News & Articles

• WordPress celebrates its 8th birthday today (wpcandy.com)
  Eight years ago today the first release of WordPress hit the interwebs. On May 27th, 2003 Matt Mullenweg first posted to the WordPress development blog that version 0.7 was available.
• WordPress wins 2011 Open Source Web App of the Year at The Critters (wpcandy.com)
  WordPress was awarded 2011 Open Source Web App of the Year this week at The Critters, a web development and design awards show that launched just this year.
• 7 Ways to Build a Business Around WordPress (mashable.com)
  The article showcases 7 ways to build your business around WordPress: Design/Development Consultancy, Web Design/Development Agency, Themes Sales, Plugin Development & Support, WordPress Web Hosting, Premium WordPress Support and Community Content.
• 101 Essential Free WordPress Resources for Building Your WordPress Website (wpmu.org)
  Having a whole collection of resources in one place is always a great resource in itself – especially when it’s categorized into neat little groups so that you can easily find what you need.
• WordPress 3 Complete Book Review and Giveaway (mondaybynoon.com)
  A great review of "WordPress 3 Complete" by April Hodge Silver . The reviewer, Jonathan Christopher, gives a quick intro to each chapter. What he liked most about this book was the fact that it covered just about every angle WordPress had to offer without going too far over the line and becoming overbearing.
• Upcoming Features for WordPress 3.2 Release (pelfusion.com)
  A list of features we can expect from version 3.2.
• WordCamp San Francisco Call for Speakers (wordpress.org)
  The annual WordPress conference, WordCamp San Francisco (home of the very first WordCamp), is now accepting speaker applications.
• Report claims Google and WordPress.com released user’s data without notification, unlike Twitter (thenextweb.com)
  It has been reported that Google and WordPress.com handed over user information of an anonymous whistleblowing blogger last year. This news follows hot on the heels that the same person’s Twitter details were handed over to courts last month.

Themes

• Chris Jean proposed a standard loop at WordCamp Raleigh (wpcandy.com)
  Chris Jean, lead developer at iThemes, gave a presentation at WordCamp Raleigh last week called “Standardized Loop API: The Next Big Thing”. In it he proposed a new approach to including the WordPress loop in themes, and in turn interacting with it via plugins.
• WordPress SEO Theme Guidelines (yoast.com)
  A quick list of Do's and Don'ts that theme developers should use to make their themes more SEO friendly.
• WordPress template part: a powerful tool (yoast.com)
  A quick tutorial on how to use WordPress template part functionality that was introduced in version 3.0.
• What should we make next? You choose! (elegantthemes.com)
  Elegant Themes asks it's users what should they build next.
• Releasing PlusOne Theme (templatic.com)
  
• StoreBox Theme for Creating Online Store (templatic.com)
  
• Nomadic: A Free Child Theme For Genesis (studiopress.com)
  
• Lifestyle 2.0 Child Theme Released (studiopress.com)
  

Plugins

• WordPress: 3 More Hidden Gems In The Jetpack Plugin Suite, & The WordPress App Is Updated! (makeuseof.com)
  A review of the JetPack plugin for WordPress.
• Front-end Editor Version 2.1 (scribu.net)
  This version integrates Aloha Editor, a rising star on the wysiwyg editor scene. Unlike other established editors like TinyMCE, it makes the content editable inline, rather than using an iframe, which means that all the theme styles are preserved.
• Members plugin beta testing (justintadlock.com)
  The main focus has been on making the current features work better and making the admin easier to use.
• How to Add a Subtitle to WordPress Post and Page Titles (wpmu.org)
  Using the Visual Subtitle plugin for WordPress you can add a simple text to be used anywhere in your theme. Makes it easy to have cool looking article headings.
• New Plugin to Style your Plugin on WordPress Admin with Default Styles! (wpengineer.com)
  It is important not to use your own styles in the admin area and use tags and classes of WordPress. This plugin makes it easy to see what classes you can use in one big page.
• WordPress Giveaway: Ultimate WordPress Administration Plugin (onextrapixel.com)
  Dev4Press gives away 3 lifetime standard plugin licenses to their plugin bundles.
• Gravity Forms v1.5.2.3 Released (gravityhelp.com)
  Gravity Forms v1.5.2.3 is now available. This is an important update that provides compatibility with changes introduced in the latest WordPress 3.2 beta which now includes jQuery v1.6.1.

Tutorials

• Understanding the Gallery Concept (ottopress.com)
  An excellent article on understanding the gallery concept and using it without installing any plugins.
• Create a Multi-Layout Portfolio with WordPress (net.tutsplus.com)
  Make use of custom post types, featured image and jQuery UI to create a portfolio page with multple layouts.
• Better Image Management With WordPress (smashingmagazine.com)
  A well written and comprehensive article on how to get the best out of working with images in WordPress. It talks about understanding and using images, managing image sizes, using featured images, creating galleries, using attachment pages, adding image data, creative attachment page uses and adding color palettes.
• Adding Google’s +1 Button to WordPress Sites (ottopress.com)
  Quick and easy way to add a Google +1 button to your site.
• Developing on WordPress using Git (markjaquith.wordpress.com)
  You can have your cake and eat it. There are several advantages to GIT vs. SVN and this is a great way to keep local branches in git but also commit to SVN when needed.