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Safari 7.1.4 Where is “Empty Cache”

Speaking of food metaphors…. an Apple moved the cheese.

Trying to clear cache in Safari 7.1.4? It’s no longer under the “Safari” menu.

Here’s how to clear the cache in the new Safari. Select “Preferences” from the Safari Menu and then follow these steps…

  1. Select the “Advanced” tab and check the “Show Develop menu in menu bar” boxsafari 7 1 4  settings
  2. Note the “Develop” Menu. Select “Empty Caches” from the Develop Menu.safari develop menu

 

The keyboard shortcut didn’t change but this hardly seems a step forward IMHO.

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Fake reviews at Yelp, Amazon Books – authenticity engine details

An interesting new report from PBS NewsHour about fake reviews on Yelp and Bazaarvoice:

They don’t mention the services that sell Facebook friends and other social media followers but that’s in the same dishonest ball park.

Reminds me of Amazon’s decision to delete thousands of book reviews that generated an uproar — the company never offered a public explanation for the sweeping purge back in 2013.

 

Giving raves to family members is no longer acceptable. Neither is writers’ reviewing other writers. But showering five stars on a book you admittedly have not read is fine.


Amazon has not said how many reviews it has killed, nor has it offered any public explanation. So its sweeping but hazy purge has generated an uproar about what it means to review in an era when everyone is an author and everyone is a reviewer.

Is a review merely a gesture of enthusiasm or should it be held to a higher standard? Should writers be allowed to pass judgment on peers the way they have always done offline or are they competitors whose reviews should be banned? Does a groundswell of raves for a new book mean anything if the author is soliciting the comments?

via Amazon Book Reviews Deleted in a Purge Aimed at Manipulation – NYTimes.com.

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Notes from WooConf 2014

wooconf-ariWooConf was full of interesting talks and it was great to meet up with Woo-enthusiasts… I liked that part of the presentations were technical and part were marketing driven – my goal is to help my small business ecommerce clients understand how to use marketing tools to optimize the performance of the websites I build for them. I’m not primarily a marketing guy so some of this is new territory for me.

SAAS Marketing Tools

  • GraphFlow: recommendation engine
  • Improvely: Conversion Tracking & Click Fraud Monitoring
  • Vero – Track behaviors and trigger all kinds of email autoresponders
  • Raven: online marketing reports – integrate all kinds of reports in one place
  • SharpSpring: marketing automation

Other tools

  • Elto marketplace for Woo and other dev tasks like site speed
  • Measure site speed with GTmetrix
  • Tip: Sliders are not good for conversion rates
  • Plugin to sort products in many ways — maybe useful if you have lots of products

Notes on talks

chris-lema-wooconf

Chris Lema

 

 

 

 

Posted in Web Design, WordPress WooCommerce | Leave a comment

Creative WordPress Archive Pages – Posts in Grids

Screen Shot 2014-10-16 at 12.01.49 PM

“Snazzy” Archives at thinkimagine.com

I use “Snazzy” Archives (wp.org page) and you can view mine but it is more interesting when you go back in time to view months where I have more posts. It has not been updated in a while but it still works great.

Another great option is the JetPack Infinite Scroll + Masonry and some detailed notes on making a responsive Pinterest-like Grid of posts.

Dynamic Grid: WordPress Posts Feed Slider

Dynamic Grid: WordPress Posts Feed Slider

This plugin offers an animation option to the grid of posts

  • I also found a Query Posts plugin that spits out fairly raw content for you to style with CSS
  • Reviews of a few post grid plugins
  • Grid Layout Shock offers free and paid version of it’s post grid plugin
  • Also minimal listing of months/years can be useful too if you don’t want a big preview image
Posted in Web Design, WordPress | Leave a comment

Review of WordPress Face Detection Cropping Plugin: My Eyes Are Up Here

What a great name for a plugin: “My Eyes Are Up Here

It helps get around the problem of WordPress cropped thumbnails that always take the center of an image – but sometimes you have a a face or other point of interest that is not in the center.  From an aesthetic point of view, if you’re using the rule-of-thirds when you frame your shot, the subject is always off-center — but ultimately  depends what the image is.

 

face not centered testSo here’s a test image with a face that is not centered:

 

 

 

 

 

 

and here’s before and after shots of how the media editor looks….

… I clicked  the “detect faces” button and it said “No faces were found” – so that’s too bad but… I added a “hotspot” manually and clicked the “finish adding hotspots” button

Before pressing "add hotspots"

Before pressing “add hotspots”

after pressing "add hotspots"

after pressing “add hotspots”

this view from the post editor is pretty cluttered since the theme I’m testing in has lots of extra sizes. It’s a bit confusing but once you know what to look for it is a nice time saver.

Note this all appears in both the ‘media’ part of the WP admin area as well as when adding an image directly to a post like this:

View from within the post editor

View from within the post editor

 

 

Here’s a comment from the wptavern review: “If your theme makes heavy use of featured images with human subjects, this plugin will help you to get the desired crop around faces and avoid the dreaded crotch shot”

Thanks to the folks at interconnectit for providing this free plugin.

Posted in WordPress | 1 Response

Notes on WordPress 4.0 – “evolutionary”

Evolutionary but not revolutionary. It’s a big new number but a “regular” number of new features—some really useful, however. The other good news is that fewer big changes means fewer chances of breakage while updating.

WordPress 4.0 “Benny” has been released today. Here’s the intro video

 

Features

new media library uses space more effectively: infinitely scrolling “grid view” added to the “list view”

new plugin views use space less effectively but provide more info:

 

TinyMCE  editor: New behavior of the editor is really useful – having the top bar be “pinnable” so it’s always visible is key for pages with lots of content. There are other improvements to keyboard and cursor interaction with TinyMCE views.

Looking forward to using it and to WordCamp in October.

Other features:

  1. Previews of oEmbed URLs in the visual editor and via the “Insert from URL” tab in the media modal.
  2. Select a language when installing WordPress
  3. Widgets in the Customizer are now loaded in a separate panel
  4. Improvements to formatting functions

via A Guide to WordPress 4.0 – Tuts+ Code Article.

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Alternatives to Hello Bar: WordPress Notification Bar Plugins

Hello Bar is a SaaS which charges based on the number of clicks the bar receives. If your bar receives 7,500 clicks per month, HelloBar would cost you $50/month. It’s a great service and includes it’s own analytics but many sites will benefit from a simpler option without ongoing fees.

Foobar ($14)

Foobar is my favorite alternative to Hello Bar. $14  is a one time payment at CodeCanyon and it features a powerful customization panel. Customizing colors, font size, shadows as well as social icons and much more. You can save multiple Foobars and assign to to specific pages. It’s great also for occasional ’emergency’ notices also.

attentionGrabber (free)

Foobar was my favorite, but attentionGrabber is nicely designed visually. The transition effect is smooth. Like Foobar, you add official Twitter and Facebook button next to the post link. So with regards to the backend and in terms of design attentionGrabber is the best.

see also:

  • Mintbar – an open source notification bar.
  • Smart Bar by SomoMe – this is just for email signup but they have interesting related products.
  • AddThis Welcome Bar – this bar appears based on which social media site your visitors are coming from.
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Google “local” “places” and “+”

It’s another Google riddle: What’s local yet keeps moving?

I had a listing on Google “local” and then that became a Google “places” page and now it’s a “Google+” page. I’m sure they’ll change it again soon enough but for now it’s nice to have more integration with reviewers identities. BTW if you are a client that I have worked with in the past… please consider writing a review for me on my business Google+ page.

The URL started as
https://plus.google.com/107925958872821931753/about?gl=US&hl=en-US
and is now
google.com/+helloaridesignwebsignSanFrancisco

In 2012 Google Places pages were completely replaced by new Google+ Local pages.

Related:

BTW: Google changed settings, including the “Hide my address” settings. Google local listings can appear in 3 places: in Google Maps, in Google+ and in the organic Google web results. Used to be that you could suppress your address in some listings.

Google is changing some settings, including the -Hide my address-settings 2014-04-23

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Akismet Error Code #10003

Akismet Error Code 10003 Screen Shot 2014-04-23 at 3.05.58 PM

This is a pretty new development. Akismet is not free anymore – but they do have a free version for “personal” use (well, it’s listed as “pay what you want”).

If you see this error then don’t panic. For that matter, in general, don’t panic. I think for now you can leave things as-is and my guess is that it will just keep working for a good long while. Till they decide to get more strict.

Better yet, do as I did and start paying them for this excellent service. Go to http://akismet.com/plans/ and sign up for a free plan – pay what you want – or a paid plan. You can make an account with Akismet or use a wordpress.com account.

And for all my clients that don’t host their WordPress sites with me, I suggest paying extra for the Akismet and VaultPress bundle. VaultPress provides a very powerful backup and security scanning service.

Related:

  • WPtavern account set-up with screenshots
Posted in WordPress | 1 Response

What’s the difference between a logotype and a logomark?

When clients ask me to design a logo for their business I always start with this discussion of what kind of “logo” they need. A “logo” is often made of a logotype and a logomark. But not every business needs both.

A logotype stands for words or the name of a business that is designed in a customized way.

A logomark is an identifying mark or symbol that doesn’t contain the business name, like a drawing or image that represents the business.

 

Logotype

The letter “IBM” written in a certain number of blue stripes is a logo. The blue is very specific and there are a different number of stripes depending on the size of the logo.

Usually when using the word “logo” people are thinking of logotype. A logotype is the name of a company that is designed in a visually unique way for use by that company. It may be displayed in a preexisting font that is customized to some degree or another.  Or it may be built from geometric shapes that abstract letters for a specific effect. There can be other specifications associated with the design of a logotype that are referred to more broadly as corporate identity elements. These include PMS colors and how much empty space is required around a logo.

It’s not necessarily needed to use a symbol or icon to effectively create a good logo, and that is the idea behind logotypes. When it is done correctly, using only typography to create a logo can be an extremely effective branding weapon. What normally happens is that this form of logo uses a special typeface and letter styling, which becomes associated with a brand.

logotypes

Famous examples of logotypes

 

Logomark

An apple with a missing “byte” out of it is the logomark of Apple Inc.

A logomark  or “symbol” does not generally contain the name of the company — it more abstractly represents that company. It may or may not always sit next to the logotype and there may be a few types of marks in the corporate identity system that get used in different contexts. These rules will be spelled out in a brand usage document.

Logomarks can be very useful, because they can enhance brand identity. It can help consumers identify what your business is about, especially if your logomark is a pictorial representation, such as a having camera for a photographer. They can be used as consistent graphic elements on marketing materials, wearables, and signage. A logomark can sometimes be more identifiable than a logotype, such as the apple symbol for Apple Inc.

 

Do I need a  logomark?

How to decide if you need both a logotype and a logomark? It depends on how you will use your logo and what business sector you are in. Designing a logomark can add a significant cost to your brand development process so budget can be a factor too. Some new businesses will start simple and add a mark after the business grows and perhaps gains more (or sometimes less – meaning broader)  focus.

It’s important for all logos to remain equally readable  at each zoom/ scale level. You may not be buying a giant billboard but printing a logo a few inches across on a brochure is a much higher resolution environment than on a website.

logomarks

Famous examples of logomarks

To see some logos I’ve design head on over to my logo design portfolio or just download my updated identity design portfolio PDF.

Posted in Design | 4 Responses
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