My Take on the WordPress Themes & the GPL License
There’s a huge hype these days around WordPress and the (infamous?) GPL license. Out of the “big guys”, first Brian Gardner of StudioPress (ex-Revolution) decided to distribute his themes as GPL. Later, iThemes followed, and now it’s time for WooThemes to adopt the license.
The discussion around this always seems to evolve into “open source” versus “author protection”. As Alex King pointed out in one of his posts, theme authors should be aware of what the GPL license exposes them too, while it provides freedom for basically everyone else.
I’m not by any means against freedom and open source. I’ve been preaching about the power of WordPress and the wonder that it is, but what I love more is to see a protection system for those authors that make a living out of releasing quality themes and plugins for WordPress. Somewhere along the way, in our quest for “freedom” we forgot how hard it is to earn our living, how hard it is to learn the things we now use to feed our families.
With all the respect I have for Brian, Adii and Alex who have been more than an inspiration for so many people and their contributions to the world of WordPress changed our lives, I fail to see how this sudden change of heart (or maybe “dictated” by Matt Mullenweg’s recent reactions) will help other developers.
The problem does not reside in the GPL license, but rather in the fact that by using WordPress you have to also release your “products” under this license. In theory the GPL license is an amazing thing that allows people to improve and build upon other people’s work, and thus contributing to the development of a bigger, better product, free or paid.
Click here to read the full blog post!
A Look Into the WordPress Themes’ Options Pages
For a long while the option panels where something that people could only find in premium (commercial) themes, and for a good reason. The pricing of their licenses allowed the premium theme developers to invest more time in giving theme users the ways to do through these panels what they could not do through coding.
With the buzz created around these themes, regular users became aware of what could really be achieved, and thus, those that could not afford the license of a premium theme, became more selective with the free ones. A good-looking theme was not enough anymore, and WordPress developers realized it.
A good premium theme would bring its developer not only a good amount of money, but also recognition in the community, and this is where the free theme developers scored their biggest points. Now that their “turf” was endangered they had to react, and they did. For premium themes like Thesis or WP Unlimited, users have now alternatives like Thematic, Hybrid, Carrington, WP Framework or my own (even if not a framework) Simple Balance.
Why should free theme developers consider adding an options page?
Because being “cool” is just not enough anymore. Theme developers need to learn how to be useful. Free stuff can be either useless and ignored or useful and praised. I’m yet to see the developer offering a free theme without gaining something from it, be it awareness, expertise, backlinks, donation money, you name it! But none of these are achieved through an uncompetitive – even if free – product.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Use Any Font on Your WordPress Blog with AnyFont WordPress Plugin
Recently I came across a relatively young WordPress plugin that allow WordPress users and designers to use basically any TrueType font you have on your computer on your WordPress blog, replacing post titles, widget titles, links and so on with automatically generated SEO-smart images using your desired font. The plugin is called AnyFont and it has been developed by Ryan Peel
The generated images have a very good level of clarity, way better than the classic SWF replacement and the plugin is really easy to administrate and customize.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Free WordPress Themes Watch: Empty Canvas
My friend Adrian Diaconescu has released a new free WordPress theme called Empty Canvas. Those familiar with his previous theme, Corporate Sandbox will observe the similarities between these two themes, but as Adrian says: “[...] don’t download this theme and expect the Mona Lisa. It’s only a simple theme, that does wonders for me.”
Click here to read the full blog post!
10 Beautiful Non-Blog Websites Powered by WordPress
The time when WordPress was used strictly as a blog platform is long gone. WordPress has evolved into a mature CMS that gives designers and developers the right tools to create amazing non-blog websites for their clients. As proof for that stand these 10 beautiful websites powered by WordPress.
FernWoodCoffee.com
Herout-Caves.com
New WordPress Plugins You Might Want to Try
While working on a couple of WordPress projects these days, I’ve been on the look out for some new WordPress plugins. During my searches I’ve come across some really cool and useful plugins that you might want to check out too.
Manual Related Links
Tired of the old and sometimes irrelevant automated “Related posts”. This new WordPress plugin allows you to hand pick the links to be displayed at the end of your posts. Also works with off site links. Some might think that it’s a waste of time, other like me will see the value in giving the reader really relevant, hand-picked links.
Download hereWP Version: 2.7+
Author: Aaron D. Campbell
WP htaccess Control
No need to access the FTP or the cPanel anymore to add rules to your .htaccess file. With WP htaccess Control you get to do that from the comfort of your WP Admin screen.
Download hereWP Version: 2.7+
Author: António Andrade aka Dardna
Click here to read the full blog post!
I Need Your Translation Skills!
Hey friends, as you might have noticed, yesterday I’ve released the 1.2 version of the Latest Posts by Category WP Plugin. As the time was short and the update was needed, I decided to leave the localization of the plugin for the next update.
As I’m typing this, the plugin is set to English as default, and I’ve already created the Romanian translation file.
How can you help?
If you’re proficient in any other languages than English and Romanian – like Spanish, French, German – and you’re willing to give me a helping hand in translating 19 short phrases, contact me via email. Tell me which language are you willing to help with and I’ll send you a text file with the required translations.
Not to be picky, but native speakers would be preferred, as each language has its own little tricks.
Each translator will receive a link to his/her website on the plugin download page and in the info files in the download package.
Already in the works: Croatian, German, Spanish, French, Bulgarian.
Thank you!
Things You Can Do To Help WordPress Developers
Today I’ve exchanged a few emails with one of Simple Balance’s users which made me think about several things that users could do to help out WordPress themes and plugins developers.
This article is written purely for the purpose of giving you an idea on how to give back to those that invest time and knowledge to give your free quality WordPress resources.
So, here are a few things you can do to help them out:
Offer to test out their themes and plugins
If their project is still in Beta stage, ask to join the testing group or register we’re this is permitted. Test out the product in whatever environment you have available and report bugs and unusual behavior to the designer / developer. They are only humans and most of the time work on too many project and might miss out things, being so closely involved in the project. An outsider could observe things that they can not.
You can also test the projects after the official release. Help is welcome anytime.
Click here to read the full blog post!
WP Plugin: Query Posts WordPress Widget
Justin Tadlock has recently released on cool little WordPress plugin that works miracles for those with little PHP knowledge. As the name says, the plugin is a visual reconstruction of the query_posts WordPress template tag.
So, what does the plugin do? It basically allows you to setup an infinite number of widgets in you widget-ready theme, widgets that will display posts from your blog, defined in the widget option area. You can display posts with a certain tag, posts from a certain category or published in a chosen month. You can display them in full, excerpt or under the form of a list, and many other really cool options.
Adam Warner has also released a video overview of this nifty plugin that you can view here or on WordPress.tv.
More info on this plugin you can find on Justin’s blog.
And you can download the plugin from WordPress.org.
Note: While PHP knowledge is not required in order to manipulate this plugin, a basic understanding of how the query_posts template tag works would turn out to help.
WordPress Powered Websites – The Real Deal
By now, you should know that I’m a WordPress fan. While most people regard it as a simple blogging platform, some see beyond that and realize that WordPress is a very capable CMS.
While working with it as a website CMS will not allow too many customizations for entry-level developers or users, in the hands of a pro WordPress is ready to perform miracles.
The advantages of WordPress powered websites
There are quite a bunch of advantages when developing websites using WordPress as CMS, but the most important are:
- Productivity – A lot less time spent on development, which guarantees a lower cost and still high quality;
- Ease of use – Both client-side and developer-side. The amount of tutorials, plugins and support groups available out there is a divine gift;
- Updates – The WordPress community is very involved in keeping the project up to date and bug free and the updates are so easy to apply.
It’s enough to run a search on Google and you’ll see how many people praise the power of WordPress but instead of using words, this time I’ll use results.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Loading ...
