One challenge to building a mission-critical website on a closed system: Love your web host or leave it… along with their proprietary backend systems that made your site work right and look great (we hope). To move it, you’ll spend the time and cost of re-interpreting the site design and re-implementing its various functions in […]
Tips for Online Photos and Artwork
Also see: Photo albums and slideshows — this page’s tips will also help to improve those, too! Every photo you edit out of a collection raises the average quality of all the remaining photos. Don’t put a photo in just because you have it, and be sure it makes sense with the rest of […]
Picking (At) a Successful Design
A new client, apropos of nothing, interjected, “Why do committees usually produce crappy design?” That client is not a designer, so it was an insightful question and difficult to answer in concise talking points. We do not intend to enshrine designers, but there seems to be something intangible at play in their best work. Something […]
Policy change: sharing links on Facebook
Social-media managers, webmasters, and others must remain aware of industry’s changing practices. Here we discuss a big change in how sharing links works when it comes to Facebook pages. Until now, it has been easy for users of Hootsuite and other social-sharing tools to link to a web page and completely customize (even replace) the […]
Using SVG graphics in WordPress
Scalable, crisp vector art for websites Dec. 8 2018 Update: WordPress 5.0 doesn’t require a plugin just to import SVG graphics into the media library. When inserted via the Customizer interface (e.g., for a header image), SVG graphics no longer cause errors or dead-ends at the cropping stage. After inserting an SVG image, it might […]
Punctuation in Publishing Online
Here we present the bare-bones beginning of an in-house style guide. Add to it as your needs and curiosity require, and always refer to authoritative sources when adding or modifying an item. Note: keystrokes often differ between Windows and OS X systems. Times of day Use the periods in p.m. and a.m. times of day. […]
How Often Do You Update WordPress Plugins & Themes?
We offer to teach most of our website clients using WordPress to update its plugins and themes themselves. It’s typically not a difficult chore, but it is yet another recurring task on a manager’s or entrepreneur’s to-do list. For that reason, we’re hardly surprised when someone asks, “Can you handle it for us?” WordPress is […]
About Web Sites for Lawyers, Law Firms, Paralegal Practices
When any new client chooses us to develop their website, it an honor and a responsibility. The observations here concern websites for law firms, in particular. We approach each law firm, paralegal practice, or independent legal professional’s web presence from the ground up, with an understanding of their “business personality,” objectives, and motivation. This ensures […]
A Host for Every Web Site
Building a new website or major re-design? The way your web developer sets up a server for developing a new site may depend on how you want the site hosted in the long term. Because of that, be prepared to choose among web hosting options early in the development process. Web hosting explained Every website […]
What’s In a Nameserver? DNS Lesson Learned.
Domain name servers The web domains we know use them: a domain name server routes internet traffic for www.ExternalDesign.com to the web server whose IP address is 104.199.120.117 (or something). DNS maps the names we humans use to the numbers that identify a specific destination or resource. Every web browser’s new HTTP request, for every […]
