When my lights are on, when my handbrake is up, when the car needs a service, when I forget to put my seatbelt on, I get told in no uncertain terms – PING – to rectify the situation.

All these PINGs are a little annoying, but they serve a purpose. However, the most important PING of all – to tell me I need fuel – doesn’t exist.

Sure, the car displays a little amber light on the dashboard to warn me of an impending breakdown on the side of the motorway. But I spend most of my drive to and from work looking at the road, not my instruments.

General Motors is currently in debt to the sum of $173bn. And it wouldn’t have happened if they’d just thought about their customers’ needs and installed a PING on Vauxhall fuel gauges.

Rant over.

Microsoft’s Bing is the latest example of search engines as aggregators, rather than indexes. Go to Bing.com, search for ‘LA Lakers’, and you get a list of results. Roll over a search result, though, and you get a detailed look at the content on the listed site.

What this means is that you’re giving the person searching for results yet another reason NOT to click through to your blog/website. Why? Well now they can read the meta description the search engine serves up for your site AND an excerpt of the first 300+ characters of content on your page.

For a blog that displays latest posts on the home page, this may not be ideal (because people may not hire you based on your latest ‘I hate clients’ blog post).

This is the problem I’ve been having with Bing (displaying the wrong content, not hating my clients), so I decided to tweak my WordPress theme (Thesis) to provide a simple fix. Here’s what I want to have displayed at the top of my home page for prospective clients, blog readers and search engines to see:

Pretty simple, right. Yes, unless you’re using Thesis, which has a tendency to make the simplest tasks complicated. Thesis uses hooks to inject code into the theme, so you have to write a custom function to make anything happen. Here’s a walkthrough to help you out:

Step 1 – Feature Box settings

I suspect Chris Pearson has big ideas for Thesis’ Feature Box in the future, but so far it’s just a little container that you have a bit of styling/placement control over. You could create a new hook with a div element, but the feature box is actually perfect for the purpose of adding a basic introductory paragraph.

In your WordPress admin panel, click on Appearance in the left navigation bar, then click on Design Options button. Under the heading ‘Features box’ in the Thesis design options page, expand the ‘Placement’ tab, and change its settings to ‘in your content column’ and select the ‘on the home page only’ radio button. Then set the ‘display feature box after post’ drop down to ‘above all posts’. Now save your settings.

This tells Thesis that if there’s a feature box function, display the contents of the feature box in the content column, just above the first post title – and only do it on the home page.

Step 2 – Create a Thesis Hook

Open your Thesis theme’s custom_functions.php file in your favourite text editor and insert the following function and hook to display the feature box:

function add_feature_box() {
?>
<p>Insert your intro paragraph text here</p>
<?php
}
add_action('thesis_hook_feature_box', 'add_feature_box')

What we’ve done here is:

• We’ve created a new function called add_feature_box
• Within our function we’ve added the HTML content that will display our new Bing-friendly introduction.
• Finally we’ve tied the function into Thesis using a hook (thesis_hook_feature_box)

Step 3 – Style your Feature box

Finally we’ll need to style our new feature box to make it look pretty. I’ve gone for some basic styling for my example, but you could technically do whatever you like. The following CSS needs to be added to your custom.css stylesheet.

#feature_box {
	background: #f5f5f5; border: 1px solid #ddd;
	font-size: 1.4em;
	line-height: 1.5em;
	padding: 10px;
	margin-right: 21px;
}

The #feature_box div is part of the Thesis core, so we’re simply styling the look and feel of the box. And because the feature box is inserted before any of Thesis’ content styling takes place, we need to assign a font size, line height, padding and margins to match the default Thesis CSS styles.

For all my whining about Thesis’ complicated hook system, that was actually pretty easy. So simply upload your custom_functions.php file and custom.css file to your Thesis theme’s ‘custom’ folder, and you’re done.

I don’t know for sure that this is going to work with Bing, but I suspect that it will, and either way it provides a nice easy introduction to a blog. If you have any problems/questions/comments/complaints, please feel free to tell me about them in the comments.

If you’re considering breaking into the PSD slicing market, I highly recommend you don’t offer the world’s best PSD to HTML and PSD to WordPress services (this is the mistake I made). Instead, learn to code like an Elbonian.

How to code like an Elbonian

• Don’t work to W3C standards. They only exist to make corporate types believe the Web is an organized, regulated place.
• Don’t ever use logical naming conventions, because #greentextblock is a much better name for a DIV than #sidebar.
• You don’t need to know what Semantic HTML is. Forget about it.
• If you consider yourself a maverkick Elbonian and you do decide to venture into the wonderful world of styling for Internet Explorer, please make sure you throw all your hacks into the main CSS file instead of using IE-specific stylesheets. We non-Elbonians like cleaning up code every time a new version of IE is released.
• Even though most websites use some form of CMS these days, there’s really no need to bear that in mind when styling content. Sure, the website’s user knows nothing about web design, but he’ll eventually figure out how to give that ordered list its assigned ID of #indentednumberedlist you so cleverly added.

By sticking to these rules you’ll be able to code an entire Photoshop design in under 30 minutes. This means you can drop your price to virtually nothing and sign up every second-rate web design agency in the Western world before lunch time. Hooray!

1. Great with WordPress
2. Good parent
3. Lousy cook

Well, earlier today Website maintenance guy and fellow South African Tertius actually noticed the new tagline and suggested to the nice folks on Twitter than I CAN actually cook. So I figure I’d better elaborate on this whole tagline thing before people start spreading rumours (I wouldn’t want you all arriving at my house expecting an impromptu gourmet dinner).

Great with WordPress

I recently discovered that I’m great with WordPress. I’m not claiming to be a rockstar developer, but I sure can knock other peoples Photoshop designs into tight, efficient WordPress themes. And to top it off, I actually enjoy it. It’s not the ‘I love this so much I’ll do it for FREE‘ kind of enjoyment, it’s more like the ‘Oh, that was fun, I wonder if someone else would want to pay me money for a PSD to WordPress gig‘ type of enjoyment.

Good parent

In a moment of awesome spousal support, Karin once told me that I’m a good parent. That’s fantastic! But it doesn’t excuse the fact that I’m bad at parenting. Connor is 5 years old and he wins every argument, always gets his own way and suckers me into making bad decisions/feeling like a complete arsehole at least once a day.

So I may be good at providing for him, and I love him more than any other human being under 4FT tall, but I suck at the day-to-day parenting duties bestowed upon me. That’s why it never ceases to amaze me what a great kid he is. Must be his mothers influence…

Lousy cook

I am possibly the world’s greatest bad cook. When I’m allowed into the kitchen (rarely) I destroy cookware at an alarming rate. This year alone I’ve wrecked 3 pans cooking rice, pasta and a cheese sauce. It’s safe to assume that my wife is about to to ban me from doing anything more complicated than making tea (which I’m actually very good at) and Braaing (that’s Barbequeing for you non-South Africans).

So, before you decide to pop in for dinner (by the way you’re welcome anytime), you need to know that I’ll spend a long time bending your ear about WordPress. Because of the ear-bending, dinner will run late and we’ll have to eat burnt beans on toast, which Connor won’t want because he’ll have tricked me into buying him fish & chips.

Do any of you lead a life this complicated, or is it just me?

Coding your first PSD

This simple layout is a good place to start learning to slice a PSD. The tutorial is pretty good too. I haven’t followed it yet but it seems well written and looks like it contains all the steps you need. Find it here

Converting a Design From PSD to HTML

Nettuts, who seem to lead the way when it comes to PSD to HTML tutorials, published this excellent article back in December 2008. At the time I was so impressed with the clean design that I stole it for a personal blogging project that has since gone the way of the dodo. Anyway, it’s a great tutorial with an easy-to-follow screencast. Find it here

How to Convert a PSD to XHTML

Jeffrey Way published this tutorial, complete with screencasts, on Nettuts in November 2008. This one is very easy to follow along to and is probably a good place to start if you’re just getting started with PSD slicing. Find it here

PSD to CSS

This one was new to me and I haven’t worked through the tutorial yet. Skimming through it, there’s a lot of detail here, so much so that they’ve split it into 4 parts. Find it here.

From PSD to HTML

I can’t help but think that this article on BolducPress was written purely as link bait, but it does show you how to slice a PSD. The best part is that if you’re a non-designer of too lazy to build a mock-up for slicing, there’s also a PSD to download. Find it here

PSD>HTML/CSS

HV-Designs published this one in mid-2008 and it also contains a PSD for download. Furthermore it actually shows you the Photoshop design process as well if you need to brush up on your design skills. Find it here

Encoding a Photoshop Mockup into XHTML & CSS

When Chris Spooner writes a PSD to HTML tutorial you know it’s going to be good. This one doesn’t disappoint. Chris shows how to convert the Photoshop mock-up he designed in a previous tutorial and code it into valid XHTML in a well written article. Find it here.

Converting a Photoshop mock-up

Chris Coyier from CSS-tricks has a nice screencast showing how to slice a PSD. It’s split into 3 bitesize chunks and includes all the source files for download. Find it here

Creating a CSS layout from scratch

I think this was probably the first PSD to HTML/CSS article I ever read. It goes through the entire process perfectly but there’s no PSD to work from so you’ll either have to design your own or grab the screenshot they’ve used to follow along. Find it here

Build a Sleek Portfolio Site from Scratch

Yet another Nettuts tutorial on the subject. This one has an accompanying tutorial over at PSDTuts to create the mock-up so it really does have everything you could possibly need. If you’re a Tuts+ member you also get to download the PSD and source files. Find it here.

There you have it. If you can complete these 10 tutorials you’ll be well on the way to slicing your own designs in no time at all. I’ll have a follow-up post on the far more interesting PSD to WordPress process in a few days.

I need your help. I’ve been toying with signing up to 3 or 4 affiliate programs but I can’t decide if this is the right thing to do. So I’ll make my case and would appreciate any feedback you can give me.

Why I think affiliate programs might be a bad idea

1. Affiliate programs are kind of sleazy. Nothing screams ‘I’m in it for the money’ quite like an affiliate link. But here’s the thing – I am in it for the money.
2. Readers get the feeling they’re constantly being sold to. Every time I visit Yaro’s blog I come away thinking ‘he’s just trying to squeeze my Paypal account’. Yes, most of the information on Entrepreneurs Journey is good, but it definitely leans towards getting you to spend cash on the latest ebook/course/membership idea floating around the Interwebs.
3. My blog is a trust-building tool. I use this blog to build trust with prospective customers. Would adding a few affiliate links affect my credibility as a WordPress consultant?

Why I think affiliate programs might be a good idea

1. I only want to promote 3 or 4 products. It’s not like every single post I write is going to be aimed at getting people to buy my shit. If you like what I have to say about something when I review it, buy it. If you don’t, I won’t talk about it any more. Simple.
2. I believe in these products. Judging by the number of products some people are affiliates for, there’s no way they can have tried them all. I am planning on recommending products that I use every day (or at least quite often). I believe they are good value, high quality solutions.
3. My blog should be monetized. It bugs me that this pretty little blog is a worthless entity for anything other than lead generation. I’m not asking for much but it would be nice if the site could at least pay my hosting bill.

So there you have my arguments. And here are the 4 products I plan to market on my blog. I KNOW SOME OF YOU ARE GOING TO THINK THESE PRODUCTS SUCK. I don’t. As I said, I use these or have used them, and I think they’re pretty good.

• Dreamhost Web hosting.
• Woothemes WordPress themes
• Thesis WordPress theme (still toying with this one)
• Ittybiz SEO School

If I decide to go ahead with affiliate marketing I will do a full review of each program’s good and bad points. But for now I’d like to know what you think I should do. Please let me know in the comments.

image credits

So this weekend I made the decision to convert the Thesis theme I’ve had kicking about for the past 12-months into something more lifelike.

What makes Thesis so special?

Thesis does something very clever. It allows you to manage the functionality of your blog’s theme without getting your hands dirty. A lot of time went into designing a Thesis admin panel that allows you, among other things to:

• Add <head> code.
• Add tracking codes.
• Adjust the dimensions of the theme container.
• Add or remove columns to your design.
• Change typography rules.
• Change the way posts and pages display.

For a non-technical person, this is brilliant. For those of us who usually spend hours tinkering with a theme’s code, it makes life a bit easier.

A word about Thesis Hooks

Going in to the project, I didn’t even know that Thesis used hooks. Had I known I would have given up, but by the time I opened the index.php file my design was complete and I had to press on.

In essence, hooks are bit of code that tell WordPress to make functions happen. For example, the hook ‘thesis_hook_header’ tells WordPress to fetch the HTML/PHP code that makes the header section of the Thesis theme display.

In theory, hooks are simple. In theory, communism works. I spent the better part of Saturday trying to understand hooks and I’m still a bit fuzzy about exactly how useful they are. If you want help getting to grips with them, I’d recommend the DIYthemes forum, Kristarella’s blog and Sugarrae’s dummies guide.

Speaking of the DIYthemes forum

When I post a question on a forum I like to receive an answer. It’s just the way I am. Sadly I’m still waiting for answers about hooks which leads me to conclude that either nobody likes me or they need more people answering questions over there at DIYthemes.

On to the design

If you’re reading this in a feed reader, this is what I had in mind for the redesign of thinkdave. If you’re reading the post via the blog, behold the glory (and leave a comment)

The hardest part of this design was figuring out how to display my header and navigation outside of Thesis’ HTML container. It took me a good hour to figure out how to do this (hint: use the full-width option in the Thesis Options).

I’m usually not a fan of CSS positioning, but as far as I can tell it’s the only way to move things around the Thesis theme. So I moved my logo to the top left, moved the navigation to the top right and removed the default Thesis footer. To create the illusion that all these elements were removed from the HTML container, I had to do a bunch of display:none work on Thesis’ custom CSS file.

I digress. The finished product looks very nice – IMHO. I probably could have got it done in the same amount of time working from scratch, but I wanted all the shiny add-ons that go with Thesis, so I endured the pain.

Thesis Pro’s

What makes Thesis worth $87 is:

• It’s a really clever framework to build on. A lot of though has gone into the structure and the user experience.
• Out of the box Thesis looks clean & tidy, and doesn’t really need any customization.
• If you’re non-technical and you want more control over your WordPress theme, there is no better solution.

Thesis Con’s

• Hooks. I know they’re vital to the theme’s functionality, but they’re going to trip people up.
• Support. I only asked one question on the DIYthemes forum so perhaps I’m being a bit harsh, but I expect answers to my dumb questions when I’m a paying member of a theme club.

Should you buy Thesis?

Yes. You’ll be getting a very robust theme framework and a brilliant starting point towards a theme you can keep forever. Thesis costs $87 for a single use licence and $164 for a developers licence. I think it’s worth the money.

If you’re a Thesis user, or you’re considering Thesis, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

7 years ago today Karin and I were joined in (sort of) holy matrimony. We’ve been together for almost 12 years so I’m qualified to talk about this stuff. Here are 2 quick tips to get any marriage off to a good start.

Tip 1: Know when to admit you’re wrong

The priest who married us was a legend. During the counseling sessions we had before the wedding he taught us that you always need to know when to say sorry. And you need to mean it. Three phrases he taught us have been the guiding principle of our marriage:

I am sorry.
I was wrong.
Please forgive me.

Tip 2: Don’t sleep with the mailman

Marriages generally fail because people sleep with someone else or they want to sleep with someone else. There’s nothing wrong with perving over the mailman (Personally I think my mailman is scary, but that’s just me) or someone you work with, but you’re not allowed to take it any further.

You made a commitment to stick with your partner forever. If you can’t handle monogamy, don’t get married.

Needless to say I still make the most ridiculous mistakes (like forgetting to say Happy Anniversary this morning!) but I never forget that marriage is a funfilled adventure; an evolving entity. You adapt, you get used to each other’s quirks and you take time to enjoy each day, for better or for worse.

Oh, and marriage also means you can go out to anniversary lunch together at Burger King! Pregnant women are odd…

What? Since when does he ditch me to go and play with some kid down the street? And to make it worse, she’s a girl! He’s only 5. Surely he should still hate girls until he’s at least 11.

If you’re a parent of a young child let me warn you that there comes a time in your life when you become nothing more than chopped liver. And just like real liver, it tastes pretty awful.

On the bright side, I did get a few minutes of quality time with my wife. At least she still likes me. Well, sometimes.

image credits

So if you must start a blog, I’ve devised a way to save you the trouble of reading hundreds of worthless blog posts before understanding what it takes to become successful.

All you need to do is follow these 3 easy steps:

1. Post lists. It doesn’t matter what they’re about or whether they relate to the topic of your blog. Just post lots of lists and you’ll get lots of traffic (see, this is a list. I’ve learned so much).
2. Give something away. Want more RSS subscribers or Twitter followers? Give something away. The ever-popular iPod or a free eBook are two giveaway ideas to get you started.
3. Follow the crowd. Find 10 bloggers with blogs just like yours (shouldn’t be hard) and comment like crazy whenever they post something new. Then post something virtually identical on your own blog and watch how the crowd follows you.

There you have it. Now you can either go forth and litter the Web with yet another boring blog. Or you could stop for a second and do something worthwhile that people will actually benefit from. Your choice.

Image credits