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WordPress merit badges

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Sometimes I come up with silly ideas and then run with it. Today was one of those days. Someone said something, this lead to more, and my brain blurted out that it would be really neat if their were WordPress achievement badges, like you get in Girl Guides & Cub Scouts.

And then I cracked open my sketchbook because I am old school like that and prefer an actual writing implement to draw with. Here’s the ones I came up with, and their descriptions. How many have you earned? 😉

WordPress logo – earned by successfully installing WordPress manually, under 5 minutes.

Mu – for installing WordPress MU, or multisite (networks).

X – for editing the Codex usefully.

puzzle piece – for writing a plugin and hosting it in the repo

Screenshot – for creating a theme

Tent – for organizing a WordCamp

BP – anything Buddypress. 😀 Using it, writing for it…

Paw print – for working in trac, submitting tickets, and patches

Matt – the “I met Matt!” badge. Must include photo for verification.

SQL Diver – for diving into the database

Troll – the anti-matt troll badge. Given in rare cases, limited amounts. (actually, this is the only DE-merit)

Server – the server management badge.

Not shown:
the badge for bringing a friend over from Blogger to WordPress
being a Wordcamp attendee or speaker (airplane!)
being on WordPress TV
the GPL badge. Icon of grape kool-aid. (’nuff said)
a $ badge if you’re a WP freelancer earning a living

What other ones could there be?

Disclaimer: I just came up with the idea as a joke, because it’s funny. Tho the positive ones would be awesome if they really did exist. Alas, while my sewing skills are good, this would involve embroidery. 😉

If anyone decides to crack open Illustrator and make ones for blog sidebars, I would LOVE to see them! 😀

More suggestions:
– tshirt collector. Can you go a week wearing nothing but WordPress shirts?
– easy one for the noobs, 100 posts.
– book author
– dog food 😉
– dev chat participant

Simple Menus

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Andrea & I have been working with the Genesis Theme Framework since it was in alpha. In fact, the theme on this site is Genesis and a customized version of Delicious. To date, I have mostly been working on GenesisBuddy (BuddyPress support for Genesis & Genesis child themes).

Over the summer, the folks at StudioPress have been releasing plugins to extend the functionality of Genesis. A couple weeks ago we were having coffee with Rebecca and she mentioned that another handy plugin for Genesis would be a menu plugin like Genesis Simple Sidebars. Since I agreed that would be a handy plugin, I wrote one that would do just that.

Without further ado, we are please to announce the release of Genesis Simple Menus. Appropriately, Simple Menus’s home page will be at StudioPress among the other Genesis plugins.

WP eBooks launch

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Well, it was time to pull the trigger – today we’re launching a new site of ours, WP eBooks. Right now, there’s two plugins with accompanying e-books for sale. Both are pretty awesome. Our aim is to provide high-quality specialized plugins with extensive documentation and intense support. We plan on adding more in the near future and hopefully highlighting e-books relating to WordPress from other vendors. Since the domain name is similar to an existing product, we also added a section on the home page linking back to wpebook.com from Kyle Eslick, which will hopefully eliminate any confusion between the two.

The site itself is a single WordPress installation running BuddyPress for the private support forums. I did use some custom slugs. We’re also using the Genesis Theme Framework and the upcoming version of Genesis Buddy.

Montreal Wrap Up

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Did you hear we had the bestest time in Montreal? We had bagels, we walked *everywhere*, we met loads of awesome people and I got to practice my horrible French.  Oh, I did a presentation too. For some reason, I was the only person in that time slot. I spoke on what is probably now my go-to session, Domain Mapping in 3.0. In the awesome words of Matt himself on public speaking, “Know your material cold,” and this one I do.

Which was good, as for some reason the Montreal version of my talk was not on my netbook, just the one I had used in Chicago. Also, this was probably the most fun I have ever had on stage. Someone tweeted that it seemed like a stand-up routine, but they meant that in a good way. 😉 So did I. My daughter also heckled me from the audience. (That’s okay, I made her wave to everyone.)

I know someone was videotaping it and I hope it makes it online, as it rocked. If and when I get a link, I’ll include it here. Montreal: A++, would WordCamp again.

(image courtesy of elidir on flickr)

Network Plugins

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At WordCamp Montreal, August 28-29, 2010, my session was Tweaking plugins to be 3.0 Network-Compatible which was a live coding demo. The plugin that I chose to use for this was AdServe which has not been updated in over 2 1/2 years. You can download my updated version with all the edits from the presentation: [download#1]

Huge thanks go out to @Digibomb, @JeremyClarke & @cafenoirdesign for an awesome job of organizing the event.

(Photo credit: Alexa Clark)

Redesign

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Finally, our new design is live! Built on the Genesis Framework from StudioPress and designed by Rebecca Diamond, who took my vague ideas and ran with it. Even though this is the third design of the site, this time it really suits us and conveys the feeling we wanted to express: one of warmth and friendliness, yet still professional. Plus it feels like home to us, with details similar to our living space.

Our strong suit is code and education. We thought for our own site, we’d leave the design work for those far more talented than ourselves.

(photo credit: R & G Diamond)