Guimikko

New look, new platform, new concept, blog, Twitter, Facebook-page...I even made my logo smaller! The old look and concept was already over a year old na in internet time that's almost an eternity. Not that there was anything wrong with the old one, but this major overhaul has been brewing in my mind since spring. I wanted something that would serve potential customers and fellow designers better and have them even participate. And would also promote my own talent better and more strongly.

What did it take? I chose open source framework Joomla! as the platform, because I thought it fit this concept spot on. Or more precisely, the Joomla! extensions in this case:
Joomfish for multilingual content
Ninja Shadowbox for them awesome ways to pop up images and other content
Social Widgets for those Facebook and Twitter share thingies - and yeah, it allows a few others, too
Neolatestnews for latest posts on the front page, as it gives more control knobs than Joomla's own equivalent block
Jcomments for commenting these blog posts
Ninja RSS Syndicator for RSS-feeds, because it too has decent amount of control knobs
JForms for contact forms, just because it is ridiculously easy and quick
MAMP for...I'm a Mac user...MAMP to run Apache and mySQL locally while building and testing the site before migrating to the actual server

Now you're probably wondering, why ready made thingies, instead of self made, since I think I'm so good at this...you've heard the saying "No point reinventing the wheel over and over again" have you? That's right, saves time and nerves. That wouldn't work out too well either, if maintaining my own site took more time than client work. Not even my dear spouse would like that. Doesn't mean that I wouldn't edit, stab and poke around php code and mySQL databases to have them bend on my will though. At times you have to, because the other guy hasn't thought everything my way, which in this case, of course, is the only way. On some other case it would not be, but this is my case. I am the customer, designer, maker, compiler, translator, photoshop monkey, code monkey, super web master guru ad nauseum. And because that's how tough guys do.

Another great thing about these open source systems and extensions, is that they are constantly being developed and updated. The user base and developer base are so vast, that these systems won't be left out in the cold, even if for one reason or another, the developer or maker could continue the project themselves anymore.

On top of everything else, this has taken coffee...mmm...coffee...time, tuning, tweaking, time and a few hundred lines of css, to have everything look exactly as it should, and not as if it was done by some semi-skilled individual. Yep, feel free to look around that css, borrow and steal even, since I'm such a good guy. And because that's what good guys do. Kind of impossible to keep those hidden anyway and if you understand something in it and it helps you and/or teaches you a thing or two, well great. In that case I'd appreciate something like commenting, recommendations, linking to this site, mentioning...the actual graphics and image files on the other hand are not fair game. Sorry. Those you need to do yourself, if you call yourself a designer. I did them myself, too. Besides, stealing them is an ugly thing to do. And because that's not how good guys do.

I won't go into any further technical details and solutions here, since they have their own place. In the future I'll be showcasing some of these tricks and gimmicks, so if you are interested, add this blog on your bookmarks, or even better, subscribe to an RSS feed. Or both! Also, keep an eye on Facebook and Twitter.