This week kicked off with a presentation at WordPress Developers New Haven hosted by Sandra Christie of M Squared Web Design. It was a pleasure to present to a group of WordPress enthusiasts and hopefully spread some knowledge. At one point our conversation turned to one of my favorite topics – becoming a WordPress developer. This has been something that I have been trying to pursue for the past year or so. Unfortunately there aren’t any ‘classes’ you can take in WordPress per se, so I’ve been trying to create my own curriculum. Therefore I was thrilled when Smashing Magazine posted an article on “Becoming a Top WordPress Developer”…even moreso because I had been already trying to incorporate some of the author’s techniques. Here are my roundups for the this week:
- Become a Top WordPress Developer (Smashing Magazine) – This is pretty much the article I’ve been waiting for – outlining a course of action to become a top WordPress developer. What to do, who to follow, etc.
- Using Genesis Connect for WooCommerce – I had to use this reference for a site I am working on. I have run into issues with Genesis before because so much of their theme is controlled by hooks and filters. Sometimes it’s difficult to manipulate the theme the way you want.
- Underscores: A Starter Theme for WordPress - I haven’t had a chance to play around with this yet, but I’m always looking for cleanly coded base templates to create WordPress themes off of. Increasingly clients are demanding responsive themes which makes it more challenging from a design perspective. Fortunately a lot of starter themes like Underscores are cropping up that help speed up this process.
- 14 Essential WordPress Development and Design Cheat Sheets - I’m giving a presentation in September at Hudson Valley WordPress Meetup Group and came across this while starting my outline. This list contains cheat sheet for basic WordPress theme development.
- Creating a Responsive, Mobile-First WordPress Theme – Another great article from the fine folks at Smashing Magazine detailing the process for creating a responsive WordPress theme. I have been running into issues with a theme I’m currently working on, and this has been an excellent resource.