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Archive for the ‘Real World Web Design’ Category

WordPress, Joomla and Drupal in Web Design

Thursday, May 3rd, 2012

I was recently asked a question about the future of web design:

I have a short general query about the Future of Web Design: do you think that we are going towards a trend where, particularly with the use of Web environments like WordPress or Joomla, programming skills will be more and more oriented towards updating and customising plugins?

My answer:

I have been a long time believer in this strategy of using a CMS as the basis of almost all your web design projects. I wrote about this back in 2010, talking about the ‘Wordpress Web Designer‘.

I use Wordpress for my web sites, but Drupal and Joomla can do a great job too. You just have to figure out which one suits you best.

Learning PHP and JavaScript:

Since Drupal, Joomla and Wordpress are built with PHP and JavaScript, it makes sense (if you really want to learn how to use these tools to their fullest,) that you should learn at least a little programming. You don’t have to become a full-blown nerd coder, but you should be able to write simple scripts and modify existing PHP and JavaScript code. It will make your life so much easier.

For a more detailed discussion, watch my video below:

Thanks,

Stefan Mischook
killersites.com

Posted in Blogs and CMS, Drupal, Joomla, Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design, Wordpress | No Comments »

Flash CS6 goes HTML5

Friday, April 27th, 2012

Hi,

As predicted, Flash has now gone HTML5 – yes, you can now export your Flash work to HTML5 using the new Flash CS6.

I haven’t had a chance to look at it, so I have no comment with regards to how well it works. Nonetheless, this is more evidence that HTML5 is going to be huge in the future of web design and web development – if it isn’t already!

Flash CS6 basically uses the CreateJS open source framework, to output animations in Flash. I don’t know how powerful this conversion process is yet … we will soon see how complex the Flash projects can be and still be able to output them via HTML5.

Whatever the case, you should still be learning HTML5 and JavaScript.

I created a video blog on this:

Stefan Mischook

Posted in Adobe, Ajax - Javascript, Flash, Real World Web Design | Comments Off

HTML5 and its’ Place in Web Design

Tuesday, April 24th, 2012

Hi,

I just released a video where I discus the growing importance of HTML5 in web design and web programming. Some of the highlights:

  • HTML5 is now supported in all the major browsers.
  • HTML5 was built from a pragmatic point of view – this means it’s really functional!
  • HTML5 has made JavaScript a much more important language to learn.

The video:

If you are a total HTML beginner, you will need to learn that, before you can tackle HTML5. You can learn JavaScript with either my written introduction to JavaScript or my super fantastic JavaScript basics video tutorial.

Thanks,

Stefan Mischook
killersites.com

Tags:
Posted in HTML5, Real World Web Design, Web Design | Comments Off

Youtube Upgrades HTML 5 video player as it moves to replace Flash.

Tuesday, November 22nd, 2011

It seems that Google and Youtube are moving quickly to replace the Flash video player; they just released a new HTML 5 video player for Youtube that does a bunch of things:

  • enable annotations and captions
  • copy embed code and URL
  • native full-screen support for Firefox and Chrome
  • 480p and 1080p options

Read more: Youtube Upgrades HTML 5 Player.

I know the Flash people are going to be pissed at me (again!) for suggestion the obvious: Flash is quickly moving into obsolescence.

From PC Mag:

Adobe confirmed Monday that it will release one more version of Flash Player for the mobile Web to accommodate Android 4.0, but that will be the final update.

“Adobe will release one more version of the Flash Player for mobile browsing, which will provide support for Android 4.0, and one more release of the Flash Linux Porting Kit—both expected to be released before the end of this year,” an Adobe spokesman said via email. “After that time, Adobe will continue to provide critical bug fixes and security updates.”

Occupy Flash!!

I’m all for advancing technology, but this is really vicious!! We now have a group who is actively looking to kill Flash:

Occupy Flash has stepped into the breach with an ambitious goal: “To get the world to uninstall the Flash Player plug-in from their desktop browsers.”

Read more: Occupy Flash has stepped up.

Final Comment:

I was one of the first users of Flash in the world – back in the 1990’s when it was called Future Splash. But being a nimble nerd who is language/platform agnostic … I’ve learned to move on from fading technologies, not wanting to fade right along with them. In biology they say the most successful species are the most adaptable; we web nerds have to be ultra nimble too.

Though it will probably take a few years for Flash to fade away into a niche, Killersites has always been about PRACTICAL web training and not getting stuck on a technology. The writing is on the wall, even Adobe is adopting HTML 5 and CSS 3.

Thanks,

Stefan Mischook
killersites.com

Posted in Adobe, Flash, Real World Web Design, The Web | 1 Comment »

Outsourcing and its’ Impact on Web Designers and Programmers

Monday, July 18th, 2011

Hi,

The one great fear any nerd has is the specter of outsourcing – will my job be outsourced to some cheaper part of the world?

Yes, free trade is really not free trade, it’s actually opening up barriers to allow big American, Canadian and European companies to ship jobs to much poorer countries so that they can save money on cheap labor.

The people who benefit are:

  • The executives of the big companies, since they can pay themselves big bonuses. Of course, they are the few who WILL NOT have their jobs outsourced!
  • The hard working people in the poorer countries – people of the west should not bear them any ill will. They are simply trying to earn a living like anyone else.
  • Bankers – who see the stock prices rise in the publicly traded corporations. In fact, it seems the big Wall Street banks were the major force behind outsourcing.

… But it is not all bad for SMART web designers and programmers working in the crumbling west. Read on and learn how!

(more…)

Posted in Business of Web Design, General, Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design | 4 Comments »

Web Designers Roadmap for 2011 and 2012

Sunday, June 26th, 2011

web designers study guide

Web Designers Roadmap
June 2011 – By: Stefan Mischook

PDF: web-designer-roadmap

The skills required in modern web design are constantly changing … that’s because the Web itself is always changing. If you want to be successful as either a web professional (web designer / programmer) or as web site owner, you have to keep up!

What to learn (as of 2011-2012) – in order of priority:

1. HTML
2. CSS
3. PHP basics
4. Javascript
5. JQuery
6. Wordpress
7. OOP PHP (for programmers only)
8. HTML 5 and CSS 3
9. iPad / iPhone (choice of either: Objective C or HTML 5 + CSS 3)

Comments

(more…)

Posted in Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design | 29 Comments »

How to get ahead in web design.

Tuesday, June 7th, 2011

One of my main motivations is to teach you web design skills that are practical, marketable and in the end, will make you more money. We want to teach you how to make a living with those skills.

… Yes, web design for cash is a good thing – in fact, it’s the goal for many of us!

How to beat the competition:

Though the Web is growing faster than ever before, you still have a lot of competition out there when it comes to web design jobs. In fact, there are many more web designers today than ever before. Fortunately, we have a couple of big things going for us:

  1. The Web is many times bigger than it was in the 1990’s.
  2. Like the 1990’s, the key to getting ahead of the competition is not all that hard because (as always) we have one thing on our side: laziness! Yes, people are lazy.

The more you learn, the more you earn:

The key to getting ahead is found in learning. The more you know, the easier it will be to find work, to land that contract and to charge more for your time. It is important that you as a web professional continue to develop your skills and to look to what is coming around the bend – those who jump onto the next web technology trend, will be able to monetize that upside.

… Since most people are lazy and will only learn new techniques when they absolutely have to, all you need to do to get ahead, is to continue to the learn.

So, what are the web skills for today and tomorrow?

  1. HTML 5 and CSS 3.
  2. Tablets and smart phones: iPad, iPhone, Android.
  3. CMS development: Wordpress, Drupal.

More later,

Stefan Mischook

Posted in General, Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design | Comments Off

Web Design Trends of 2011

Thursday, December 30th, 2010

web design trends 2011
Hi,

One of the early lessons in my business life was that to make money, you had to figure out the trends going forward.

… You can’t be looking at what was popular last year and you shouldn’t pay too much attention to what might happen 5 years from now – you need to figure out what will be the in thing within the next 12-18 months.

Web Design Trends of 2011

My predictions are as follows:

  1. Android development – this means HTML5 and CSS3
  2. iOS development – this means HTML5 , CSS3 and for programmers: objective C.
  3. Small business website development – this means PHP or Ruby, Javascript/Jquery and learn a blog program like Wordpress or a CMS like Drupal. Of course these days, Wordpress is pretty much a CMS too.

So there you have it. Concentrate on learning one of these and you should do well this coming year.

Stefan Mischook
killervideostore.com

Posted in Business of Web Design, Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design, Web Design News | 1 Comment »

Do you need to be artistic to be a great web designer?

Sunday, November 14th, 2010

Here’s a recent question put to me:

I would like your advice … I have NO experience at all in web design … not very artistic or good at math!! Do I need these talents to become a web designer?

Teresa

Hi Teresa,

I have good news for you:

1. You don’t need to be artistic to be a great web designer.
2. You don’t need to be good at math to be web designer.

You need to learn to be organized and persistent thought.

Shameless self promotion:

If you want to save money and get extra stuff not found elsewhere, then the Complete Web Designer is the best deal … by far:

http://www.killervideostore.com/video-courses/complete-web-designer.php

I hope that helps,

Stefan

Posted in General, Professional Web Design, Real World Web Design, Web Design | Comments Off

Perl Programming in the Modern Web?

Sunday, November 7th, 2010

I recently got an email from a student learning web design (and some basic web programming) … and he said something like this:

I took a web design course and the syllabus only taught Perl …

Wow! They are still teaching Perl!

Perl (is not) part of the modern web … for the most part.

Yes Perl is a powerful language and yes it is still used by a shrinking number of die-hard zealots. But these days, you have a few other languages that are just so much better suited for today’s modern web design and programming:

  • PHP
  • Ruby
  • Java

… And there are more.

Perl’s power without its’ weakness.

Perl’s power was largely found in something called regular expressions – RE (as nerd’s call it,) can process and parse text like nothing else. It is tricky to use but so powerful it is, that most … if not all modern programming languages have it built-in now. So Perl’s secret weapon is now gone and all you are left with is the weakness.

To Perl or not to Perl?

No question, just go to PHP or Ruby for your server side programming. Although I think for web designers, PHP is the top choice.

CIAO,

Stefan Mischook
killersites.com

Posted in Coders Code, Real World Web Design | 2 Comments »

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