There are a number of websites that exist to allow developers to share code snippets with each other, or to allow developers to manage their own snippets. In this post we’ll take a look at 11 websites that are excellent sources of code snippets.

CSS Deck

CSS Deck showcases pure CSS creations (only HTML and CSS). You can view the creations on display and view the code snippets used to create them. You can submit your own creations, leave feedback on existing creations, or browse for code that can be used in your own projects.

CSS-Tricks

Popular blog and community site CSS-Tricks includes a section for code snippets. The snippet categories include HTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery, PHP, WordPress, and .htaccess.  You can easily submit your own snippets if you would like to contribute.

Snipplr

Snipplr is a repository of code snippets for HTML, CSS,  JavaScript, PHP, Ruby, and more. You can view the snippets with or without an account, and with an account you can comment or summit your own snippets.

DZone Snippets

DZone, a popular community site for developers, includes a section for code snippets. With an account you can add your own snippets and assign them tags. You can browse existing snippets through the tags or by user.

Joyent Code Snippets

Joyent also allows you to add your own snippets and tag them.You can view recently submitted snippets, or browse by tag or user.

WpRecipes

WpRecipes posts helpful snippets for WordPress developers. Snippets for all kinds of purposes are included.

Smipple

Smipple exists for the purpose of allowing users to share code snippets with others. You can submit a snippet using your Google account, and tag your favorite snippets for future use. With or without an account you can browse popular and recent snippets.

PHP Snips

PHP Snips focuses, of course, on PHP. You can view popular snippets, the most recent snippets, or search for specific snippets. With an account you can submit your own snippets to share on the site.

Codes PHP

Codes PHP also focus on PHP snippets, but also provides snippets for MySQL, WordPress, and PHP frameworks. Snippets can be browsed by category, plus popular and recent snippets are shown in the sidebar. You can add your own snippets by creating an account.

Snipt

With Snipt you can submit a snippet and assign tags to it. Snippets can be browsed by tags and can even be easily embedded. With or without an account you can leave comments on existing snippets.

DevSnippets

DevSnippets includes code snippets, links to helpful tutorials, and links to resources.

If you spend much time working with WordPress you’re most likely already familiar with Elegant Themes. They are known as one of the leading sources of premium WordPress themes, and their membership pricing model is one of the best buys you’ll find in the theme market. For just $39 per year Elegant Themes members get access to all of their themes (currently they have more than 70 themes). That price is about the same as what you will pay for just one theme at most theme shops.

Their WordPress themes use attractive and professional design, as well as many other enticing features. Those features include a powerful theme options panel, shortcodes, multiple page templates, and localization. As a member you’ll also get access to support through their members-only forum, and theme updates as long as your membership is active.

Here are examples of a few themes that are available:

SimplePress

Nova

Sky

LeanBiz

TheSource

That represents just a fraction of the themes that are available to Elegant Themes members. To see all of them, please visit Elegant Themes.

Giveaway Details:

If you would like to be one of the 5 lucky winners, all you have to do to enter the giveaway is leave a comment on this post (one entry per person). On Friday, June 1 we will select the winners at random. This post will be updated to announce the winners, and the winners will be contacted by email.

Although improvements and new features are what users want, it does require some effort to learn how to take advantage and how to use the new features. Fortunately, there are already a number of tutorials online that will help you to learn more about CS6. With the help of these tutorials you’ll be working better and faster in Photoshop than ever before.

Quickly Select Skin Tones in Photoshop CS6

Here you’ll find 25 tutorials, plus 16 articles that cover the basic changes and additions to CS6.

How to Use Adaptive Wide-Angle Filter in Photoshop CS6

Color Splash Effect in Photoshop CS6

Quickly Change the Appearance of Photoshop CS6

Wrath of the Titans in Photoshop CS6

Content Aware Move Tool

Hunger Games Poster Composite Using Photoshop CS6

Use the New Timeline in Photoshop CS6 to Create an Animated GIF from a Video

Colorize a Black and White Photo

How to Use Content Aware Scaling

Use New Features in Photoshop CS6 to Create an Administrator Dashboard Interface

Hipster Text Effect in Photoshop CS6

How to Use the Content Aware Move Tool in Photoshop CS6

How to Change Lip Color in Photoshop CS6

How to Use the Content Aware Patch Tool in Photoshop CS6

Video Tutorial: Battleship Poster in Photoshop CS6

Photoshop CS6 Blur Gallery Tutorial

Use Photoshop CS6 to Create a Micro Machines Inspired Scene

Create Tilt Shift Photography with the New Blur Tool

Add Motion Blur Effects in Photoshop CS6

Better Blur with Photoshop CS6

Color Lookup Effects in Detail

Iris Blur – Photoshop CS6 Tutorial

Build a 3D Scene Using Photoshop CS6 

Creating Animation with Audio in Photoshop CS6

Articles and Guides Covering Photoshop CS6 and New Features:

• Adobe Photoshop CS6 Top Features Overview
• Introduction to Photoshop CS6
• 23 Cool New Features in Adobe Photoshop CS6
• Finally, Background Save and Auto Recovery in Photoshop CS6
• Type Styles in Photoshop CS6
• Camera Raw Update in Photoshop CS6
• Add Strokes Without Layer Styles in Photoshop CS6
• Working With Vectors is Easy in Photoshop CS6
• Easily Import and Export Presets in Photoshop CS6
• Photoshop CS6′s New Crop Tool Step-by-Step
• Discover Photosop CS6′s New 3D Tools
• 3D Improvements
• New 3-Way Color Correction Tool
• Manage Your Layers More Efficiently in Photoshop CS6
• Photoshop CS6 Includes Improved Auto Adjustment Features
• New Liquify Performance and Usability Enhancements in Photoshop CS6

Communication during the client intake process is critical because it is needed to get the designer and client on the same page, helps to avoid lost time from unnecessary revisions, establishes the responsibilities and expectations of both the designer and the client, and it sets the foundation for design decisions that will be made throughout the project.

Having a set process for client intake can help to streamline the process and save time. Additionally, it will also help to ensure that nothing is missed or skipped accidentally, and it will help to make the communication smoother and less time consuming for clients. While there will always be differences from one project to the next that may require special attention, the major aspects of the client intake process will be applicable to almost all of your projects.

At Vandelay Premier we have released a resource that we feel can be an extremely valuable resource for helping freelancers and small design agencies with the client intake process. Many designers use questionnaires to help with gathering information from new clients, so we created a resource to help with this process. Our Design Brief Print and Web Template has an InDesign template that includes a variety of common questions that help to gather the basic information that is needed on most client projects. The questions can easily be edited in InDesign to customize the document to meet your needs.

While the InDesign document is certainly helpful, we know that many designers, and many clients for that matter, would prefer to complete the questionnaire electronically rather than dealing with printing a paper version that may require mailing, faxing, or scanning. So we had the design brief coded into a template that can be quickly and easily uploaded to your website. The template includes a PHP form. You can upload the directory to your site and send clients a link to the form. They will then complete the form right on your site and the responses are sent to you by email. This version can also be customized to suit your own needs. You can see an example of the design brief here.

How to Set Up the Design Brief On Your Website

To start with, you’ll need access to the template file. The Design Brief Print and Web Template sells for $10 at Vandelay Premier (see the end of this article for a discount offer), and it is also available to all active Vandelay Premier members (learn more about membership here). Once you have downloaded the file you will need to unzip the file and make a few simple customizations.

The first thing you will need to do open the data.php file. Here you can add a link to a logo image to be included in the header, and enter the email address where you would like to receive the responses. You’ll also have the option to customize the subject line of the email, the confirmation message that is shown to users after completion of the form, and the error message that is displayed when required data is missing, but you can also leave those items as is and it will work just fine.

$logo_path = 'css/i/logo.png';

$user_email = 'info@example.com';
$name = 'Your Name';

$subject = 'New Design Brief Submission';

$confirmation_message = "Thanks for completing the design brief. We will be in touch shortly.";
$error_message = " Some required fields are missing.";

At this point you can upload the directory to your website (you can change the directory name to something other than “design-brief” if you prefer) and as long as the php mail() function is enabled on the server, which is typically the case, it should be working right away.

If you would like to make minor changes to the wording of specific questions you can simply open the index.php file and find that particular question. You will see code that looks like:

$ui->createToggle('material',"5. Do you have materials like a logo and photos to use in the design?");

You can simply change the text here. So an example of a slight change would be:

$ui->createToggle('material',"5. Do you have materials like a logo or other branded graphics that you want to use in the design?");

If you want to add a new question, that can be done rather easily as well. In the index.php file find the location where you want to add the question. For this example we will be adding a new question to the “Tell Us About Your Company” section. So we’ll find this code in the index.php file:

<h2 class="title">Tell Us About Your Company</h2>

  <div class="content">
    <?php 

	$ui->createTextarea('company_brief',"1. Please provide us with a brief profile of your company");
	$ui->createTextarea('describe_products',"2. Please describe your products and/or service");
	$ui->createTextarea('target_audience',"3. Please describe your target audience");
	$ui->createTextarea('primary_comp',"4. Who are your primary competitors?");
	$ui->createTextarea('apart',"5. What sets your company apart from the competition?");

	?>

  </div> <!-- End of page content -->

We’ll add our new question at the end, so before the closing PHP tag we’ll enter it based on the following format:

$ui->createTextarea('field_name',"Your Text label here");

So here is the code that we will enter:

$ui->createTextarea('mission',"6. What is your mission statement?");

This code tells it to create a new text area that we have titled “mission”, and it asks the question “What is your mission statement?” You don’t need to change anything in order to get this question to be included in the email that is sent to you, it will automatically be included. So you can see it is rather easy to customize the form to meet your own needs. Documentation is also provided in the download that explains how to add other types of fields, such as ones with checkboxes.

Discount for Our Blog Readers:

If you like this design brief template and if you are not already a Vandelay Premier member, we’d like to offer a 20% discount on this product. The regular price is $10, so the discounted price is $8. If you’d like to take advantage of this offer you can visit the product page for the Design Brief, click on the “add to cart” button, and enter the discount code “designbrief”. The discount code is only valid on a purchase of this individual resource.

Theme features include:

• Customizable slider on home page
• Events calendar
• Custom post type for audio files with audio player
• Upload your own logo, or just use the site title in text
• 4 color schemes from which to chose (see details below)

This free theme has everything your church needs for an effective website. First, choose from four different color schemes to get a site that matches your church’s identity (screenshots or alternate color schemes are at the end of this page).

Your home page will include a slider that can be easily customized from the WordPress dashboard. Without touching any code you can upload new images for slides, (optionally) set any of the images to link to a specific page when clicked, and set the transition effect between slides. The slider is a great way to promote upcoming events, special programs or initiatives, a current sermon series. or anything else that needs exposure.

Every church website needs some type of upcoming events list or calendar functionality. This theme allows you to enter events and they will displayed chronologically in order of the event date. As the date and time passes, the event will automatically disappear from the list so you won’t need to constantly update the site manually after each event.

At the top of the site’s header there is an area for custom text, intended to be used to display the time of your services. Enter your church’s address in the WordPress dashboard and it will automatically create a link to the map and directions from Google Maps.

The theme includes a custom post type for audio media files, so it’s easy to add sermon audios to your site. And more importantly, it’s easy for visitors to listen to them right on your site. We recommend using a service like Amazon S3 to host audio files so they do not put a strain on your hosting account, although this is not necessary depending on your host and the size of your files.

Documentation for the theme is available in this PDF file.

View the theme demo | Download for free

We Recommend BlueHost

If you’re looking for a hosting company, we recommend BlueHost. They offer quality shared hosting and responsive customer service at low prices. The video below shows how to sign up with BlueHost, install WordPress, and upload one of our free themes in a matter of just a few minutes. Read a more detailed explanation of why we recommend BlueHost.

Sign up with BlueHost

Alternate Color Schemes:

While having a well-designed website is important for any business, iPhone users are especially interested in quality design, as it has played a big role in Apple’s success of the years and most Apple-related sites featured an attractive design.

In this post we’ll showcase 50 examples of iPhone app websites. These examples show high-quality design, and hopefully they will provide some inspiration for your own work when you are creating a site for an app.

Photo Stats

Layer Cake

Pocket

Sipp

Stamped

Localhero

Bord

Yowza

Run do to-do

Leaflet

Storific

Movies Now

Camera+

Tea Round

Ringer

RaceSplitter

Zoopy

Faces

Postmates

Overlapps

Euro 2012

Handshake

Moojive

Cutest Paw

Fontain

Scoretastic

Face Fun

Popset

Cocktails

Saver

Flight Card

Blip Me

Zootool

ParkBud

Piictu

Notica

Instagram

Friends

Tourist

Lighty

Headquarters

Nota

Billings Touch

Lite Weight

Pastebot

Ecoki

Junecloud

HipGeo

TouristEye

Lo-Mob

For more design inspiration please see:

• 50 Awesome Portfolio Websites
• 40 Impressive Design Agency Websites
• 25 of the Best Photographer Portfolio Websites
• 50 of the Best Church Website Designs
• 40 of the Best Websites on Non-Profit Organizations

In this post we’ll take a look at 55 responsive WordPress themes, including free and premium themes. The majority of the themes showcased here are premium. Although there are some good free responsive themes available, the time and effort required to create one is rather significant, so most of the good ones must be purchased. There are more free responsive themes available aside from the ones we’ve mentioned here, but we tried to showcase only the best ones regardless of whether they are free or premium.

Free Responsive WordPress Themes:

Skeleton

Responsive Twenty Ten

Meeta

BonPress

Mixfolio

Respo

Orion

Leon

Origin

Oxygen

Hatch

Yoko

iTheme2

Premium Responsive WordPress Themes:

Hero ($49)

Uber ($49)

Reveal ($49)

Infinity ($49)

DailyJournal ($39)

Trim ($39)

Pioneer ($35)

Angular ($35)

Swagger ($35)

innoVative ($35)

Office ($35)

Zig Zag ($35)

Next ($35)

Gigawatt ($30)

Aware ($35)

Propulsion ($40)

Good Minimal ($35)

Reaction WP ($35)

Good Space ($35)

PixelPower ($35)

Super Skeleton ($35)

Whitelight ($70)

SMPL ($70)

Unsigned ($70)

Shelflife ($70)

Olya ($70)

Beveled ($70)

Currents ($70)

PhotoTouch ($39)

Simfo ($39)

Micro ($50)

LitePress ($69)

PhotoNote ($69)

Momento ($60)

Knead ($60)

XO ($35)

Jigsaw ($35)

Akita ($35)

Website ($35)

ELOGIX ($35)

ProMotion ($35)

Modernize ($35)

For more WordPress resources please see:

• The Best WordPress Themes for Churches and Non-Profits
• 27 of the Best WordPress Themes for Photographers
• 25 of the Best Real Estate Themes for WordPress
• WordPress E-Commerce

Today we’ll see how to do an awesome categories menu, based on Pawel Kadysz’s awesome menu design.

We’ll see alternatives to WordPress wp_list_categories functions that allows full customization. Also we’ll see how to do it with clean CSS and a little jQuery for final touches to make it smoother.

So, are you ready to rock?

The Final Look

This is what we get by the end of this tutorial. Highlighted item is the hovered one and all those categories will come from WordPress. You can Download source files or visit the live demo.

#1 – Slicing and adjusting

Before getting into the coding part we need to slice the psd we downloaded, right? Actually no (I know, I know, the sub title is wrong). We’ll use CSS3 for those subtle effects so the only image there will be the background image.

We’ll need to adjust the background image to make it tileable. Each developer does it his own way, what I do is duplicate the layer, invert it vertically and delete the top part for the inverted layer with a smooth eraser. Then I flatten the result and do same thing horizontally.

You can just download the final result from the source files.

#2 – PHP (and, why not, HTML5)

When it comes to a categories listing we often just use wp_list_categories, in the best case add a few CSS rules to make it better but we just ignore all the possibilities of using better markup and completely custom menus.

Here we’ll use a standard HTML menu and for categories listing we’ll use the get_categories() function. It works pretty much same as get_posts, returning a lot of data on our categories but with no markup or styling at all, it’s just a PHP object.

Here is our main code to get the menu:

<nav>
<ul class="mainNav">
	<li><a href="#">Home</a></li>
	<li>
		<a href="#">Categories</a>
		<ul class="submenu">
		<?php
			//http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/get_categories
			$args = array (
				'hierarchical ' => 0
			);
			$cats = get_categories( $args ); //meooowww!!

			foreach ($cats as $cat) {
				echo '<li><a href="' . get_category_link( $cat->term_id ) . '">'.$cat->name.'<span class="number">'.$cat->count.'</span></a></li>';
			}
		?>
		</ul>
	</li>
	<li><a href="#">Archives</a></li>
	<li><a href="#">Search</a></li>
	<li><a href="#">Contact</a></li>
</ul>
</nav>

As for our demo this is the HTML output after processing this function:

<nav>
	<ul class="mainNav">
		<li><a href="#">Home</a></li>
		<li>
			<a href="#">Categories</a>
			<ul class="submenu">
				<li><a href="#?cat=1">Tutorials<span class="number">15</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=2">Inspiration<span class="number">5</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=3">Roundups<span class="number">8</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=4">HTML and CSS<span class="number">7</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=5">Freebies<span class="number">25</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=6">Workspaces<span class="number">4</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=7">Apps<span class="number">9</span></a></li>
				<li><a href="#?cat=8">News<span class="number">13</span></a></li>
			</ul>
		</li>
		<li><a href="#">Archives</a></li>
		<li><a href="#">Search</a></li>
		<li><a href="#">Contact</a></li>
	</ul>
</nav>

Now we have our raw material. Let’s make it prettier.

#3 – CSS3, gradients, text shadows…

To avoid crazy browser default values, we’ll use a CSS reset. Ok, now we need to add that wooden background and position our main nav. Also we’ll use the CSS gradients to avoid using images. This is the CSS to get this working:

body {
	background: url(background.jpg);
}
.mainNav {
	position: relative;
	margin: 100px auto 0;
	width: 500px;
	height: 50px;
	font-family: Arial, Verdana;
}

Now we need to style our links. Since our subitems are also links we need to target our rules for the top ones and then create specific rules to the submenu items, which is easier than use general rules and overwriting them all every time.

We’ll use also CSS gradients for our items. Unfortunately we still need a lot of vendor prefixes to get those items working, but their syntax is pretty similar from one to another. And the final touches will be done with text shadows to avoid using images at all:

.mainNav > li > a {
	display: block;
	padding: 20px 21px 18px;
	font-size: 12px;
	line-height: 100%;
	color: #666666;
	text-decoration: none;
	text-shadow: 0 1px 0 #f4f4f4;
	text-transform: uppercase;
	border-top: 2px solid #f8f8f8;
	border-right: 1px solid #e9e9e9;
	border-bottom: 1px solid #e5e5e5;
	border-left: 1px solid #afafaf;

	background: -moz-linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background: -webkit-linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background: -o-linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background: -khtml-linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background: -ms-linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background: linear-gradient( top, #dddddd, #cdcdcd );
	background-color: #dddddd;
}
	.mainNav a:hover,
	.mainNav .hover > a {
		border-top-color: #3F3F3F;
		border-bottom-color: #272727;
		color: #ffffff;
		text-shadow: none;

		background-color: #2a2a2a;
		background: -moz-linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
		background: -webkit-linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
		background: -o-linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
		background: -khtml-linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
		background: -ms-linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
		background: linear-gradient( top, #2c2c2c, #272727 );
	}

As you can see, this CSS will give a nice divisor between elements but it won’t look good for the first and the last items, so we’ll remove this styling for them:

.mainNav > li:first-child a {
	margin-left: -1px;
	border-left: none;
	border-radius: 8px 0 0 8px;
}
.mainNav > li:last-child a {
	padding-right: 25px;
	border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0;
	border-right: none;
}

Now we’ll style our submenus. We need to position it as absolute so it won’t affect the rest of our main items. Also we have a specific styling for our links under submenus. This CSS will get you there:

.submenu {
	position: absolute;
	padding: 15px 0 20px;
	width: 350px;
	background-color: #2a2a2a;
	background: -moz-linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
	background: -webkit-linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
	background: -o-linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
	background: -khtml-linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
	background: -ms-linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
	background: linear-gradient( top, #272727, #181818 );
}
	.mainNav .submenu a {
		position: relative;
		float: left;
		padding: 8px 0;
		margin: 0 0 0 16px;
		width: 150px;
		color: #666666;
		font-size: 10px;
		text-decoration: none;
		text-shadow: none;
		text-transform: lowercase;
		border: 0 none;
		border-bottom: 1px solid #333333;
	}
		.mainNav .submenu a:hover {
			margin-top: 0;
			color: #ffffff;
			border: 0 none;
			border-bottom: 1px solid #333333;
			background: transparent none no-repeat;
		}

#4 – jQuery touch

Now that we’ve got our pretty menu we need to hide it when users have JavaScript enabled and also add the proper bindings so we’ll have the hide / reveal effect.

To make things easier we just got a CDN copy of jQuery so we don’t even need to download it (more on this technique later!):

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.7.2/jquery.min.js"></script>

We’ll add our script tag after everything to improve performance. You may be aware that we need to use $(document).ready(); to avoid triggering jQuery before the DOM is actually ready (doh!). But we can also use this great shortcut:

<script>
	$(function(){
		/* your code here! */
	});
</script>

This is pretty much same as $(document).ready(); but it’s far easier to remember, isn’t it?

We’ll hide our submenu. This is pretty easy, this line will do the job:

$(".submenu").hide();

Now, we need to show the submenu when we hover its parent. Since we already selected the submenu item we can just make use of jQuery chaining and go up in the DOM tree with the “parent()” function.

Now, instead of using the hover function, we’ll use the on, and a mouseenter / mouseleave binding since the hover is just a shortcut for this. This is the corrected line to get it working:

$(".submenu").hide().parent().on('mouseenter', function() {
	$this = $(this);
	if ( ! $this.hasClass("hover")) {
		$this.addClass("hover").children(".submenu").stop().fadeIn();
	}
}).on('mouseleave', function() {
	$this = $(this);
	if ( $this.hasClass("hover")) {
		$this.removeClass("hover").children(".submenu").fadeOut();
	}
});

Notice that we’ve made use of caching also, so our performance will be a little bit better than if we called $(this) twice for each block.

[Note: the code in this section for adding jQuery is used for the HTML/CSS demo. For use in WordPress themes it is recommended that you use wp_enqueue_script().]

That’s all!

So, what do you think about it? Do you have a better idea to implement this awesome menu? What about idea for future articles? Don’t be shy and let us know via comments!

View the demo | Download the source code

About the Author:

I’m a WordPress and FrontEnd (HTML5, jQuery, CSS3) specialist from Itajubá, Brasil. I just love writing about obscure topics, doing some cool stuff and helping people out there.

Follow Rochester: Website | Twitter | YouTube channel

This set of textures is free for use in your own personal and/or commercial projects. No attribution is required to use the textures.

Download the textures (12 MB zip file)

In this article we’ll take a quick look at 9 things you can do to stay focused and productive.

1. Work from a To-Do List Each Day

One of the best ways to stay focused and on task is to have a list of specific things that you need to do each day. Without having a to-do list it is easy to get distracted or to dedicate time to things that aren’t important, but with a to-do list you’ll always know exactly what you need to do each day. Most of us don’t like to end the day with things from our to-do list still unchecked, so it serves as motivation to stay on task and to get things done.

2. Eliminate the Easy Tasks from Your To-Do List First

This may be more personal preference than anything, but for me it is one of the most important things I can do to stay focused. Each day will have a few siginifcant tasks that will take up most of the day, and a few smaller tasks that can be done in a matter of a few minutes. When I look at my to-do list and see things crossed off I feel good about my progress and it’s easier to stay focused. When I leave the little things till later my to-do list will look more intimidating all day, and sometimes it can be distracting. I prefer to take care of the easier things early in the day so I can get them off of my list and then I can focus completely on major tasks without distraction of having a to-do list that looks very full.

3. Keep Your Expectations Realistic

There is only so much that you can get done in one day. If you overload your to-do list you will be stressed out all day and you probably won’t do your best quality work because you’ll be feeling rushed. If you keep a smaller number of things on your to-do list you can focus more on doing your best quality of work.

4. Work Ahead of Deadlines Whenever Possible

Working on tight deadlines can hurt your focus in a few different ways. First, if you’re thinking more about the deadline than the details of the project, it can hurt your work. Second, if you have deadlines coming up you’ll have little choice about what you’re going to work on since you’ll need to rush to meet the deadline. When you’re not working with tight deadlines you’ll have more flexibility to choose what you are going to work on each day, allowing you to use your time and attention wherever you want.

You won’t always be able to avoid tight deadlines, but it’s a good habit to work ahead of deadlines whenever possible.

5. Close Out of Unneccesary Programs

Most designers and developers work in a lot of different programs throughout the day. If you have programs open that you are not using it’s easier to get distracted by something that you aren’t expecting. Closing the programs that you’re not using at the time will help to declutter and you’ll eliminate potential distractions before they can become an issue.

6. Turn Off Your Phone

Phones can be a distraction not only when you’re receiving calls. Most people receive and send several text messages each day. By turning your phone off you won’t hear notifications of new text messages, and you won’t pick up your phone to read it. Once you pick up your phone the interenet and apps can also be a distraction. Turning the phone off for a while obviously helps to eliminate these distractions as well.

7. Don’t Try to Multi-Task

Multi-tasking is one of those things that most of us have been programmed to do, and it’s often considered to be a great skill. The problem is that when you are multi-tasking you’re not focusing on any one thing, and your work will typically suffer in all areas.

Rather than trying to do several things at once, focus on one thing at a time and move through your to-do list by checking things off individually. This will help you to get things done faster and with better quality of work.

8. Have a Comfortable, Dedicated Office Space

Your environment has a lot of influence on your focus. If you’re working from home make sure that you have an area that is dedicated to being your work space and nothing else. A private room with a door is best, but if you don’t have the space for an office make sure you at least have a desk and a section of a room for your work space. This work space should be confortable (including a good chair) and preferrably in a quiet area of the house.

9. Take Short Breaks Throughout the Day

Trying to work for too long without any breaks will lead to poor focus. Just taking 5 or 10 minutes to stretch your legs, get some fresh air, or get a drink will help to improve your level of work. Breaks don’t usually need to be long in order to have an impact. If you feel like you are struggling to focus, take a break for a few minutes.

What’s Your Experience?

How do you stay focused throughout the day? If you have tips or advice for our readers please share in the comments.