Tag: plugins

One of the Pains in My Ass

Just one.That’s all you can handle,right?

Plugin authors have had a pain in their collective asses,too because they have to remember to do this: wp_enqueue_script(‘jquery’); when using jquery in their plugins if it’s going to be used in the site admin section (the dashboard) because a lot of jquery is used there. But not all of the plugins I was using at the time of this writing did this. Following one plugin author’s instructions I tried to edit a plugin file but got a syntax error. So I said fooey and just edited it to use the jquery version in /wp-includes/js/jquery.

Now I can use Custom Fonts and upload images. Awesome.

Nextgen Gallery and WP-Ecommerce

Just the slightest bit wonky when used together in one WordPress installation

I have 1 website freshly updated to WordPress 2.6 and only using the latest version of nextGen.
I have 2 other websites, both using 2.5.1 and the latest stable versions of WP-Ecommerce and nextGen.

In the first website with just nextGen the pop up window displays the full size link under the image which you can see in example 1.
In the sites where both plugins coincide nextGen detects that WP-Ecommerce is installed and links to it’s version of jquery and no full size link is displayed. Also the pop up is different – it shows a vertical row of thumbs down the side of the window alongside the main image.This is nice but wonky because sometimes the vertical row of thumbs don’t display as thumbs but as little dots.Which you can see in example 2.To tell you the truth I’m kind of liking just seeing one large image pop up at a time. Now I think the vertical row is overkill because a page of thumbs is already being displayed on the page itself, making the pop up row redundant. Just my opinion. I saw the same kind of design when I activated wordtube, another plugin from Alex Rabe meant to be a media center for WordPress.You can use it to display images and videos in a playlist. I’d tried using it just for photographs but found once again it seemed like overkill. But if you have a lot of videos I could see it’s appeal.

One good thing is I learned how to use custom fields to control each individual gallery or slideshow.
This is essential because you might want a slideshow to display first on one page but have a row of thumbs show first on another gallery page. And if you do have a few slideshows you can use custom fields to control how they look independent of each other no matter what settings you configured in the Gallery options such as:transition effects(blocks,lines or fluids),size of the slideshow,colors of the rollover,timing,etc.
The second nice thing was finding an explanation of the Imagebrowser option for nextGen.
Place this in the page or post [ imagebrowser=6 ] “6” being the id of the gallery you want to show,and you will get this

I could try deleting the jquery that WP-E-Commerce uses and loading nextGen’s in it’s place and seeing how that works…But to tell you the truth being able to at least control the nextGen galleries is work enough for one day.

WordPress 2.6 and Custom Fonts

After waiting a bit of time to see if the world would end after WP 2.6 was released and seeing that it did not end I decided to upgrade my test site. Well, I meant to upgrade my test site, I instead upgraded my main site. Nothing bad happened and my main site could just suck it anyway if it had exploded.

It’s my client’s sites I give a fig about which is why I am such a cautious old so and so when it comes to upgrading. For myself, if a plugin turns out to be non compat I just say see yis to that plugin and move on.

But some of my clients have tastes that can only be satisfied with certain plugins,like Custom Fontswhich is a great plugin but doesn’t look like it’s compatible with WP 2.6. Having it activated seems to get rid of the media upload buttons in the editor page.
I’m being diplomatic when I say seems but I’m almost certain that it is the culprit.When I de-activate it the media buttons come back.When I activate it they go away. I’ve tested it with the visual editor on and off and with that option completely disabled in my user profile.I’m sure it’s an easily fixed problem,though.

I may just go ahead and try to convince my client that it might be more important to have the latest version of WordPress as her website’s engine than it is to have fancy page titles.In her case sifr-replaced page titles was a branding choice and one that I was not able to talk her out of but it was better than the other option which was using images to replace text.

If it’s a popular plugin, the author will get so bombarded with emails and forum posts and etc and will probably make it compatible out of sheer exasperation with the demands of the (usually) non paying/donating public. What a thankless task. I salute all you who do this for free and deal day in and day out with kibuttzers who think you owe them something.

The best news so far is WP Ecommerce seems to chug along just fine on WP 2.6.

Good News For All Us Font Freaks

I grouse frequently and often about how limited the selection of “core” fonts is with which to use in web design. Some say there are 16. Some say there are only 3. 16 or 3 it’s bound to come up with a client that the font you’ve used is “too clinical”,”schoolkid-like”,”typewriter-ish”,”dull”,”really bad”,”bad, awful, not at all what I want”…etc. You bow your head in shame. After all, if you were any kind of good web designer you could make the font pretty,couldn’t you?

Actually… I have a ka-ba-ja-zillion fonts downloaded to my computer so yes I can use any freaking font I want and I will see it in the design. You will not. You will see a default list of fail safe, dull, old universal core fonts. If everyone downloaded 10 fonts a day for the rest of their lives there would still be a big fat chance that the font you are using isn’t going to be in their computer. ‘Cause of all the fonts there are in the world.

Give us web designers a little bitty break,puleese. The reason we stoop so low as Arial is because it is the number one font everyone is bound to have. We might get all crazy and try to use Century Gothic because maybe 65% of the internets have it loaded but the rest sees Arial and thinks it sucks.

sIFR to the rescue. And if you use WordPress,Alejandro U. Alvarez to the rescue.

You should take a look at this picture,
otherwise you may have trouble understanding what the name field means or what selector means.

Also you should know that his plugin uses sIFR version 2 so you cannot use Ian Purton’s online conversion tool.

Alejandro included a command script you can run in Flash to automatically get your fonts and make swfs but I found it easier to download my own copy of sIFR package version 2.0.2. I opened sifr.fla in Flash, selected my font and then exported the movie in mac flash version 8. I closed sifr.fla without saving the changes.

I uploaded the font.swf to the right folder in the custom fonts plugin folder and I edited the custom_font.php file as instructed. His instructions are on the plugin page,so scroll down to find them.

I tried to do it his way with command> run command script he provided but when I used the produced swf I got this output on my page titles “text made by sifr version 3” or something similar. This just meant I was using incompatible versions of either mac flash or sIFR! Yeah, as simple as that.

I am not as nifty as Ian Purton but if you need a font you can email me the .ttf or .ot font you would like converted to a .swf and I will make you one in Flash. It takes about a minute to do. i may even already have it.

I should tell you that I am using Baar Sophia but what you are probably seeing is Trebuchet MS or Helvectica. And if you haven’t got those fonts you’re probably seeing Times New Roman.

Or *censored* Arial.