Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/smartphotojs-mobile-slideshow-plugin/
Responsive image gallery designed specifically to display your website on mobile devices.
The post SmartPhoto.js – Simple Responsive Image Viewer Designed for Mobile appeared first on Hongkiat.
Visit hongkiat.com for full content.
Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CreativeBloq/~3/jpYun4xTn2s/10-ace-design-magazines-to-add-to-your-reading-list
Design magazines have a number of functions: they let you know what's going on in the industry, inspire you, offer advice you can apply to your own design portfolio, provide you with insights from design superstars, go behind the scenes on the biggest and most experimental design projects – all that stuff. But design magazines are also obliged to look dead cool while artfully stacked up on your coffee table.
We've picked out a selection of design magazines from around the world; titles with the best writing and photography, the coolest designs, and the top production values. We looked at big-selling design magazines that have been around for decades, and smaller, independent titles that dare to be different.
Wallpaper*
For interiors inspo, Wallpaper* can’t be beaten
The first of our heavyweight titles is Wallpaper*: 'the world's most important design and lifestyle magazine brand’. The monthly mag has readers in 100 countries, the majority employed in the creative industries, so it covers design from around the world in all its forms. You might see a story about Frida Kahlo next to one about Paris Fashion Week, something on wearable football kits beside a piece about a new bar in Buenos Aires. It's no good for Photoshop tips, but can't be beaten for #apartmentgoals.
Computer Arts
For practical advice, you can’t beat Computer Arts
Whatever stage of your career you're at – student or studio boss – Computer Arts is a cornerstone magazine. The monthly title champions graphic design, branding and illustration. It interviews the world's best studios and individual designers, but also regularly celebrates fresh new talent. The magazine goes behind the scenes on big projects to see how they're put together.
It's one of our sister magazines, so we're a little biased, but where Computer Arts really comes into own is with career tips and advice: how to upgrade your skills, tips for making it as a freelancer, and what to do if you decide to quit your job.
The covers always look super-smart too. A particular highlight is Computer Arts' annual cover design competition, run in association with D&AD New Blood. It's a chance for fledgling designers to show off their skills, and for industry pros to take a look at the best upcoming talent. You can see 2018's winning entry on the issue on sale now. Pick up a copy to check out the full shortlist, or check out last year's winners.
Creative Review
CR has been running since 1980
Our final big title is Creative Review: 'We celebrate the work that matters. And we dig into how and why it gets made. We challenge and champion the industry we love.' Since 1980, the title has been covering all quarters of the creative industries – not just art and design but advertising, film and TV, too. It interviews big-name creatives and analyses high-profile projects, looks at how things are made and why, inspires you to go and make your own stuff, and offers practical advice on how to run your own studio.
Eye
Eye has great coffee table appeal
Eye calls itself 'the world’s most beautiful and collectable graphic design journal' – and it might just be. Aside from always having a killer front cover (this is definitely one to leave artfully stacked on the coffee table), the quarterly magazine offers some of the best writing around on design and 'visual culture' in general. For a taste of what to expect, a recent issue includes stories on Estonian design, the anatomy of a magazine, and an interview with the design director at the New York Times. Eye also does some pretty good student subscription deals.
99U
99U is made by Adobe, so you know you’re in safe hands
Another one of the best-looking magazines around is 99U. It’s aimed at everyone from designers and engineers to educators, marketers, artists and CEOs: ‘If you approach your work creatively, 99U’s goal is to help you find the inspiration to build an incredible career'. It's made by Adobe so you know you're in safe hands. The current quarterly issue covers Pentagram's Natasha Jen, an insider's tour of Berlin, and 10 designers sharing how they upset the status quo – firing their best client, good stuff like that.
Communication Arts
This US-focused mag is aimed at creative professionals
Communication Arts covers design, illustration, typography and photography, as well as advertising and interactive fields. It's US-focused and is for people in the industry more than general hobbyists. The bimonthly magazine is at its best when interviewing designers and design studios – the Surrealist photographer from Portland; the experimental marketing agency in San Francisco – about the work they make.
The Great Discontent
TGD specialises in longform, in-depth interviews
The Great Discontent started out online but it's definitely even better in print. The title specialises in big, proper, longform interviews – in the tradition of literary magazine the Paris Review – with artists, writers, graphic designers, photographers… people from all corners of the arts. You even get the odd musician. It attracts big names like Michael Bierut and Stefan Sagmeister, but the detailed mix of biography and practical advice makes every interview worth your time. The magazine itself is quality, too – and is available in hardcover, as a magazine, or as a travel-sized version.
B magazine
Each issue of B focuses entirely on one specific company
Strictly speaking, B isn't a design magazine. Instead, each bimonthly issue focuses on one specific company, and the 'untold stories behind a brand … its sentiment and culture.' It's a good mix too: there are companies like Netflix, Airbnb and Google, alongside notebook-maker Moleskine, footwear specialist Danner, and outdoor clothing brand Patagonia.
Patagonia, for example, based in California, lets its people to go surfing when the waves are up, and make up the time later. The system apparently increases productivity. It's this level of detail that makes the magazine a good read for studio bosses or anyone interested in brand marketing and management.
FORM
Each biannual issue of FORM has a particular theme
Leading design writer Steven Heller called FORM the best design magazine in the world, 'for its holistic coverage of industrial, product, graphic, and hybrid designs.' The magazine prides itself on being a print title first and foremost, so it does all the things that print titles do best: in-depth, long-form articles alongside quality photographs and illustrations. The covers are always exceptional, and it’s bilingual too: German and English. Each biannual issue has a theme. It could be a country (Mexico, South Korea), a topic (sport, designing protest), or something more abstract (danger, failure).
Printed Pages
Printed Pages is exceptionally well put-together
Printed Pages is a biannual magazine that covers all areas of art and design, and presents a 'curated view of the best creative work we’ve seen in the past six months’ as well as ‘a host of feature interviews with a list of names who are currently making their mark on the creative world’.
The current issue's recurring theme is activism and using creativity as a voice for positive change. It includes interviews with designers Sagmeister & Walsh, artists Gilbert and George, and street photographer Joel Meyerowitz. Exceptionally put-together, this one also passes the coffee table test with flying colours.
Read more:
10 ways to make your magazine cover stand out66 brilliant print advertsCreate special print finishes in InDesign
Original Source: https://inspiredm.com/exclusive-freebie-12-instagram-story-templates/
Created by Nice, Very Nice! the Instagram story template pack “Napali” contains 12 high-quality templates. The bundle is a useful tool for influencers, bloggers, marketers, brands, and storytellers aims to help promote e-commerce products, share deals and announcements or attract the attention of the followers. These templates are fully customizable and compatible with Adobe Photoshop and Sketch App.
See the templates live on Instagram here.
Product features
12 Templates for Photoshop and Sketch App.
Document size: 1600×2844px.
High resolution/retina proof.
Download links to the free fonts.
Well ordered layers.
All shapes are vector based.
Pixel perfect shapes.
Easy image placement via smart objects.
How to use the product
Open a file with any template.
Drag&drop new photos, replace the texts.
Save the file.
Upload to your Instagram story.
Download Napali for free from here.
The post Exclusive Freebie: 12 Instagram Story Templates appeared first on Inspired Magazine.
Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/ebook-reader-manager/
Some of the best e-book readers along with their positive and negative features.
The post E-book Readers & Managers – Best of appeared first on Hongkiat.
Visit hongkiat.com for full content.
Original Source: https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/07/8-secrets-of-the-perfect-link/
A few weeks ago a frustrated face appeared around the corner of my desk. “Sorry mate, you don’t do any printing do you?”
“Well yeah, sometimes,” I said.
I have a dedicated desk in a co-working space, we share a printer, and it was this shared printer that was frustrating the face in question: “I’ve been trying for hours to get this bloody thing printed, I’m absolutely desperate, I can’t find the right driver anywhere…”
“I think you just log into the dashboard and download it,” I said. “I think that’s what I did, hold on let me try,” I said, firing up the office dashboard. “You go to printer instructions…”
“Yep, I did that.”
“…and then you click…”
“Oh God!” he wailed. “It’s a link isn’t it.”
Here are the instructions that he’d been struggling with:
An intelligent, professional person, had spent two hours searching for the right driver for a Canon printer, never realizing that the “Download Driver” instruction was a link.
As he slunk back to his workspace, it seemed impolite to enquire as to whether or not he’s color blind, but I’d put good money on it; if he is, that link probably appears mid-grey, blending in with the rest of the text.
Links are arguably the most important element in any document. Without them, the web is just a collection of files stored on the Internet. The perfect link is simple, honest, and usable. Here’s how to design it.
1. A Good Link is Not a Button
…and a good button is not a link.
We frequently misunderstand the role of links on the web. A link describes the relationship between two pieces of data, providing context, and often providing meaning.
Buttons perform actions, links form contextual relationships
A link does not perform an action. The printer driver link above should not be a link, it should be a button; buttons don’t link data, they perform an action.
It’s entirely true that the vast majority of GUIs allow you to tap or click a link in order to access the linked data, but that is simply a shortcut. The primary role of the link is to establish a connection between pieces of data.
Buttons perform actions, links form contextual relationships.
2. A Good Link Clarifies its Purpose
Central to the problem of how a link should be used, is the fact that the anchor element is flexible enough to be used in a number of ways without breaking. A mailto: link for example should not be a link (it’s an action, not a connection between pieces of data) that has escaped deprecation by being really very useful.
We have a whole hierarchy of headings—including the relatively useless <h5></h5> and <h6></h6>—but we have a single anchor element. In an ideal world we’d have multiple anchor elements to give semantic meaning to links, perhaps a <ae></ae> element for external links (data on a different domain) and a <ai></ai> for internal links (data on the same domain). At present the nearest we can get to giving links semantic meaning is using absolute paths for external links and relative paths for internal links.
We can of course apply different styles to different classes of anchor using CSS. It makes sense that to clarify purpose, internal links should be styled in-keeping with the site’s brand, but that external links should be distinct in some way.
In Tim Berners-Lee’s 1997 thoughts on the nature of UI, he states that:
the interface to a universal space should have a certain universal consistency
Certainly users’ understanding of how to use the web has developed since those words were written, but the essential point holds true; users prefer a UI that reflects their wider experience. While there is an argument to say that internal links should be in-keeping with a site’s brand to clarify what they link to, there is an equally valid argument that adhering to the default styles—blue, underlined, system fonts—for external links, not only simplifies an interface, but clarifies that the data being linked to is outwith the current site’s domain.
Whether inconsistency of links causes more confusion than it relieves should be addressed on a case-by-case basis. But in cases where internal links and external links are styled the same, in the interests of usability, it’s the familiar blue, underlined, system font approach that best serves the user.
3. A Good Link is Visited
Thanks to William Gibson-esque metaphors, we have a tendency to conceptualize surfing the web as traveling to different locations. Links are viewed as a gateway to somewhere else, when in fact they are a gateway to somewhen else. Take a look at your browser history. It’s not a map of locations, but a chronological record of events. Links are points in the timeline of our data consumption.
visited links are the low-hanging fruit of UI design
As important as links to future data, are links to past data: visited links. Visited links are important because it is visited links that contextualize our data consumption and highlight (by their elimination) that data that we have yet to consume.
Visited links can be a little crude—ideally a link would be compared against a user’s browser history to determine not just if the document had been visited, but if the document had been updated since the user’s last visit. Despite this, visited links are the low-hanging fruit of UI design—easily styled as a slightly desaturated, less urgent version of an active link—and provide invaluable information to the user about their experience.
4a. A Good Link is Always Blue
The principle formalized by psychology as the Mere Exposure Effect teaches us that the more familiar something is, the more appealing it is.
The default color of a hyperlink in a browser, is blue. Hyperlinks appear to have been established as blue by sheer chance (presumably someone somewhere’s personal preference). The fortuitous decision benefits usability because almost no one has a blue sight deficiency; unlike red and green, we can nearly all see blue.
Whether a learned behavior, or an inherently more usable color, blue links are clicked more.
(Because of this deep association, no text should ever be blue unless it’s a link.)
4b. A Good Link is Rarely Blue
Blue is the most popular color across the board. Blue is also the most common color in UI design, especially among technology and news sites.
The omnipresence of blue raises a challenge for designers: if the primary brand color is blue, should the links in the document also be blue, or does the use of blue in the general design obfuscate the location of links?
Whenever designing with a lot of blue, I’ve found users prefer complementary colors for links; orange, or green for example. However, with the proven effectiveness of blue links, it’s worth edging towards the blue end of the spectrum: reds should edge towards purple, greens towards turquoise.
5. A Good Link is Underlined
The argument for underlining is that, as with the printer driver example, underlining reinforces the color indicator; if a person is color blind, they can still see the underline.
The argument against underlining is that it interrupts the flow of text. Google removed underlined links years ago with no apparent downside—at least not enough of a downside to cause them to reverse the decision. But then Google’s links are blue, the linkiest of all link colors, and less of a problem for the color blind.
If underlining text is genuinely too disruptive, there are two simple alternatives: you can either style a pseudo-underline by applying a dashed or dotted bottom-border to the link which will be visually less impactful, or you can highlight in a different way, such as applying a background color to the link.
(As with the avoidance of blue text, never underline text that isn’t a link; users will conclude that your link is broken long before they realize you made a poor design decision.)
6. A Good Link Stands Out
Links should be identifiable at a glance. Interaction is inconsistent across devices, and relying on scrubbing the page to uncover links is a recipe for user frustration.
Links should be identifiable at a glance
Eye-tracking research suggests that users scan through links, just after titles, to identify the parts of the page most interesting to them. This ability is even more important for screen reader users, who can’t visually scan a page for relevant content, but can (and do) scan through links to identify interesting content.
When treated as bullet points, links describe not only the data that they link to, but the content in which they sit. You wouldn’t link to information on perfume from a paragraph on mountain bikes, so it’s common sense that if there’s a link to mountain bikes, then the paragraph in which it resides will also be about mountain bikes.
7. A Good Link Uses Good Microcopy
If possible, keep links at the end of sentences, or the end of blocks of text; this limits the interruption to the thought process, and creates a less disjointed experience. However, never employ the “more information…” approach.
Running a search on Google for “click here” returns 5,090,000,000 results. A similar search for “read more” returns 17,090,000,000 results. What a waste.
Beyond the evident SEO failures of “read more”, “find out more”, “click here” etc. poorly written links give the impression that the current content is abdicating its authority. You are in effect saying, “this information is shallow, there’s better information elsewhere.”
If a link is designed well enough, it is clear at a glance that it’s a link, and “click here” style instructions are superfluous.
8. A Good Link Facilitates Good UX
It’s essential that links can be easily triggered, regardless of the delivery device; mobile sites need large enough hit areas, speech readers need distinct microcopy.
A link must always keep its promise
Links should follow the reasoned approach of the majority of use-cases. That means that internal links open in the same window, and external links open in a new tab. There are exceptions, a link to a privacy policy for example is an internal link but should be opened in a new tab. Whenever making this choice, ask yourself if the user is likely to need the back button. If so, use a new tab so it can be easily closed returning the user to the previous information.
No link should ever surprise a user, and that includes the type of content you’re linking to. If you’re linking to content that is NSFW, or behind a firewall, consider using the :before or :after pseudo elements to insert an icon next to the link, warning the user of what’s coming.
A link must always keep its promise. That means that when a user clicks, taps, selects, or otherwise triggers a link, they get exactly what they were expecting. And that includes ensuring that links are never, ever broken.
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Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CreativeBloq/~3/lJs3xgqCqa8/free-resume-templates-111517854
There isn't always time to craft your creative resume from scratch. If you're facing a tight deadline, one option is to get ahead by choosing a free resume template and customising it into a bespoke design.
We've had a search around and found these striking free resume templates, each of which offers something a little different. Download one of these templates and wing your way to a job interview for the role or client of your dreams.
01. Material design resume
Turn heads with a resume that has an irresistible dash of Material Design cool
For a stand-out resume with an on-trend look, this template, inspired by Google's Material Design framework, is a shoe-in. It includes areas for professional profile, work experience, education, skill circles, skill bars, social media icons and images, and it's supplied in A4-size format for Adobe Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop. It uses free fonts, and if you'd like a covering letter and portfolio template to go with your resume, there's a premium version that also includes new colour options plus matching business card templates and custom icons.
02. Stylish infographic resume
Why not tell your career story with a swish infographic?
Want to get all your relevant information across in an eye-friendly, graphical way? Why, you'll be wanting some kind of infographic, then! And this stylish template by Federica Procaccino delivers just that, enabling you to get your message across on a single page without overwhelming everyone with text.
03. Creative resume
Give yourself a colourful leg-up with attention-grabbing template
Catch any potential employer's eye with this fun one-page template. It's ready to edit in just about any package you care to imagine, it has plenty of room for all the important bullet points that you'll want people to know about, and the colourful splashes along the edges mean that it won't get lost among a pile of other applicants.
04. Modern resume
Edit this template in Illustrator to make it your own
If you know your way around Adobe Illustrator and don't mind getting your hands dirty, then this template is prefect for producing a great-looking resume that you can customise to your personal taste. You can either use it as-is, changing the text and adding a photograph, or you can spend time editing the colours and tweaking the layout until you have something that more accurately reflects your personality.
05. YA resume
Whether you’re a graphic designer or a sea captain, this template will see you right
Created by Indonesian graphic designer Angga Baskara, this elegant template covers all the bases with three sections – a main CV info page featuring eye-catching progress bars to illustrate your main skills, a covering letter and a portfolio section where you can add a selection of your work in the form of images and short descriptions.
06. Graphical resume
Fay Zodiac’s template is bold
This resume template by Fay Zodiac isn't one for the faint-hearted. Its bold letterpress-styled icons, patterns and text certainly pack a punch, and will ensure your CV jumps out from the pile. You'll just need the confidence in the job interview to back up your loud resume design. It comes with the fonts and icons, as well as the Photoshop resume template, and is fully editable.
07. Colourful resume
Riccardo Rivieccio’s template comes with matching business cards
As any designer knows, colour sells. Riccardo Rivieccio's free resume templates come in a choice of six colour schemes with attention-grabbing patterns in the header. And to further sweeten the deal, he's also designed matching business cards. These Illustrator files are fully editable, too, so have fun with colour.
08. Creative Vintage Resume
This wonderfully retro template comes in gorgeous earthtones
This is a splendidly vintage-looking resume template in deliciously earthy tones, and it comes as an .AI file so that you can adjust it to your heart's content. Be aware, though, that the fonts aren't included, so you'll either have to hunt them down yourself (they're all free fonts, luckily) or substitute your own.
09. Creative Designer Resume Template
Make an instant impression with this visually-focused template
Fully layered and well organised to keep customisation nice and easy, this bold and punchy visual template enables you to get yourself and your skills across quickly, without any messing around. It comes as a print-ready 300dpi A4 PSD, ready for editing in Photoshop.
10. Project-based resume
A centre-aligned layout with space for images
Depending on the type of application process you're dealing with, it may be appropriate to include samples of your work within your CV. This template, Velli, is great if you have images of visual work that you'd like to form part of your resume, and there's also space for a cover letter.
11. Two-column layout
A two-tone layout with two columns
Fitting a lot of information onto your first page can help to a grab a recruiter's attention, and a two-column layout is a good way to achieve that without making your page look cluttered.
12. Timeline resume
Create a good first impression with this free timeline resume template
This free timeline-based resume template was created by graphic designer Patryk Korycki. An AI file, the design features typeface Open Sans, with various fields available to enter education details, skills, interests and much more.
13. Stylish resume
A stylish resume template that includes a timeline of your employment history
This subtle yet stylish CV template features all the details you need to include, along with a neat sidebar holding a profile and references and a timeline – in which you can list your employment history. There’s also an online profile section to show just how social media-savvy you are and a software skills bar graph so you can show your exact skills. It’s supplied in PSD, AI and INDD formats.
14. Resume for icon fans
This resume template has some super-stylised icons included
If icons are your thing, check out this free template from designer Fernando Báez. A sectionalised design, complete with stylish type and icons included (you get the CV in AI format and the icons in PSD), this resume is perfect for customising with your own icons to represent your interests and achievements.
15. Resume for type fans
A central typographic column enables you to list your skills
Sure, this may not be to everyone's taste – but it's certainly impactful. A central typographic column bursts out to boxes in which you can add your details. The resume is supplied in AI format so you can easily export a PDF – and comes in black and white so you can get creative with colours.
16. Simple resume
This simple resume template uses colour
Simplicity is the key in this type-based CV that puts your profile at the top, then lists experience and education in simple boxes. There's also a professional skills section enabling you to give yourself a percentage score on languages and professional skills. The Illustrator file makes the most of colour to aid its simplicity.
17. Clean resume
The Smart Object header makes it a cinch to add your own graphic to this resume
This highly customisable resume template comes in PSD and AI formats, and has a Smart Object header, meaning you can quickly and easily link in an image of your choice. It's A4, 300dpi, with 3mm bleed – so completely print-ready. Just add your logo, bio, experience and so on, and you're ready to print and send.
18. Hadi Reda
Super-minimal with a neat icon style, this resume is ace for designers
Keep it super-minimal with this resume template. Once again there's a bar graph for your skills (which we're still not sure about but some employers may like) along with a neat icon style to represent your social media profiles and software competence. It's supplied in layered PSD format.
19. Resume that makes a statement
It’s definitely worth experimenting with this contemporary resume template by Paolo Pettigiani
Maybe you’re looking to make more of a statement with your one-pager – in which case this typographic template by Paolo Pettigiani may be just the ticket. Easy to customise and available in AI format with all the necessary fonts and icons, it’s definitely worth experimenting with.
Related articles:
10 beautiful paper portfolios to inspire you30 brilliantly creative resumes5 quick ways to improve your portfolio dramatically
Original Source: https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2018/07/webp-manual/
Introducing “The WebP Manual”
Introducing “The WebP Manual”
Markus Seyfferth
2018-07-24T12:00:00+02:00
2018-07-24T10:53:31+00:00
What’s WebP in the first place? Can we actually use it today? And if yes, how exactly? The role of media in performance, specifically images, is of huge concern. Images are powerful. Engaging visuals evoke visceral feelings. They can provide key information and context to articles, or merely add humorous asides. They do anything for us that plain text just can’t by itself.
But when there’s too much imagery, it can be frustrating for users on slow connections, or run afoul of data plan allowances. In the latter scenario, that can cost users real money. This sort of inadvertent trespass can carry real consequences.
In this eBook, you’ll learn all about WebP: what it’s capable of, how it performs, how to convert images to the format in a variety of ways, and most importantly, how to use it. Of course — the eBook is — and always will be, free for all Smashing Members.
Looking for a sneak peek? Read an excerpt.
84 pages. Written by Jeremy Wagner. Cover Design by Ricardo Gimenes. Available in PDF, Kindle, and ePub formats.
eBook
Free for Members
$14.90Get the eBook
PDF, ePUB, Kindle.
$0.00 $14.90 Free for Members →
…along with 12 webinars and 56 other eBooks.
What’s In The eBook
This guide will encourage you to experiment and see what’s possible with WebP:
WebP Basics
WebP images usually use less disk space when compared to other formats at reasonably comparable visual similarity. Depending on your site’s audience and the browsers they use, this is an opportunity to deliver less data-intensive user experiences for a significant segment of your audience.
Performance
We’ll cover how both lossy and lossless WebP compare to JPEGs and PNGs exported by a number of image encoders.
Converting Images To WebP (Excerpt)
This can be done in a myriad of ways, from something as simple as exporting from your preferred design program, by using Cloudinary and similar services, and even in Node.js-based build systems. Here, we’ll cover all avenues.
Using WebP Images
Because WebP isn’t supported in all browsers just yet, you’ll need to learn how to use it that sites and applications gracefully fall back to established formats when WebP support is lacking. Here, we’ll discuss the many ways you can use WebP responsibly, starting by detecting browser support in the Accept request header.
About The Author
Jeremy Wagner is a performance-obsessed front-end developer, author and speaker living and working in the frozen wastes of Saint Paul, Minnesota. He is also the author of Web Performance in Action, a web developer’s companion guide for creating fast websites. You can find him on Twitter @malchata, or read his blog of ramblings.
Here’s Why This eBook Is For You
The WebP Manual will get you ready for the new image format that is capable to significantly less data-intensive user experiences for a majority of your audience:
Learn how lossy and lossless WebP compare to JPEGs and PNGs exported by a number of image encoders.
Learn which services and plugins you can use to export or convert images to WebP with your preferred design tool or command line tool.
Learn how to can use WebP in production, and how to implement proper fallbacks for browsers that don’t support WebP just yet.
Learn how to use the full potential of the WebP format. It will substantially improve loading performance for many of your users, customers, and clients, and it will become one of your favorite tools for making websites as lean as possible.
The eBook is free for Smashing Members (you can cancel anytime, of course).
eBook
Free for Members
$14.90Get the eBook
PDF, ePUB, Kindle.
$0.00 $14.90 Free for Members →
…along with 12 webinars and 56 other eBooks.
Original Source: https://inspiredm.com/breathing-new-life-into-an-old-website/
Everyone working in development is bound at some time to discover they’ve been shelling out good money for hosting an old website that has been forgotten about.
Rather than letting this investment go to waste, you could actually revive the old site by updating it. What you do with it after that is entirely up to you. You could sell it on to a new owner, monetize the content with advertising, use the site to promote a new product or service, or simply keep it as a portfolio example of your work.
The longer the site has been sitting around, the more work you will need to do to getting working well. What follows are the basic things you’ll need to check and basic steps you can take to correct any problems you encounter.
1. Make sure you actually own the rights to the site
This is not always as simple as it seems. Sometimes you may have developed the site on behalf of somebody else, in which case they may be the legal owner of the site under most circumstances.
It gets complicated if:
the business that contracted the original site ceases to exist
the client never pays for the work
the site was developed in partnership, and the other partner withdrew from the partnership
If the site was one you developed entirely on your own and entirely for yourself, you can do as you please. In all other cases, you should check your ownership.
2. Scan for any trademarked or copyrighted content
This is similar to the above. You don’t want to have a problem from somebody else claiming you have infringed their copyright or trademark. Also you’ll want to know if somebody else has stolen your content and is using it on another site.
illustration by Kyle Anthony Miller
3. Check for broken or outdated links
The web is a dynamic place and sites come and go all the time, and site owners sometimes move content around without redirecting properly. Broken links can be frustrating and detract for the user experience, so we should always attempt to fix broken links when we find them on our sites.
These are the steps to take when you discover a broken link:
Try to discover the new home of the content the link was supposed to point to
Try to find an alternative content source that would be sufficient
Search the Wayback Machine to discover if there is an archived version of the content you can link to.
If all else fails, remove the link.
Obviously also you should make sure the link is still relevant to whatever purpose you originally included it for, which brings us neatly to our next tip.
4. Make sure content and links are contemporary
If your original content was all about getting ready for the 2014 Singapore Film Festival or an article extolling the virtues of XHTML as the perfect development language, or recommending Flash as the perfect online animation tool, you’ll want to update that content and the links that go with it.
The site for the 2014 Singapore Film Festival may still be online, so the link might not be broken, but it would normally be of more value to include a link to the upcoming or most recently completed Singapore Film Festival.
Likewise there may still be a few dinosaurs making sites in XHTML instead of HTML 5, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but if you are extolling the virtues of technologies that most coders consider to be virtually obsolete, it runs the risk of you appearing to be obsolete.
Keeping your content contemporary and fresh is important, and an often overlooked requirement. It’s most noticeable if you’re talking about technologies, scientific theories, health issues, and so on. New discoveries can make your site content stop being factual, and as a publisher you have a responsibility to not present wrong information.
5. Don’t forget about social media
There are two ways you can have problems about social media in relation to your websites. The first, and most common, is that your site doesn’t link to your social media (and your social media doesn’t link to your site). This is simple enough to correct.
The second problem you could face is that your site might point to the wrong social media. For example, you may have had a Facebook page back in 2012 and your site pointed to that, but since then you no longer have control of that Facebook page even though it still exists.
illustration by Csaba Gyulai
That’s a problem because the traffic flow isn’t working for you, it’s working for someone else or it’s working for Facebook. You should fix these kinds of problems.
You should also consider creating a new social media presence specifically for this site, as that can give you the most value from traffic flow.
6. Fix security and privacy flaws
There are things we used to do, like putting our plain-text email address on a page, that we really shouldn’t be doing now. You may also have published content in a more innocent age that today would be considered a serious privacy risk to yourself.
You should check for this kind of stuff and remove or censor it. There are definitely better ways of allowing users to contact you than publishing your email address in plain text, and that image of your car showing the license plate number really should be doctored to obscure the number and any other features in the image that might put you at risk.
There’s no need to be paranoid, but sensible precautions certainly won’t do any harm. Failing to take precautions, on the other hand, has been known to create problems for some people.
illustration by Hurca
Giving your old site a new lease of life can be a good thing
The decision about whether to delete a site or revive it depends on a lot of factors, and it’s not always best to keep that old site up and running.
On the other hand, if you’ve been paying to host it, it has some half way decent rank on Google, and gets a reasonable amount of incoming traffic, it would feel wasteful to squander the opportunity reviving that old website represents.
You can benefit from that positive traffic and relatively good Google rank, and possibly your old site can bring new traffic to other sites you want to generate interest in. It may be prudent to hesitate before hitting the delete button, and think about the potential value your old site still holds.
header image courtesy of Mansoor
The post Breathing New Life into an Old Website appeared first on Inspired Magazine.
Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/designers-developers-monthly-07-2018/
An interesting mix of tools including Sketch library by WordPress, React.js and Vue.js tools and resources to learn development skills.
The post Fresh Resource for Web Developers (July 2018)…
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Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CreativeBloq/~3/8aj1fy9r0vw/3-stunning-blood-moon-images
Are you ready for Friday's blood moon? On Friday 27 July, photographers will be training their lenses on the night sky as they attempt to capture the longest, reddest and most dramatic total lunar eclipse for decades: the eerie phenomenon known as a blood moon.
For over an hour, the moon will turn a vivid orangey-red colour for lucky sky-gazers in the UK, Europe, Africa and Asia – weather permitting, of course. Compared to the flash-in-the-pan occurrence of a total solar eclipse, a dramatic total lunar eclipse such as this is a gift to photograph, provided you have a decent zoom lens.
But if you don't have the photography skills to capture it to your satisfaction, fear not. We've dug out three stunning blood moon images you can download today.
Aside from editorial use, striking, atmospheric moon images such as these are ideal for common design projects ranging from album covers to posters, flyers and more. So read on for our top picks of the very best blood moon images…
01. Blood moon gradient
At the start and end of the total lunar eclipse, a beautiful gradient will appear on the blood moon
You may have seen a partial lunar eclipse before: the full moon becomes much duller, and therefore easier to photograph. But it's only during a total lunar eclipse such as the blood moon on 27 July that the moon turns red, as it moves into the darkest part of the Earth's shadow.
It's a similar principle to a sunset being red, because the light has to travel through a lot of atmosphere before reaching our eyes. During a total lunar eclipse, sunlight is bent through the Earth’s atmosphere and onto the moon.
As the moon enters the earth's shadow, the edge takes on a pinky-orangey-brown hue before the whole face gradually turns red, and then fades out again as the eclipse ends. The result is a soft gradient that's captured beautifully in the image above, shot by Danita Delimont in Seattle, USA.
02. Blood moon with landscape
In the UK, the blood moon will be low in the sky – making interesting landscape compositions possible
While a total solar eclipse is only visible for a few fleeting minutes, and from a very specific area of the planet only, a total lunar eclipse can be seen from the entire night side of the planet.
While the blood moon on 27 July 2018 can be seen from Europe, Africa and Asia, it will be in different stages and positions in the night sky. The UK, for instance, will miss the first 20 minutes of totality, and the Blood Moon will already be red when it comes into view at 8:49pm.
The positive side of this is that the blood moon will be low enough in the sky to be captured as part of an interesting composition. In the example above, shot by Darren Robinson in British Columbia, Canada, the silhouettes of trees in the foreground frame the blood moon nicely.
03. Blood moon in close-up
This final Blood moon image – shot by John Sanford in 1996, and part of the Science Photo Library collection – perfectly captures the moment immediately after the totality phase, with the bright highlight at the top left and stark, moody shadow at the bottom right adding a satisfyingly three-dimensional feel to the image.
This kind of stunning close-up shot demands the ideal combination of high-end photographic equipment, finely-honed creative skills and years of professional experience – not to mention the perfect timing and atmospheric conditions.
If you fancy your chances at achieving that ideal balance, you'll find top tips to photograph the blood moon over at Digital Camera World. Good luck, enjoy yourself – but if you want premium quality without the effort, all three of the above examples can be found at Getty Images.
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