There isn’t much else to report really. There might be a theme change over at my other site, www.coreytess.net, and there will also most likely be a change to how the galleries there are run. I am not happy with the Wordpress plugins for galleries, so I am going to try out Gallery2. It’s another rebuilt deal, and installed pretty painlessly.

Let me know what you think of the new theme in the comments.

The themes that seem to be more up to date are the eBusiness, ePhoto, eVid, eGamer, and Coldstone themes. They are the nicest looking, in my opinion. The other themes look just as nice, but I haven’t worked with most of them, and a couple I tried look like they are waiting to be updated to 2.8, or my local test environment is broken, could be either really.

The themes all have a read me on how to install them, and any required plugins, and Photoshop files to work with if you choose to customize anything. The site also has a large forum for everything from questions, to suggestions, and a place to show off any customizations to the themes.

Once you get the theme installed you’ll want to go and take a look at the options for the theme. Currently they are working on making their options piece for the themes easier to use, and nicer looking.

Here you can see the options for the eBusiness theme, they look nice, and are pretty straightforward in what they do.

Most of the theme is controlled through the options, some of what you can put on your homepage, or use for thumbnails is done through the use of custom fields, a common thread amongst themes like these, and the rest is setting the links and some teaser type text. The on thing I can say here is the use of IDs for things on the homepage, specifically with eBusiness theme, and a couple others. I don’t use the querystring param setup for my permalinks, it hurts SEO (yes even on a tiny site I think about SEO). I use permalinks formatted with the month/day/year/title, or something along those lines. I don’t like having to dig to find the ID of something to have it on the homepage. I guess either Wordpress could make these IDs more readily available, which may already be possible but I am not seeing it. It would be better if the theme could pick the ID, or maybe have something to browse the content you already have in the site, and it can pull the ID itself.

Once those items are setup, the last thing left to do really is replace the stock logo with your own. This was one other point I was kind of disappointed in. Throughout the theme you can set the URL for an image for the “About Me” section, or for many other items like ads. However with the logo, the only thing I can find is to change the name of the file in the header file, or to name your custom logo the same as the stock one. It would have been nice to have an option for this in the theme. Again, this is a tiny thing, and anyone who knows Wordpress should be able to manage this on their own.

All in all, these themes are fantastic, you get a lot for a tiny price tag really. I highly suggest taking a look at the site, see if there is something you like for your own site, and take the plunge. The forums are active with the admins, so help is always easily found, and they are beautiful themes, with the most important part, the right price.

I had spent a lot of time looking at other “premium” themes, and theme clubs. What I found was a lot of generic layouts, or worse the same layout repeated with slightly different colors or fonts. Most of these themes alone, cost more than the price of the many options you get with Elegant Themes. Hop on over and take a look, and check my other site where I’ll be using on of their themes soon. Now I just have to make up my mind.

Dreamhost has a lot of stuff built into their web panel that just makes life easier, and they allow me to manage my domains, ASO does not. The domain thing was huge, it allowed me to setup Google Apps for the new domain in a flash. It’s all little stuff I guess, when you’re talking about little sites it all is little really, but it is nice nonetheless.

So either way, the new site can be seen here, coreytess.net. Let me know what you think, either here or there.

I’m working slowly, I managed to pick up a new hobby over the summer, Remote Control Cars/Trucks, and it has been consuming a lot of time, and to my girlfriend’s dismay, money. Great hobby but it can turn into a money pit when you start racing like I have. I’m sure I can make a whole post on the racing and what I’ve learned and done and so on, maybe I will tomorrow. Anyways, once the weather turns to the cold stuff we enjoy so much up here in New England, I’m planning on going full speed into the rails version of this site. I’ve dug myself a bit of a hole with it already using Wordpress for the interim, as I will now have to write some sort of import for the existing post and content on the site now. All in all it should be nice once done. I’m not sure about a design, but I am sure I’ll try and go simple and keep it along the lines of what is here now.

Work has been busy, I’ve been expanding my programming skills a great deal in the .Net world. I have made some amazing pieces of functionality for our customers. It might be my opinion but I have no shame in taking pride in the things I have made lately. I honestly was not aware of how much I knew and could get done at my previous job. I was not allowed time or opportunity to really program like I do now, and I am glad I made the change. You can take a look at the work we’ve been doing from our corporate site, Websolutions Technology Inc..

For anyone interested my girlfriend does have website finally, we got her setup on Dreamhost after a deal I could not resist. They offered $6.95 for a full year of unlimited hosting. So I set her up with a Wordpress blog like mine, and now she blogs about her quilting and crafting, and she links to her Etsy site where she sells what she makes. Feel free to take a look, http://lovejessicaalways.com.

Well off for now.

First was a blog called ThemeGrrl, as the name and title suggests it is for more feminine themes, but since this was my girlfriend’s crafting site, that’s a good thing. She seems to have a lot of posts for different styles of themes, and is pretty well put together. She uses the same host as the new one I used for my girlfriend, and has posted about them a few times as well. 

Next was SimplyWP, the site is not too bad, they have some nice themes to look at, although I wish they would put a preview pic in the blog post itself. I’m a huge fan of free themes, it’s a great way for people with the skills to put together a small portfolio, even better if they get used. There is also really no need to pay for a lot for theme for your personal blog. I sometimes wonder how much business the “Premium” themes vendors get, if anyone of you is reading this, please feel free to give me a clue. I myself am completely incapable of designing anything, I just don’t have the creativity I guess, and I envy those who can. 

As always setting up the new site was a breeze, especially since most hosts have auto installers for Wordpress. I really like that I can crank out something simple and useable so fast, which still has the potential to become a decent site either with additional plugins, or by adding in another app to the host. If anyone needs some help with Wordpress I might be able to help, just ask away. If I don’t know the answer, I will gladly make up one that sounds good, just kidding.

Which brings me to my second update for today, I am a free agent again. If you’ve looked at my resume you’ll notice my previous employment at Ektron Inc. has ended, and I have moved on to some contract work. I am new to the independent contractor world, but so far I am enjoying it. I am a little worried about handling the taxes for the first time like this, but I am sure my friends over at H&R Block or Jackson Hewitt will keep from being thrown to the wolves at the IRS.

Like I said above I am interested in freelance work so if you’re looking for some website development, drop me a line here. I am sure I can fit some time in between my other contracts. While I am not a designer, if only I had such talent and skill to do so, I know a great deal about web development. My main skills are mostly .Net, but I learn fast, and do have a decent amount of knowledge with PHP and of course RoR. Jump over to the about page and take a look at the resume, there is a portfolio on the way, maybe tomorrow or this weekend.

On a sidenote, anyone who has a blog should have Akismet, it’s been catching lots of spam on this little end of the interent, I can only imagine what it could do for a highly active blog. It’s a great plugin for Wordpress, and best of all free.