One of the biggest hurdles for many web designers and developers is trying to make sense of the process of going from a simple concept idea and turn it into a full blown interactive website. We’ve got this covered in an upcoming Design a Layout from Scratch training course on May 28th and 29th at WebDesign.com. This 5 hour (2-part) training webinar is available to members of WebDesign.com.

The Initial Idea

We will start with the initial concept of a “napkin idea” you might have. We will uncover what are some of the key things to be thinking about when even before you begin designing the site. By starting at this initial state, you can get the foundation for your entire development process off on the right direction.

Integrating the Wireframe

There is a huge benefit of moving through a wireframe process before you get into the actual design and mockup stage. We will discover the many benefits of wireframe work with clients as well as look at some quality tools that you can start using today.

Fleshing out the Design

Before we even touch any theme code or some customization to WordPress, we need to have a method of fleshing out the design of the site. Having the flexibility of an image editor at your disposal it makes building the color palette and other exact necessary measurements available to you immediately.

Bringing the Idea to WordPress with Builder

Finally, we will walk through the process of what it takes to bring the site idea into WordPress using the Builder theme. We will walk through the steps of constructing the exact layouts as well as styling the site in CSS.

This course is open for registration for all members of WebDesign.com at http://webdesign.com/schedule. If you would like to attend this training and also gain access to over 500+ hours of recorded training in the WebDesign.com library, you can learn more about WebDesign.com on our informational front page.

Are you ready for a comprehensive course to help you get off the starting blocks and into the journey of building sites with WordPress? We’ve got an exciting course coming that addresses this specific need here at WebDesign.com, June 11–13, 2013.

Start learning how to get WordPress to work for you instead of you having to labor over WordPress methodology. In this course, attendees will receive a solid foundation from which to base their skill when working with WordPress.

Several of the topics that will be covered in this multi-day event are:

• What REALLY is WordPress? Understanding the relationship between PHP and MySQL … that WordPress is essentially a “pretty face” for a MySQL database.
  June 11th @ 1pm – Reserve your seat now
• The history of the POST and the difference from a PAGE. By understanding where WordPress came from we can understand why everything is a “post” in WordPress. We will also learn about hiearchy, taxonomies, and ordering.
  June 11th @ 3pm – Reserve your seat now
• Setup WordPress with minimal fuss. Learn the necessary (and sometimes hidden) options you need to set in order to work with WordPress.
  June 11th @ 5pm – Reserve your seat now
• Cracking the mystery of themes while getting loopy. By understanding how different theme pages have built-in hierarchy, and how template tags dictate how content is displayed, you will understanding theme construction. Also learn the basics of the WordPress Loop and how it works so that you will be better prepared to customize any WordPress theme.
  June 12th @ 1pm – Reserve your seat now
• Working with images. The WordPress Media Library can be both useful and frustrating. Learn how to make the best use of this built-in resource.
  June 12th @ 3pm – Reserve your seat now
• Extend WordPress. Learn the differences and rationals between using a theme’s functions.php file and using a plugin to extend WordPress.
  June 12th @ 5pm – Reserve your seat now
• Menu and Widget Freedom Learn how to use the WordPress menu system to create useful navigation systems for your site. By learning that WordPress widgets are nothing more than tupperware containers that hold ‘stuff’, it can free up restrictions you feel WordPress has placed on you.
  June 13th @ 1pm – Reserve your seat now
• Managing Users. The capabilities of managing users can be unnecessarily confusing but through this session attendees will learn how to take advantage of WordPress user roles and how this can expand the capabilities of different sites.
  June 13th @ 3pm – Reserve your seat now
• Building with Builder. The final session will show how much easier it is to work with WordPress when using iThemes Builder because of Layouts, Views, Extensions, duplication and more.
  June 13th @ 5pm – Reserve your seat now

We’ll be rolling out more information soon, so make sure to mark your calendars for June 11-13!

See the schedule

There are hundreds (if not thousands) of WordPress slider plugins available to choose from that range from simple free image sliders to complex and robust premium content sliders. So why would anyone want to BYOP (Build Your Own Plugin) their own slider? In this two-day class, we will discover the answer to that question while building the Slider Reboot WordPress plugin. But here are some hints…

Control what you want your plugin to do

While it is true you have tons of options for WordPress sliders, having the ability to control exactly what information and data is needed for your plugin and control exactly how that slider will look in your WordPress theme is a true mark of a quality developer. The best site that a client can receive from a developer is a site that does exactly what they want it to do… no more, no less. So learning how to deliver that capability is vital to anyone who wants to take their freelance development career to the next level.

Learn how a plugin is constructed

During this training we will dig into the necessary functions to create our Slider Reboot plugin and how to connect the functionality through WordPress hooks and filters. We will build a Custom Post Type to store the slider information and then build a WordPress shortcode to allow us to place our created Slider Reboot slider into any post or widget. We will also incorporate a simple admin area settings panel to control the look and feel of the plugin.

Add a new tool to your toolbox

Most web developers and freelancers have a certain skill set. Those skills might contain the ability to work in HTML, CSS, PHP, jQuery, MySQL, WordPress, Themes, etc. Adding that capability of building custom WordPress plugins adds a vital skill level to your quiver of development arrows. Having the option of billing for custom work can raise your earning potential over just being able to modify other people’s code.

Join us for this intensive two-day training event as we build our own Slider Reboot plugin. Signup on the WebDesign.com Event Schedule page.

Due to a scheduling conflict, the Members Only Chat previously scheduled for Tuesday, May 7th at 2pm (Central) has been moved to Friday, May 10th at 11am (Central).

I always get a little excited when I’m adding new courses to the LIVE schedule here at WebDesign.com. And today I’m happy to announce another slate of live classes that will be taught by one of our regular guest instructor, Nathan Ingram. Head on over to the WebDesign.com Course Schedule page to read more about the upcoming courses that Nathan will be teaching and to reserve your seat. Here’s a quick summary of some of those courses.

• Supercharging WordPress Search - April 24, 2013 – Wed.11am (CDT)
  The default WordPress search is a lot like a fast food hamburger. It’s ok, but there are better options available. In this webinar, Nathan will explain some changes you can make to default WordPress search to narrow down your results, and also make recommendations on several plugins that will replace it altogether.
• Evernote for Web Developers - April 29, 2013 – Monday 1pm (CDT)
  Evernote is a powerful information management tool that should be part of every web developer’s arsenal. In this webinar, Nathan will explain the whys and hows of using Evernote to manage information and projects in a web development business.
• Pretty WordPress Menus (without a plugin) - May 06, 2013 – Mon. 1pm (CDT)
  The menu builder in WordPress makes creating your own hierarchical drop down menus simple. But in many themes, menus are basic or ugly. In this webinar, Nathan will use some simple CSS techniques to show you how to spice up your WordPress menus… without a plugin.
• Contact Pages That Don’t Stink - May 13, 2013 – Monday 1pm (CDT)
  Practically every web site has a contact page, and most of them are basic, bland, and boring. In this webinar, Nathan will offer some principles of effective contact page design, give some examples of well-conceived contact pages, and demonstrate how to implement some of these ideas on a Builder site.

Nathan also has a bunch more classes on the schedule and I encourage you to sign up now. To learn more about Nathan and his background with WordPress development, you can follow him on his blog at http://nathaningram.com/.

Read more about the upcoming WordPress Developer Course.