Tag Archives: projects

CCAS Website: Another work in progress

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For the past couple weeks I’ve put my own website overhaul on the back burner to design and develop another site for CCAS (Cloud Computing Advisory Services). Using WordPress for the CMS, I killed one of it’s default themes and resurrected it as a child them for the CCAS design.

This has been one of the most fun web development projects I’ve worked on so far. I’ve mostly had total control over the design except for the usual obstacles like the kind of content and the amount of content, but it’s been no problem so far compared to what I get to do along the way.

Except for my own site (the blog part), this is the first chance I’ve had to play with all the new HTML5 elements and CSS3 selectors and the possibilities that now don’t seem so far off. My favorite thing to make it into common web development over the past year has to be the @font-face web type stuff. As a designer that’s worked mostly on the print side of marketing & design for the last couple decades, the ability to choose fonts other than Arial, Courier, Helvetica, Geneva and Verdana has given me a reason to live! I’ve played with several on my own site but really had a chance to explore on the CCAS (Cloud Computing Advisory Services) project.

Since the site is still a work in progress, I’ll follow up with what I’ve learned along the way when I’m closer to the end of the job. Learning how to make WordPress 3 work for me is what I’m spending most of my time on with this project, and a few of the things I’ve been able to do with functions and templates may be worth mentioning. I had a hard time finding information about WP functions and template tags when I ran into problems getting them to perform the way I wanted, so I may cover some of those topics when it’s over.

That’s all for now. Back to the drawing board.

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Crazy Times & Trying to Keep Up

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The last three weeks have been super nuts; I haven’t had two free minutes to do any updates or upload any new graphics, it’s taken all I have to keep up the pace.

Starting with a small marketing design project after several weeks with nothing to do at all, the projects and issues just snowballed. Right up until I started getting paying gigs again I had been working on Cindy’s chopper, finishing fabrication of the frame and some of it’s components, hoping to get it on the road this summer.
In the middle of my new project, we became victims of Comcast’s evil plans to go totally digital, forcing us to upgrade and pay thriple for the service, as well as screwing up our Internet connection for several days.
While this was all happening I have also decided to take on a little pro bono project for an iPhone/iPad app developer just because I like the app and he needed some help. I’ll explain this in detail later when I can talk more about it.
In addition to those projects I have been working on a prototype backrest for my own motorcycle which I finally wrapped up last weekend and did a little R&D this week.
Finally, a friend with a local shop referred a customer to me yesterday for a minor motorcycle repair job on a H-D Softail.

So, over the last couple weeks I’ve fabricated motorcycle parts, set up all new cable connections and installed a new digital cable box, new modem, new router, and rewired half the house to get connected, designed some marketing materials, designed an iPhone app icon and launch page, designed and fabricated an adjustable backrest for my bike, and repaired a customer’s bike. One thing I can say for certain is that it hasn’t been boring!

This entire time however, I’ve been staring at a folder full of really cool photos I took back in March that I’ve been dying to add to my free grahics on the website. I just haven’t been able to get to it.
My goal for the weekend is to process at least a handful of the photos and post for everyone to download. Look for at least a couple new ones tomorrow and maybe a few more on Sunday unless things go completely sideways on me over the next couple days, which has been known to happen!

I’m also planning to post some progress pics of the Sportster as well as the backrest prototype. If all goes well, I’ll have those online by Sunday.

Until then, have a happy happening, keep the rubber on the road and your mouse on the pad!
- J