Since I started this blog I have been contacted by a few people requesting the availability of the WordPress theme I was using.

As I did not create the theme itself (merely changed its colour) I discouraged people from using this version as I had made a lot of little changes – that I didnt believe that others would want. Andreas Jacob over at Cordobo.com actualy created the theme, but at the time it was lime green – which didnt really appeal to me. As a result, I photoshopped the images and changed the colours in the style.css file so that everything would be orange. Alas this is what you see now.

The latest version of the Cordobo Green Theme is available (its still in beta though) from the Cordobo website and there is no need or point in creating a seperate version. So I have decided to make available the images and stylesheet that can be dropped into the latest versions “styles” directory and used just as the other colours are.

For more information on the Orange Twist version of the cordobo theme click here.

If you have any questions – just let me know.

Categories: Website, Wordpress Themes

All professional organisations that provide Client/Server applications to their customers must go through the testing phase of the software development lifecycle. Most people think of testing purely from a “does it do what it claims to?” point of view. Although the basics of testing is done with both black and white hat methods, some software issues will still creep through.

Black Hat and White Hat testing methods are extremely valuable at squeezing out the basic clitches – but only when Loadtesting a Client/Server application can you actually start to determine the proper efficiency, performance, durability, correctness and robustness of the system you have created.

The requirements specification stage of the SDLC should depict that the system will be able to maintain proper function with a load of X amount of users. Depending on the use and scope of the application – this number will vary.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: ALM, Testing

I recently submitted my post on Integrating RSS feeds into your website… to Digg and Reddit in order to gauge the response and potential traffic flow that can be generated by doing this.

Submitting the post to Reddit went off without a hitch – I signed up and submitted the post. Simple. Digg on the other hand threw a little gotcha into the mix – which did indeed … get me.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: Experience

Targeting users to read about your company can be a difficult proposition. Customers usually just want to know what you can provide and how you can help them. If they are not immediately interested or captivated, it is more likely than not that they will leave and not return.

By integrating a blog feed into the pages of my website I hope to coax my customers and readers into wanting to know more and therefore feel like they are closer to the company. This can make customers more loyal.

Blog software is so user friendly that it already provides the facility to enable its readers to subscribe to an RSS feed – but normal websites dont have an immediate avenue to integrate that feed and maximize its benefit. After all – it is highly likely that the people visiting my website will be the people that will be interested in how it was created, as it is a Holdings company and doesnt really provide much value.

By doing a quick search of google I can find just a couple of good, php based, RSS feed parsers available :

1. MagpieRSS
2. Simplepie

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: RSS, Website

In programming my website, I have broken each component down into their individual sections. By this I mean that I have simplified the ability to update an area of the website by simply changing one file. Here is how my file structure works :

1. Header module
2. Footer module
3. Sidebar module
4. main content

The sections above shouldnt really require any explanation. By modularizing how the webpage is created I can then ensure that any changes I wish to implement in the future are made all the easier – because I simply have to update one file.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: SEO, Website

The Prototype Framework has been selected as my framework of choice for implementing the AJAX version of my website. It abstracts the need to invest time in how the background operations in an AJAX call and subsequent element update happens.

As I am currently an expert in progress, I cannot say with any great conviction that the Prototype framework is the answer to all my prayers, but as far as first impressions go…. I am impressed.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: AJAX, Website

So, I have been busy with my full time job lately and when I get home its a bit of a struggle to get back in gear so that I can work on the site. I am a very persistent guy – so I’m battling through it.

I’ve been wanting to create my contact form for the past 2 weeks but getting the time has been difficult. I am glad to say it is now complete. I do have a basic concern that it is not 100% spam protected so I will be relying on my emails spam filter to catch the most of it until I can address the issue in the future. At the moment it is more important to have some facility for feedback than none at all.

It is currently a simple run of the mill contact form. A user enters their name, email address x2, selects a subject and then fills in their question/request. This is as good as it gets. Its how it works in the background that I am wanting to change.

An AJAX implementation is now the standard for all websites to achieve and I am setting my sites on converting mcnicholl.com to meet that standard.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: AJAX, Website

Submitting my sitemaps to Google proved a little more difficult than I expected. Sure the webmaster tools make the process of submitting the links to the sitemaps relatively easy, but attempting to resolve any issues you might have if things are not working are a little more difficult.

After I generated the sitemaps I then made my way over to the webmaster tools to submit them. I had to submit two sitemaps, one for mcnicholl.com and one for the blog. It seems to take google varying amounts of time to conduct the download and checking of the sitemaps so I didnt get instant feedback. When I did though, it wasnt what I was expecting. Both of my sitemaps got the following error :

URL timeout: DNS lookup timeout

This type of error would instantly tell me that I :

1. Had made a spelling mistake when typing in the URL to the sitemap
2. Had issues with my DNS servers

So in addressing these, I typed in the link I had supplied to google into the address bar of Firefox. This brought up the XML straight away. So the link was correct.

Next I checked out the situation with my DNS servers. I generated a report over at DNSStuff.com. This did explain some issues with my DNS servers, but when I mentioned these to my webhost they said I had nothing to worry about.

At this stage I was puzzled. What is causing this error?

After continually submitting the same link to google in the vain hope that it might magically work, I contacted my host again for some troubleshooting advice. Needless to say my sitemaps are working perfectly now. It turns out that there was an issue with the folder permissions in place. After having these reset – everything was working perfectly.

Now, after I submit a new post to the blog the sitemap is updated and google gets a ping all at the same time.

Categories: Google, Sitemap

Since it is very important to submit a sitemap to google, I made it one of my top priorities. So I created a one for www.mcnicholl.com based on their xml schema. This wasnt to difficult. When it came to creating a sitemap for this blog, I decided that it didnt make productive sense to continually update a sitemap after every post – so I hit google for some wordpress plugin options.

Here are the ones I found :

• Social Patterns
  
• Dagon Design
• Arne Brachhold

This isnt an exhaustive list, just the ones that came to me first. Maybe someone can let me know of a better one down the line. I plumped in the end for Arne Brachholds sitemap generator as it fitted my requirements and didnt over complicate anything.

Categories: Google, Sitemap

Since this blog is more of a companion to the main business than the actual business itself, I couldn’t use it as the main home page for mcnicholl.com. Instead I had to create one myself. For the average web designer out there, throwing together a mock up of a website is a relatively easy task. Programmers tend to make the worst GUI’s possible, caring more for the functionality of the product than how it looks. Instead of gracefully glancing the brush across the canvas, I would hold the side of the easel and feverishly scribble.

The design of the website is, though, my own work. I couldn’t justify spending money unnecessarily at this stage of the project and I feel that the site is perfectly adequeate until money is available for a more professional twist.

As of the time of writing, it is still not completely finished. I have to complete the following pages :

1. Portfolio
2. Advertise
3. About Us
4. Contact
5. Index (just a touch up here and there. I dont feel like its quite finshed yet.)

Reading that list actually hits it home that the site is currently only 45% complete.

I created the website with my favourite text editor Notepad++ . Using CSS and HTML and my trusty sidekick – photoshop. Obviously I made frequent reference to W3schools.com.
I tried using the Gimp (alternative to photoshop) – but I just felt it was inadequate. If they hired a professional GUI designer – I’d bet it would be 100 times as popular.

With the other 55% still to go, I’ll call it a work in progress and let you know when it is finally complete.

Categories: Notes, Website