I seem to find myself working with Youtubes thumbnail images quite a lot (for instance on Miniclips videos section) – and I am always having to go searching for the parameters to use to generate those thumbnail images.The highest quality...
I was asked recently how to get into WordPress themeing and so I thought I would answer publicly. Perhaps my thoughts can help others.When I first started using WordPress things were much simpler. The default theme was an index.php and...
Last year WebDesign.Tutsplus published a short tutorial showing how to create a stack of paper using a single html element and some css. It was nice little tutorial but the end effect wasn’t fluid. It relied on hard coded widths...
I had a weird problem yesterday where I had applied a css transition to an element that was fading from opacity:0.1 to opacity:1 – and along the way it seemed to change in size or position.The reason for the change...
So – it’s now after the holidays and I’m back at the day job – and I’m pleased to say I was able to do some good work on Blobcat over the break and the game is coming together rather...
WordPress has a built in function, called human_time_diff, for creating messages that say how long ago a post was published – however I think it is confusing when you have posts from a long time ago that read “posted 15...
At WordCamp London last week I made my first contribution to WordPress – a bug fix for the Twenty Fourteen theme that’s being released with WordPress 3.8. Part of doing this involved created a patch.Now I know this is pretty...
I have a theme coming out soon that displays the ‘estimated reading time’ for each blog post on the homepage.The theme is inspired by the new blogging service Medium – but I first saw the idea mentioned on Brian Crays...
I’ve made quite a few WordPress themes in my time, and so I thought I would write a few blog posts sharing some of the code snippets that I find myself using repeatedly.First off is some numeric pagination using native...
Last weekend I went to WordCamp EU – Europe’s first WordCamp – and my first WordCamp.I’ve always fancied going to a WordCamp conference but never known what to expect – or even what I would get out of it. I’ve...
I like BitBucket – all the cool kids use Github, but for small businesses BitBucket is great. Why? Because it has free private repositories for teams of 5 or smaller. And that’s me right there.Currently I am using BitBucket for...
Anyone who knows me, knows I am a frustrated game developer. Working at Miniclip I’ve developed a few games (I mentioned a few here) but I now focus on web design. I’m really passionate about web design and will continue...
Open Source software is awesome. If it weren’t for WordPress then I’m not sure what I would be doing – but that doesn’t mean open source software is perfect, or that it fulfills all requirements.The beauty of open source software...
Recently I saw a tweet conversation between @Norcross and @JPeterson about decaching css files when developing with WordPress. The solution is simple and something that WordPress even has built-in – however it’s also something that is easy to forget to...
WordPress theme frameworks are on their way out. They’re dying a slow death. At least that’s what I think.Nathan Rice recently wrote an article with his thoughts about theme frameworks – in defense of them – however he clearly has...
I’m thrilled to announce my latest project – Brush Ninja. Brush Ninja is a browser-based animation app that aims to bring back the simplicity and creativity of early versions of similar platforms.Sketch StarI am employed by Miniclip, an online games...
A couple of years ago I bought my first house. My wife and I have spent the time since renovating it – our original goal was to renovate it in 3 months. 18 months later and we’re still going.Apart from...
Last weekend I went to the Coronation Festival at Buckingham Palace in London. Not only did I get to walk around the royal gardens, but I also got to see, meet, and try many of the products that have the...
I was recently asked to put together some SEO tips for people at Miniclip (where I work) who are planning new projects. Essentially it was meant to be some tips for them to keep in mind from a business perspective...
It’s only been a year since I last redesigned Binary Moon – I’m generally content to redesign, and then sit on things for a while, let it stew and evolve. However a lot has changed in the last year. Design...
I’ll be honest – I haven’t played many of the Uncharted games. In fact the only one I’ve played is the PS Vita version – Uncharted: Glolden Abyss, which by all accounts is a reasonable interpretation of the format, especially...