• Downloaded WordPress 3.2.1 from http://wordpress.org/download/ and extracted this in /Users/andij/Projects/wp-bootstrap/httpdocs/
• Gave it a url of wp-bootstrap.com (set 127.0.0.1 wp-bootstrap.com in my hosts file and then setup the vhost accordingly) as this url will be the final destination of the sample theme.
• Created a new database in mySQL called wp-bootstrap.
• Visited my new local development environment of wp-bootstrap.com and followed the config steps. All is well : )
• Copied the ‘twentyeleven’ theme, renamed it as ‘bootstrap’ then switched to it.
• Took a look at http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/upload/ to see what’s involved in creating a proper WordPress theme.
• Here http://codex.wordpress.org/Theme_Unit_Test there’s a list of things to do to setup the blog to enable comprehensive testing.

After importing the test-data.xml and adjusting the WordPress settings accordingly including the the Long and Short menus I decided to add an html comment to the top of each of the php files in the bootstrap theme . I did this to make it a little easier to pinpoint which file to edit from viewing the source. In Firebug. (Select the HTML menu flyout and choose ‘Show Comments’)

Add the bootstrap hotlink to the hosted stylesheet:
link rel="stylesheet" href="http://twitter.github.com/bootstrap/assets/css/bootstrap-1.1.1.min.css"

Starting point

For now, I’m going to leave the twentyeleven.css in place give me a helping hand (kinda like the feeling of walking hand in hand through a park in the autumn with a new love). I will however remove the reset css from the top of this file.

I will start at the top of the homepage and see what I fancy changing first.

Taking the menu from underneath the banner and placing it at the top and inheriting the bootstrap styles seems to be a good starting point.

Moving the search into the topbar which meant removing some default twentyeleven functionality which changed the position of the search if there’s the Display Text enabled or not.

Including #masthead from the docs.css from Bootstrap to emulate the same design made the look of the entire header and nav pretty sweet.

If you’re looking at this blog at the end of August 2011 then this is likely to be what you’re seeing right now.

During this process I often find myself using the same markup with the same class names, for example my pagination nearly always ends up exactly the same HTML and CSS with different styles. After a while I noticed a number of tricks and techniques were also being repeated. This included CSS to style buttons exactly the same if the markup used was an anchor, button or input. Then a number of styles to make the button appear disabled, negative, positive and neutral, then I’d usually include classes to make them large, medium and small.

Think in your mind that dreamy type of music to set the scene….

“Wouldn’t it be great if these techniques were available to implement at the beginning of a project with a way of modifying them to suit the design of the website I’m building them for.”

While this is still a distant “I may get round to doing something one day” thought. Along comes Bootstrap from Twitter. A set of tools put together by @mdo and @fat (from Twitter) which takes this concept by the short and curlies and provides a full set of amazingness, especially if the things I describe above are familiar to you.

A grid system, typography, lists, tables, forms, buttons, tabs, pagination, page messages, modals, tool-tips, popovers are all included, which is so amazingly comprehensive I am overwhelmed!

Wait, there’s more! ‘Really?’ I hear you say. No, there’s actually Less. Combining all this Bootstrap awesome with the power of Less is nothing short of genius. It would have been great without it but so so so much better as part of the deployment. You can get really funky with mixins and all that jazz.

As you can see, my blog is a bit of a shambles, with no styling of any note. It’s all because I like to tinker with the source code of my themes. I enjoy dipping into the world of WordPress every now and then as it feels more of a hobby than the java that I’m exposed to on a daily basis.

My intention is to implement Bootstrap from Twitter into a WordPress theme as it simply feels like the right thing to do, then make it available for download. Watch this space… Please get in contact (or comment on this post) if you have the same intentions and would like to help out and keep up the motivation to get something released pretty soon.

So I’ll get my shizzle out and create my desired implementation of Bootstrap into my WordPress theme and then and only then will I request it has a place in the themes section on wordpress.org.

As a first attempt to understand Bootstrap for Twitter I simply bolted the hotlink css into my existing theme and hey-presto, a new look website! -sweet-

See full post – Bootstrap from Twitter for WordPress

I’m currently knee deep into constructing and developing my WordPress theme in HTML5, CSS3 spiced up with a bunch of @media queries.

As I described in my previous post, I’m experimenting with a number of new technologies. I have started to build this framework for a WordPress theme which will showcase the power of CSS3 @media queries. So, while you’re here, scale your browser to see the different @media queries in action, and why not take a peek using your smartphone, or if you have one, your iPad. When you’re there, give it a twist and see what it looks like in portrait and landscape.

Funky EH! Right, I’m off to do a little more coding before going to visit my nephew, who’s celebrating his first birthday.

Using a raft of the latest tech plenty of testing and experimentation has been creeping it’s way into my daily routine. Armed with a laptop with two external screens, a couple of ‘standard (single screen)’ laptops and PCs accompanied with a small handful of smartphones and a tablet:

• Lenovo T500 – 1680×1050 – Windows 7
  • Dell P2210H 1080×1920 (portrait)
  • Dell P2210H 1920×1080 (landscape)
• Toshiba Tecra – 1024×768 – Ubuntu 10.04
• Dell Optiplex GX520 – 1280×1024 – Windows XP
• Apple iPad – 1024×768 – iOS 3.2.2
• Apple iPhone 3G – 320×480 – iOS 3.1.3
• HTC Desire HD – 480×800 – Andriod 2.2

These tools of the trade allow me to see my projects on many different devices, so, as a result I’m going to be using this blog as a testing area for a ground-up build of a wordpress blog incorporating a bunch of ideas. Many of which may fail, so if it’s spannered at any time you’ll know why.

So, first up is Elliot Jay Stocks‘ Starkers WordPress theme, this awesome bad-boy of a theme is right up my street as a web designer, it provides me with the bare-bones ‘naked’ theme for me to apply a bespoke design from scratch.

Couple that with the baddass HTML5 Boilerplate code, giving me access to the most top-notch tricks to get a full-on HTML5 website started off on the right foot.

Then….. An even awesomer revelation!! Aaron T. Grogg has got his shizzle out and performed an amalgamation of Starkers and Boilerplate in the form of a WordPress theme called Boilerplate: Starkers WordPress theme!.

I can hardly believe my eyes.. So much help and assistance out there on the interweb these days.. – love you guys -

THEN…. (Yup, it’s not over yet…) I scoot on over to Less Framework 3 and shave the CSS from here with all it’s @media queries. Providing me with a foundation for tailoring the theme to a number of different width layouts. I strip out the reset stuff as that exists in the Boilerplate theme by default. Rock on over to WordPress.org Child Themes and use this info to create myself a child theme of Boilerplate.

As a result, I end up with this wonderful baseline of a theme, all ready and waiting for me to apply my limited knowledge to. I’m certain that I’ll learn plenty from this process and expect to be able to apply this new found wealth to my lucky customers.

So, far, so good.. I’ll now evolve this theme steadily as I learn how to utilise all this wonderment.

To make it cool(harder) to get to, scan this QR-Code using your mobile phone QR Reader to visit the demo website:

This demo may well be short lived, so I can’t guarantee that it’ll be there in the future, but for now, give it a go.

I took the idea of “transform” and thought of a new butterfly emerging from it’s chrysalis, seeing as my mum is the Publicity Officer of the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Butterfly Conservation the idea sprung to mind. Having seen the bathCamp logo on the bathCamp Blog

bathCamp Logo

I thought it fitting to use some of the logo’s elements and colours, it fitted perfectly so now let’s hope that Stu likes it!

Both Stu and I are going to bathCamp this weekend to enjoy the company of the cool geeks in the south-west. It’s our first time doing this kid of thing, so it’s with open eyes and an open mind that we take with us to this event. We’re both looking forward to it and hope that our talk is going to be of use to some.