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NYC Tech Startup Tour Meetup Recap: ideeli and Skillshare

April 15, 2012 By Chrisdigital 9 Comments

Crowd mills about before presentation part 2 startsA little luck shined on me a while back on February 16th, when I was contacted by the organizer of the “NYC Tech Startup Tour Meetup: For Curious Developers.” It seems she was just starting up the group and was trying to roundup the founding membership for the fledgling endeavor and offered me an invitation.

I joined up thinking it was a great idea. The prospect of meeting some new people in the context of learning how they run their businesses was intriguing, and I was very curious what they would present to a room filled with visitors.

False Start

Unfortunately for me, I missed the first Meetup out of the gate at Squarespace & Zoc Doc due to a job interview scheduling conflict. I was really bummed because I’ve long been a fan of Squarespace since they started a few years back. I even reached out to them early on to see if they planned a white-label product for designers and developers (like Pagelime or Perch for example – products that I don’t think even existed yet during this time period.) This was way before I got into WordPress and some other CMS products. I just really liked how they were pioneering some interesting UI elements, and client accessible controls that I feel were the precursor to a lot of things people like about Tumblr, Posterous, Flavors.me, About.me, and similar services. It’s even been suggested recently with their 6.0 release Squarespace is gunning to cut into WordPress’ market share. That’s not likely mainly for flexibility reasons, and WordPress’ massive community support. They are more of threat to proprietary Website builder businesses like Intuit and Adobe’s Business Catalyst.

Escape To Chinatown

Fast-forward to the second meetup at iDeeli/Skillshare, both of which are in the Chinatown area of New York City. Everything was well organized and I was pleased my $5 got me dinner (at the Bongo Brothers Cuban food truck – @bongobros) and beer to go with meeting some nice people. The organizers Jovena (@skillfer) and Jenn (@missjenshaw) were very engaging and kept the scheduled events moving along. They incidentally also run the NY Tech Women Meetup Group. I was also impressed with both companies’ presentations which I describe below.

ideeli

Ideeli lobby sign(Taken from their Linkedin Profile) ideeli is a leading online retail site dedicated to delivering a unique, exciting daily shopping experience with a curated selection of offerings across the apparel, accessories, home, shoes, kids, travel and lifestyle categories. Each limited-time sale event offers privileged prices on the best brands and experiences. Most sale events start at noon ET and last only 40 hours.

 

Looks Like Fun

Ideeli was first up. A substantial crowd was already in attendance when I arrived, and the ideeli space didn’t allow too much free range movement with a horde of visitors milling about. However, under normal circumstances it looks like a fun place to work with a decent view of Chinatown. I walked around a bit and noticed a friendly dog policy and a ping pong game in progress amongst some top of the line computer hardware and a well kept office.

Their Presentation

First demo at ideeliThe presentation was lead by Jim Menard and Leslie Borrell and three other intrepid souls: Jeff Wolski (dev) pictured in foreground, Patrick Brisbin (dev) and Malcolm Preston (ops.) Their showcase focused heavily on technology, backend architecture and operations. I have to say I was blown away and 50% of the discussion was slightly over my head. Who knew short run online sales of ladies apparel and accessories was so hardcore. It was all surprisingly transparent and certainly impressive.

Ideeli seems from the outside looking in, to be a dream work place for any developer. They covered team collaboration, construction of scrum teams, how they conceive ideas for sprints, general ideas about their agile workflow, caching schemas, network design, load balancing server requests for the traffic spikes, their trails and tribulations with third party vendors, traffic monitoring and analytics. They roughly got into everything they’ve tried over the last 5 years and where they imagine they’re going in the present and future. It was amazing. Other than one or two questions from the crowd I think we were collectively just trying to process it all. Speaking for myself, I watched with a great deal of professional admiration. Their desire to not be boxed into any one solution was apparent, and their eye for detail shined greatly.

Skillshare

A little Skillshare swag, notebook and stickers(Taken from their Linkedin Profile) Skillshare is a platform to learn anything, from anyone. Our mission is to flip the traditional notion of education on its head and revolutionize learning. We are challenging the assumption that learning only occurs within the four walls of a classroom. Instead, we’ll tap into existing communities and networks, which we believe are the world’s largest universities.

On To The Next One

Skillshare was up second, and we were organized in groups of eight due to the tiny elevator at Skillshare HQ. I took the lead of one of the groups and headed north up the block and left to the next location. I must say fitting eight grown people in an old school Chinatown elevator was an amusing circus “clown car” act since my group was mostly six-foot dudes.

Education For All

Skillshare’s presentation was different for a lot of reasons but mostly because they were bright, shiny, and new (contrasting with ideeli’s five years in business.) I personally became aware of Skillshare a few weeks ago through a twitter contact, around the same time I ran across Treehouse.

Skillshare’s space is set up “Japanese” or “agency” style with no walls and rows of tables, as they encourage their team to move around to switch up who they interact with regularly. They share the space with another company and have a large kitchen area and a couple of decently sized rooms they actually teach classes in. I especially got a kick out of their “creative corner” where all the whiteboards were set up.

There was plenty of room to spread out and we were immediately introduced to the entire Skillshare team that was there for the evening. Skillshare’s team consists of less than 15 staff here in New York and they recounted the story of starting out with just two founders (Malcolm Ong @malcolmcasey, Mike Karnjanaprakorn @mikekarnj) and scaling up here in NY and then to various major cities around the country. I appreciated immediately how careful they are about who they bring on board, fostering a collaborative environment, and controlling growth. I like the team members I talked to, and I made sure I got all their cards: Malcolm, Michael, Abigail, Jake and Danya. I especially enjoyed Danya’s evangelistic attitude to try to convert me into a teacher.

You Should Teach!

Danya and Malcolm talk to the groupAs we listened to the Skillshare story, I was personally present to the fact they are all about community and team focus. The topics and vibe at Skillshare contrasted somewhat with ideeli since they are selling class slots and encouraging education to the masses, not retail products. The group conservation ran the gamut: company strategy, technical infrastructure, revenue streams, challenges finding or training teachers, course content, product promotion, perceived competition, etc. as Malcolm and Danya lead the tour into the kitchen.

Danya and I hit it off during the talk and she started working me over pretty good to start teaching a class when everyone started mingling afterwards. This was after I piped up a couple times in the Q&A and related the story about trying the find a good school for my son and the state of U.S. education in general. I think Skillshare’s goal of “democratizing education” and their belief “almost anyone can be a teacher” is an refreshing conversation to be involved in right now in our society.

Skillshare Takeaways

Some things I noted in our conversation were Skillshare encourages team members to wear many hats and jump into other “lanes,” they shared an anecdote about how one of their designers is often sharing links about topics involving education and spurring group discussion. I also found it interesting that they are not yet involved in online learning (in the works.) Most significantly, they plan to have cross-over and group collaborations with other companies in the education sector. Possibly planning and encouraging an “expo” of like-minded companies. They have no interest in viewing these other companies as threats. I think Knewton was mentioned as an example.

The Wrapup

I had a good time and I made some new friends, networked with developers and established contacts. I even have some thoughts on courses I might teach at Skillshare and learned some strategies that might improve hobby concepts I have in the works. I especially want to find time to go over my notes on vendors I want to check out, like the YII framework that Skillshare uses. I will certainly attend another NYC Tech Startup Tour if time allows.

Hope To See You At A Meetup

Want to bump into me at a meetup? Check out my profile on meetup.com

Read more on ChrisDigital’s Digital Designer Blog:

1. My WordCamp NYC 2012 Recap : 800 WordPress fans assemble

2. The Importance of Social Media and Your Online Persona

3. Responsive Design: WordPress NYC Meetup Recap

Filed Under: General Tagged With: ideeli, Meetup, NYC Startup Tour, NYC Tech Startup Tour, Recap, Skillshare, Tech

Intro to WordPress Plugin Development : NYC Meetup Recap

March 24, 2011 By Chrisdigital 8 Comments

Brad Williams addresses NYC crowd at WordPress NYC meetupIt’s been an interesting last few weeks for my personal development, and metaphorically speaking you could say that it has mirrored what’s been going on with WordPress over the last few months. I’ve been optimizing, learning, and expanding the scope of how I see myself, and how others view me, plus I finally got around to launching some online design samples. As far as what’s going on with WordPress, the “little blog platform that could” has matured greatly and now launched (at the time of this writing) a full upgrade to WordPress 3.1.

Many consider WordPress to be a full blown Content Management System (CMS) even more than before, with the recent introduction of custom post types (and admin UI to match) and the fact that you can hack the admin interface to your liking with plugins like White Label CMS. It seems (at least for me personally,) all that remains is learning how to use the WordPress core smarter in my projects, plus figuring out whats a nice add-on (plugins, themes, hacks, and custom code) versus what practices should just be abandoned in lieu of improvements in WordPress 3. So, eager to find out what I could do with WordPress outside the norm, enter the latest WordPress NYC Meetup.

Oliver Wellington of Nrelate walks the WordPress NYC Meetup crowd through the Nrelate Related Content plugin and the design contest they are running.After missing a few WordPress meetups I really wanted to attend, I made time this week to head out to the WordPress Meetup NYC at it’s new location hosted at NYU Poly, and I made sure I RSVP’ed to get a slot. Especially, since in this edition the topic was a hot one, Brad Williams of WebDevStudios presented Intro to WordPress Plugin Development. Brad coincidentally runs the Philly WordPress meetup and if this presentation was any indication it’s also definitely worth attending on a regular basis as well.

A few changes since my last meetup were apparent this time around. NYU Poly is now the venue sponsor replacing Oracle in midtown. I must say the sunlight coming in through the window made for a nice feel. The environment definitely felt less corporate than the Oracle space and I recommend getting there early to find a good perch to view the screen.

Brad Williams’s slides were straight forward and focused on laying the foundation of good WordPress optimized code. He’s a great presenter that made nice with the NYC crowd sporting a “I Love NY” undershirt, and using fun examples like walking us through his faux plugin that engaged “Rage mode” on a mock blog to teach us his philosophy on plugin construction. There was a lively Q&A session but mainly the crowd wanted his slides. Other interesting things to note are – there was a heavy presence from designers, and a large group of newcomers to the meetup which was nice to see.

I won’t re-hash Brad’s slides but here are my main takeaways from the presentation and the Q&A:

  • A complete grasp of the anatomy of a plugin
  • Better understanding of introducing my own short codes
  • The concept of “conflicting” function names with other plugins and how to combat this
  • Two examples of high-selling premium plugins are Gravity Forms and Backup Buddy
  • Taking advantage of code hooks in WordPress and there are thousands of them, some undocumented in codex and detailed info only exists in WordPress core code.
  • His anecdote about the folks behind Gravity Forms “building a better mouse trap” contact form and then turning down client work to focus strictly on product development, hit home. In addition, his comments on finding plugins you like – which development has stalled on, might be a good place to start for ideas on your own plugins.
  • Brad also discussed “pay models” and licensing for your potential products: give it away free with paid support, versus pay up front and offer varying levels of support and upgrades, etc.

Brad’s presentation got people excited, after which the crowd broke up into two rooms: WordPress Newbies (in which Chris Cochran of Webdevstudios fielded questions) and the more advanced WordPress crew stayed in the main room with Brad Williams and Steve Bruner.

Steve Bruner addresses the crowd during WordPress NYC meetup.Sponsors Nrelate and Themeforest.net were on hand to make their presence felt. Nrelate is running a contest you can learn more about by subscribing to their newsletter on their blog, Oliver Wellington basically announced you can style (using css) the output from their Nrelate Related Content plugin anyway you want, which they boast can improve your click-through rates on your site by at least 5%. Submit your styling for their review and you can win some cash and credit in the source code if your styling gets integrated into the next version of the plugin. Also Steve Bruner and Mark Brodhuber of Themeforest.net handed out 23 t-shirts to some lucky early birds.
The other treat for the attendees was that 3 copies of Professional WordPress Plugin Development, and 3 copies of Professional WordPress (Wrox Programmer to Programmer) were raffled off after Brad’s presentation. Still bummed I didn’t win any.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to the next one, and seeing some familiar faces and meeting new friends. Especially, since I will have knocked out a “Hello World” plugin or perhaps my own “Rage mode” plugin by then. Cheers.

More thoughts on WordPress, Custom Post Types, and Plugin Development

1. Brad William’s slides for Intro to WordPress Plugin Development

2. The CMS Power of WordPress

3. Tutorial – Custom Post Types for WordPress

4. Registering and Displaying WordPress Custom Post Types In a Very Easy Way

5. Ten Things Every WordPress Plugin Developer Should Know

6. How to Write a WordPress Plugin: 12 Essential Guides and Resources

7. Do we do enough to support WordPress Plugin Developers?

Read more on ChrisDigital’s Digital Designer Blog:

1. My WordCamp NYC 2012 Recap : 800 WordPress fans assemble

2. The Importance of Social Media and Your Online Persona

3. Responsive Design: WordPress NYC Meetup Recap

Filed Under: WordPress Tagged With: Meetup, WordPress Meetup, WordPress NYC Meetup, WordPress plugin

Mobile computing is full of action, rapid change, opportunity

June 18, 2010 By Chrisdigital Leave a Comment

Mobile computing is full of opportunity for Web and application developersDevelopers these days are finding themselves trying to reach a growing mobile computing audience and it may be their greatest challenge to date. Today’s Web browser is a pretty well known commodity on the Internet, but “traditional” Web browsing is no longer the primary game in town, and hasn’t been for a while. Taking a peek at any Website’s traffic logs will quickly outline new masses of users seeking out text, video and multimedia content using new and different tools such as the iPhone. Devices such as mobile smart phones, laptops, netbooks and the growing popularity of tablet computers (like the iPad) in the consumer market are forcing today’s developers to widen their project scope. More and more questions are asked like,”How will my site look on a mobile phone?” or “How will my application behave when accessed by a handheld device?”

Refining code for this expansive collection of client users that are no longer stuck in front of a computer has lead to many innovative hybrid solutions, and a lot of ingenuity on display in current apps. But navigating the current alphabet soup of programming languages, code frameworks, and scripting technologies in an intelligent way is chewing up a lot of time for any forwarding-thinking developer that wants to stay relevant. Adding to this situation, new players, browsers, and devices enter the stage almost every day.

[ ↓ Jump down to my list of mobile development frameworks ]

Mobile market is where the action is

Just to scratch the surface of what I’m talking about, let’s review relevant developments in computing and handheld devices over the last few months. We saw a very public feud between Apple and Adobe over flash (Steve Jobs public letter about flash), with another notable company (ahem… cough, cough… Microsoft) and vocal developers chiming in. We saw thelaunch of the iPad and the another remix of the iPhone after it was leaked in a rather ridiculous and public way. We saw the Android mobile operating system and Google Chrome Web browser debut in the market and claim a loyal user base especially because of Google Apps integration. The iPhone OS itself also got an upgrade, and Apple threw in the not unimportant news that the iPhone’s iBook app will now have Adobe PDF support. Oh, and for those of you waiting for the world of the Jetson’s or Star Trek, both Sprint’s HTC EVO and Apple’s new iPhone 4 offer mobile video conferencing. In other news, we also saw the leak of a Microsoft Courier tablet device, only to hear they decided not to go there after all. Dell’s tablet computer, called the Streak, was launched in Europe (and should be offered by T-Mobile in the US by August 2010); rumors of the HP Hurricane also hit the media. We have heard news of a Google tablet and a Blackberry tablet. Not to be left behind, even Garmin the GPS device maker jumped in on the act and teamed up with T-Mobile to offer the Garminfone. I’m sure I left out a few items, but you get the idea.

In it, to win it

Let’s not forget these devices need software and applications–and everybody is paying attention to this booming mobile browser market and an insatiable mobile app market, which is slated to grow to 17.5 billion dollars by 2012. But, life is not easy for companies on the bleeding edge. Let’s take a look at the recently announced mobile app using the Adobe Air framework. Adobe and Wired magazine teamed up to produce an app for the iPad that from the descriptions I’ve read seems to be nothing more than an image viewer of high-res magazine pages ported over from Adobe Indesign sprinkled with a interactive feature here or there.

A closer look at an iPad app

Let’s analyze this last item and assess what’s really going on, because it’s indicative of the scenario I paint above. Scrambling to get an app to market, developers were not anticipating Apple’s resistance to Adobe flash technologies on the iPad and they had to adapt–fast. The original specification relied too heavily on Flash, and the development team had to re-write the end-product in Objective-C. Adobe is working to circumvent Apple’s exclusion of their software on its iPad by teaming up with a magazine and other app-publishing companies, creating new iPad software add-on packages for it’s print layout program called InDesign. Until now, InDesign has been used primarily in the publishing world, but the way that it works adapts very well to app creation. In publishing, once a document is created, InDesign “packages” it, creating a file that includes all the fonts, images and other documents linked to the final product, allowing them all to be sent to a printer (or in this case an App). The new add-on allows users to include other types of media within their files, for example, video or graphic simulations that are suspiciously flash-like.

Embracing a push for standards? For mobile Web, maybe

The technologies in the mobile development space are moving rapidly and the concepts that have the most staying power have big names behind them. In a recent post I explored some implications for HTML5 and CSS3 which Apple, Microsoft and Google are heavily invested in (for reasons I get into below.) Adobe developers are working within their authoring environment to allow coders to port their code to multiple devices, including browsers. In the process they are also working hard to integrate HTML5 and CSS3 benefits into their products. In a world where developers will search for ways to simplify code, cache data on devices and minimize calls back to servers anyway possible – Adobe might be in a position to ensure their Apps don’t raise the ire of their bandwidth-starved install base with their history of superior Web compression and streaming solutions. However, one developer I talked to addressed that last point and feels strongly that the reason Apple locked Adobe out of its mobile platform is simply because it’s a third-party proprietary technology they weren’t interested in policing. Like most other major corporations, Apple will simply buy out a company and absorb the personnel and brain power it needs if it’s something that critical to their success. In addition, much like other companies such as Microsoft, Google, Blackberry, Android, etc., Apple offers robust software development kits with other options developers can leverage. Whether or not you want to debate Apple and Adobe software history, or if their business issues align, the smart phone and mobile app business was too volatile, and nascent to ease up on the reins of control so early on–so flash has been blocked.

Mobile Web and Mobile Apps are not the same animal

I reached out to some developer friends to get their feedback on this post and in this verbal exchange, it became clear to me there are two divergent paths emerging in the mobile market (that weren’t clearly distinct to me before). Mobile Web is racing as fast as it can to standardization practices; mobile app development, however, is not. Here are some quotes from my discussions: “Mobile Web growth is accelerating due to the standardization on Webkit browsers with full support for HTML/CSS/JS. This includes Apple, Android, Palm, and soon Blackberry will be releasing its Webkit based browser with OS6. With HTML 5 these browsers will start to support content that feels app-like, but that can be developed by anyone with core Web development skills. Microsoft likely won’t do a Webkit browser, but they will likely support some high degree of standardized HTML.” “App development is much harder. The major platforms each have separate development environments with varying degrees of capability. Apple has led the pack in creating great tools for developers, but it’s nowhere near as simple as Web development. You have to deal with issues like memory management, garbage collection, networking, builds, and a whole lot of other things that Web developers are insulated from. I wouldn’t trust any standard tool to create efficient optimized app code that could run cross-platform well. Apple won’t trust components or functionality (which would likely become popular) for the user experience of Apple products to an outside source.” “Some developers do go to code sharing resources like GitHub, Google Code, and SourceForge to look for open source libraries to help with the development. Some developers have tried to maximize code reuse by creating all the core application logic in C++ and then writing platform specific interface layers. The C++ core layer can be quickly ported to Android, Palm, Apple, even Symbian (although not really blackberry).”

Mobile broadband, unlimited data plans offered at a premium?

It’s crystal clear that mobile computing is driving the technology industry right now and there’s a rich landscape for developers looking to sell their wares. But, not to be lost in all this is the fact that mobile devices are useless without their connectivity. If you can’t get a broadband Wifi signal or surf on a quality wireless network connection, your mobile device is just a plastic brick in your pocket. This is not lost on developers that have major investments in this market, as their foundation was shaken recently with the announcement that AT&T was changing their approach to unlimited data plans for their subscribers. As the current exclusive carrier for Apple-based iPod and iPad, developers are freaking out a bit, despite AT&T assurances that this will have little impact on business (Here’s a comparison of unlimited data plans for major US cell phone carriers).

Controlling the future

The obvious agenda, of course, in all this recent in-fighting between the big dogs of Web and computing technologies has been about CONTROL, not about Flash, or even has the most RIA developer fans–it’s about subscribers to media channels and advertising dollars. Everyone is betting on the use of mobile video expanding exponentially just as it did in markets like Japan. All the corporate players want the least amount of impediments to full access to their users. This is all about video search, real-time media and being awash in all-mighty advertising dollars; buying spots in multimedia streams in their exclusive publishing platforms. Microsoft, Apple and Google all made moves over the past two years to eat into Flash FLV dominance in the Web video playback market so their faucet to cash wasn’t beholden to an outside propriety technology. Developers are finding they need hybrid technologies to get around issues like cross-domain scripting security and platform-independent video playback until there are more widely adopted browser standards.

Fast developing scene

Going forward, common variables like dynamic features and basic infrastructure are bound to improve as software manufacturers create new ways for developers to reach users everywhere and on every device. It’s a brave new world out there, from mobile gaming to mobile online dating–we’ve certainly moved beyond checking your stocks on the beach. We’re bound to see improvements in hardware too, to allow phones and other mobile devices (including the iPhone, Android and the recently released Microsoft KIN) to handle more data at faster transfer rates, more layers of information on sites, etc. Currently, developers are searching for ways to reach end-users where they are with on-demand data services, geo-tracking, order tracking, CRM and flexible payment systems. Device creators are beginning to make devices that intuitively read and translate Websites for display on their devices (as Apple did with its iPad) but, as with any automatic translation, developers who want to be sure their site displays correctly still need to think about mobile displays when creating their site. It doesn’t help that there still isn’t a standard browser for these mobile devices–and new browsers, like Bitstream’s BOLT are still being introduced. However below I’ve accumulated a few sites with solid tips for making your site mobile-friendly.

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Mobile Frameworks

Thinking about jumping into mobile development? or learning more about how the magic happens? Check out these links for information on how to streamline your project:

1. Slider:Flex Mobile

2. jQTouch

3. Kyte

4. Open mobile IS

5. PhoneGap

6. IPFaces

7. Taplynx

8. Adlib Framework

9. .Net mobile

10. Android

11. Sencha

12. Appcelerator

Below are a few articles for reference in creating mobile-friendly Websites:

1. For the iPhone: 6 Tips to optimize your current site for the iphone

2. For Blackberries: Tips For Optimizing A Web Site For BlackBerry Devices

3. How to optimize your WordPress blog for iphone android and other mobile phones with wptouch

4. WPtouchpro is a popular WordPress plug-in to optimize your WordPress install for mobile users.

5. Optimize Your WordPress Blog Mobile Friendly

6. How to make your Website mobile

Read more on ChrisDigital’s Digital Designer Blog:

1. Responsive Design: WordPress NYC Meetup Recap

2. My WordCamp NYC 2012 Recap : 800 WordPress fans assemble

3. The Importance of Social Media and Your Online Persona

Filed Under: Code Tagged With: ipad, iphone, itouch, mobile apps, mobile computing, mobile developer, mobile web

Looking behind the curtain of WordPress 3.0

May 19, 2010 By Chrisdigital 2 Comments

Exploring WordPress 3.0 and development issues raise questions about this important version updateI went to my first WordPress NYC Meetup yesterday, and I was pretty excited about it. It was serendipity that my work load started to ease up when this meetup was scheduled, and I wanted to hear directly from others what they were up to with WordPress. Since I’ve had my head down the last few months fine tuning this blog, I also wanted to know about issues I might run into down the line with the pending release of WordPress 3.0 coming later this year. At the time of this writing it’s currently in its second beta and a lot is still in flux. This topic was a hot one and it was reported 94 souls braved the rain and schlepped it to mid-town NYC to get some insight into what’s coming next for WordPress fans.
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So, how was it?

Many thanks to the presenters Steve Bruner and Boone Gorges (who covered WordPress 3.0 MultiSite functionality) for their time and energy. They kept things moving and hosted a lively discussion. I got the most out of hearing what people were actually doing with WordPress currently and possible answers to their functionality questions. In addition to covering the new standard theme for 3.0 “2010“, how to retrofit old themes for 3.0, the new native parent/child theme functionality, custom taxonomies, custom posts, some minor changes to WordPress semantics, etc. (here’s a full list of announced features of WordPress 3.0), I also left with a short list of plugins I need to look into that might help me with some of my current work.

Do you need to care about WordPress 3.0?

The short answer is “No, not yet.”
To be perfectly honest I’ve been ignoring 3.0 since I heard about it because I haven’t worked on multi-user or a network of sites that require one back-end database, which is one of big selling points of 3.0. My indifference apparently is being rewarded as I heard the unofficial word yesterday that there will be support of WordPress 2.9.x for sometime even after 3.0’s release, while people sort out how their world is changing. As of right now and on the horizon, there is no immediate need to make the jump to the latest beta or new release as in the past (usually for critical security patches) because 2.9 is so stable. As you can see by this project plan 3.0’s release is a little behind, no doubt due to issues that pop up in real world application of the new release.

Laying the ground work for migration and upgrading

I did walk away with some sound advice from the Meetup, which is – there is functionality in the new release that makes your life a lot easier, ESPECIALLY if you’re running multi-user sites and doing advanced tweaks to your templates and themes. However, using a beta on live client sites is inadvisable due to the fact the product is still in beta testing. What you should be doing is copying your live sites in a “sandbox” environment or doing local installs of the beta and seeing how your data interacts with it. This will help you be ahead of the curve when WordPress 3.0 officially drops later this year. This is especially prudent if you have to describe functionality to others or train your clients on new features. You can peek behind the curtain on the WordPress development blog to get on idea of how furiously developers are working to get 3.0 released.

Is this app going to be a beast?

This is one of the questions that came up at the Meetup, and how your Website will scale is definitely a concern that WordPress 3.0 will have people talking about. Using this software certainly comes with the responsibility of understanding the hosting infrastructure you’re installing it on. There are sure to be some hosts that ban or at least discourage installing multi-user site features on their network for fear of them being resource hogs. Come on… who wouldn’t want a potential open faucet that could scale to thousands of users in a matter of months on each hosting account? The politics behind this should be interesting to watch. The first thought I had when this crossed my mind was the possibility of modified version releases or some ability to disable core functionality with tiered license keys so that hosts could feel comfortable that they can control the install base on their network. I’m curious if this will be a serious push to have WP 3.0 sites hosted on “cloud” platforms. It’s probably also likely a lot more Web hosts are going to get into the CDN business in one form or another as a result of WordPress 3.0’s release.

What’s next?

WordPress 2.9 is stable and fine for most people right now. WP 3.0 beta introduces functionality fixes, and some changes to UI quibbles users had with previous versions. But I’m really interested in what the WordPress plugin and theme framework developers will do with 3.0. I’ll take my cues from that community, which will most likely push WordPress very far from being known as a “blog platform.” For example, Steve Bruner showed a demo of RoloPress, his version of “Contact Manager” built on WordPress backend at last night’s Meetup. WordPress 2.9 introduced a lot of concepts and GUI goodness that will be in 3.0 final release, but 3.0 kicks it up a notch for 2.9 users with features like the “drag and drop” menu builder. In the past building something equivalent and having the associated admin UI to manage that feature would have to been a code hack or involved searching for a pretty specialized and heavy duty plugin. Doing less code hacks and slimming down on the use of plugins is always good because it simplifies your software upgrade path, giving you easier access to the next latest and greatest thing. Everyone likes that :-)

Notes

Looking forward to Wordcamp NYC later in the year (planning was announced for October or November 2010.) The book I mentioned in the Q&A that covers WordPress basics quite nicely is Building a WordPress Blog People Want to Read and having Jeremy Clarke there answering questions was awesome also.

More Thoughts on WordPress 3.0

1. WordPress 3.0 – What Lies Ahead? Awesomeness

2. What’s coming up in WordPress 3.0

3. What’s Coming in WordPress 3.0 (Features)

4. It’s coming! WordPress 3.0 – Pros and Cons

5. How to Enable Multisite in WordPress 3.0

Filed Under: WordPress Tagged With: Meetup, multi-site features, Upgrading to WordPress 3.0, WordPress 3.0, WordPress 3.0 features, WordPress Meetup, WordPress NYC Meetup

Comprehensive SEO Toolbox- SEOJeff

April 19, 2010 By Chrisdigital 2 Comments

Jeffrey Nichols' Comprehensive SEO toolboxWhen I was working on my recent post about a duplicate description meta tags bug that were showing up in my WordPress theme, I ran across this site. SEOJeff.com is a good site to visit if you ever want to try to understand what an SEO consultant actually does, and Jeff supplies some great tutorials on his blog so that you can take on more advanced analytics yourself. He compiled a list of essential tools you can you to improve your SEO and it’s pretty good. There’s a plenty of information there if you’re interesting in going a little deeper into SEO.

Filed Under: Bookmark Links Tagged With: Analytics, SEO, SEO Consultant

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