provide multiple gigabytes of storage, so deletion is totally unnecessary.

Pre-Constructed Responses

I know this is kind of cheesy, but many of the emails that a corporate employee sends out each day will look and sound very similar. Even having a response directing the email to the appropriate division is useful. For common questions or responses, create and save a pre-formatted response that you can edit over time and modify to meet the needs of the current email.

Follow Ups

One of the best things you can do to reduce your email management problems is be proactive. By scheduling “follow ups” for important emails or blood thirsty clients, you can prevent explosions before they happen. Use your email program cooperatively with a scheduling program to remind yourself of tasks that will require your attention at a future date.

Improve Your Type Speed

According to David Allen, creator of the popular book and seminar on productivity known as “Getting Things Done,” you can save literally years of work just by improving your type speed to 50 words per minute. Whatever your current speed is, learning to type more quickly is sure to decrease your email response time.

Three hundred emails are sent out every second, which means by the time you finish reading this article, nearly 50,000 emails have traveled from one account to another. For someone who answers email as a part of their professional life, handling their share of those emails can be daunting. Fortunately, following productivity tips like the ones listed here can help make that portion of your work day flow more smoothly, increase your overall efficiency, and give you a few more chances throughout your day to stare out the window and just breathe.

Tek3D Weblog

Use Shortcodes in Elegant Themes

Button Varieties

Content Boxes

Toggled Content

Tabbed Content

Slideshow

Image Slider

Easy Tooltips

Social Media

Password Protected Content

Author Bio

Column Layouts

Related Posts:

Touch Screen Technology in 2014

Related Posts:

Day & Night – Latest Pixar’s Short

Related Posts:

Technology Highlights – Week 35

Microsoft Co-founder Sues Apple, Google, Yahoo

Apple September Music Event

Samsung Galaxy Tab

Related Posts:

Apple September Event 2010 Keynote Video

1. New iPod Touch

2. iOS 4.1 for iPhone and iPod Touch

3. New improvements of iTunes 10

4. New Multitouch iPod Nano and iPod Shuffle

5. New Apple TV

Related Posts:

Technology Highlights of Week 34

The Twitter Queen

Apple Special Event

Vietnamese Youtube star Natalie Tran

Samsung Galaxy Tab Preview

Related Posts:

How to Set Up WordPress Site for Mobile Devices

1. Wptouch

2. Mofuse

3. Mippin

4. WordPress Mobile Pack

Related Posts:

Google is Testing Live Updating of Search Results

Related Posts:

Make Free Phone Calls from Gmail

Related Posts:

Top 5 Email Productivity Tips

Filters

Labels/Folders

Pre-Constructed Responses

Follow Ups

Improve Your Type Speed

Related Posts: