Sandbox Development and Consulting Inc.

url: http://www.hiphopwired.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• jQuery programming
• XHTML/CSS programming/cleanup
• WordPress theme creation
• Custom PHP programming
• Ning Integration

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, PHP, Ning

front end:

The client had worked with an outside designer to create all the page views (graphics and XHTML/CSS). The only front end work I did for this project was to put together a basic Ning theme for the Ning forums as well as to put together the code for the featured stories.

back end:

This site has a number of custom plugins, widgets, admin panels, and customized loops. I wanted to focus on giving the client the ability to change and manipulate as much content as possible without touching any of the WordPress theme files so I ended up building a number of admin panels to control the featured stories, ads, media, etc. The templates for this site are some of the most complicated I have ever created but make the content management very easy for the site admins.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

I had worked with this client in the past and it is great to see them add another exciting site to their portfolio.

Lucidity Catalog is an easy to use, intuitive WordPress theme that is highly customizable by any level of user. Lucidity Catalog has all the functions and features of Lucidity – with the addition of a “catalog” feature. Lucidity Catalog is perfect for people that are looking for an easy to use, set up, and maintain catalog on their blog within their content management system. This theme also supports threaded comments and sidebar widgets by default.

Simplicity is King

Sometimes setting up a eCommerce site or plugin is over the top, too complicated, or just too involved for people. With Lucidity Catalog – you can easily set up your own catalog or store using WordPress categories and a few custom fields. You can offer a store on your web site in a matter of minutes by following these simple five steps:

1. Create Your Store or Catalog Category. Create a category within WordPress that you want to use for your store or catalog. You can just use one master category or you can create sub categories as well to offer several “types” of products.
   

   Create the Category

2. Select your Store or Catalog Category. Go to the Lucidity Catalog Settings and choose your category.
   

   Select Your Category

3. Create a Post Announcing or Highlighting Your Product. Create a post that highlights your product and add in the extra information that will be used for the store or catalog view.
   

   Create a Post

4. Categorize Your Post/Product. Add your product to either the store or catalog category or one of the sub categories.
   

   Categorize

5. Sit Back and Enjoy. Simply view your store or catalog category and you will see everything dynamically put into place as soon as you add a new post within that category.

You can see this in action by checking out the demo catalog: http://themes.sandboxdev.com/lucidity-catalog/category/catalog/ or by seeing a customized version: http://www.sandboxdev.com/category/blog/wordpress/wordpress-commercial-themes/

Support

Support is available at the SDAC Inc. Forums

Demo!

You can demo this theme: http://themes.sandboxdev.com/lucidity-catalog

Purchase!

This theme is available for purchase: Buy Theme ($75.00)

*This theme is licensed under the GPL license.

Lucidity is an easy to use, intuitive WordPress theme that is highly customizable by any level of user. Lucidity is perfect for people that are looking for a minimal clean lines layout with minimal code for fast page loads all while having the ability to control content and layout using the admin. This theme also supports threaded comments and sidebar widgets by default.

Take Control!

After building over one hundred custom WordPress themes – we decided to put together something that the majority of our clients wanted: the ability to control basic settings like colors, fonts, adding external code, etc to their site without having to touch the templates, know CSS, or mess with the .htaccess file.

Changing The Appearance is Fun!

We all love options. With Lucidity – you can easily change the look and feel of your site by selecting one of the several options available in the admin.

Simply select the font you want to use on your site in the drop down menu, save the selection, and reload your site to see the changes.

Fonts

Now you can customize your site – with your own preferences without having to know CSS or pay a designer to change it for you.

Colors

Changing colors is something that most people love to do, but get frustrated with CSS. With the easy to use point and click color picker – simply point to the color you want, save the option and your web site will use the newly selected color.

Say goodbye to editing the CSS file and looking up the color codes for the colors you want to use.

Feedburner Is Easy

If you use Feedburner – you can copy and paste your custom Feedburner URL into the Feedburner field and all your readers who want to subscribe to your RSS feed will be directed to your Feedburner URL.

No more need to edit your .htaccess file, add a plugin, or do anything more than a simple copy and paste.

Follow Me With My Social Network Links

If you are like most people – you want to share your social networking site links like your LinkedIn Profile, your Facebook page, and your Twitter feed. With Lucidity – you can easily do so by copying and pasting your social networking sites into the admin.

Show all your sites easily in the header of your site without having to upload images, edit template files, or add in any other special code.

Stats Please

Companies like Google and Quantcast make it easy to track your web site’s stats. Simply copy and paste the code they give you into the admin and it will be automatically be added to each page, post, attachment, etc page in your site.

No plugins or messing with templates required.

Support

Support is available at the SDAC Inc. Forums

Demo!

You can demo this theme: http://themes.sandboxdev.com/lucidity

Purchase!

This theme is available for purchase: Buy Theme ($50.00)

Looking for a simple catalog solution? Check out our Lucidity Catalog Theme.

url: Mutiple TIME Inc. Blogs (See Below)

• http://swampland.blogs.time.com
• http://tunedin.blogs.time.com
• http://china.blogs.time.com
• http://mideast.blogs.time.com
• http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com
• http://workinprogress.blogs.time.com
• http://nerdworld.blogs.time.com
• http://lookingaround.blogs.time.com

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS programming
• Moveable Type to WordPress Migration
• WordPress theme
• Custom PHP programming

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, Moveable Type, WordPress, WordPress.com (Hosting), PHP

front end:

I used the existing TIME Inc. Moveable Type templates for the sites above and from those I created WordPress templates that would display everything so that the readers would not know there was any difference on the backend.

back end:

The templates are used across multiple TIME Inc. blogs and have custom functionality that allows them to be flexible enough for customizations across the sites.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

Creating a theme that would be used on several sites took some creative thinking and careful execution. This was an interesting and fun migration. (WordPress VIP hosting migrated the data).

url: http://www.protegek9.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS/JS programming
• Custom graphic design
• Custom web design
• WordPress theme customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, JS, WordPress , PHP

front end:

The client approached me with a blank slate. I put together the color scheme, layout, and graphics. The site needed to be clean, masculine, and easy to navigate. The client plans to have 50+ pages on the site so they also wanted drop down menus.

back end:

In order to make this as easy to use as possible for the client, I made use of a number of WordPress functions so that they could control the site for the most part by working in the WordPress admin. All the content on the site can easily be manipulated by using the WordPress admin. The menus are dynamically be generated from WordPress pages (any new pages will be added as soon as they are created, same goes for any deleted pages) and make use of custom menu CSS and javascript in place. The site is set up to use sidebar widgets so the clients can easily add new functionality as the site grows. The site also uses the “blog” functionality for their news section.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

The front page image was created inhouse by a talented graphic designer that does some work for me. He took four separate images of dogs in different settings/lighting and cut them out so they could be placed on one background and I think he did a great job!

url: http://travelfootprints.ca/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS programming
• WordPress theme customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress , PHP, CSS

front end:

The client came to me after purchasing a news theme (Remix) and wanted some customizations (colors, layout) and added logic.

back end:

I added in a lot of custom logic to dynamically control the header image which changes on per category, and also custom logic to the sidebar so the client can easily add related links and have them show up dynamically per category. I added some custom plugins to take care of these issues as well as the images on the homepage. All the customizations make it easier for the client to control the output of content while using WordPress’s admin.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

It is wonderful to be able to travel as much as this client did – I look forward to seeing their upcoming trips documented!

url: http://topspinmedia.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS programming
• WordPress theme customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress , PHP, CSS

front end:

The client came with a basic layout and all the artwork finished and wanted to me to build a WordPress theme out of it. The layout is very clean and minimal which I really enjoy.

back end:

This was a very straightforward build – no fancy custom functionality – but I was able to help out with some of the Apache difficulties they were having which was a fun change of pace.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

Working with the people at Topspin was a great experience and I look forward to reading their blog.

url: http://www.tamradaviscookingshow.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS programming
• Custom web design
• WordPress theme customization
• Custom WordPress plugins

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress , PHP

front end:

The client approached me wanting a very simple interface that would allow people to focus on her content. She wanted something that would be dynamic and easy to maintain so all content areas of the site are editable by using the WordPress admin.

back end:

The client also wanted an easy way to combine different posts to create a “master” post (the show) so her viewers could see a lot of content without taking up a lot of room on the page. Because of this – I used AJAX to show/hide content with an accordion in the “shows” section. I then created a custom plugin to tie in multiple posts in the “show” section.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

The shows and recipes are great and I look forward to the cookbook!

url: http://www.chicagosportstalk.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

• XHTML/CSS programming
• Custom web design
• bbPress theme customization
• WordPress MU theme customization
• WordPress MU and bbPress plugins customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress Mu, PHP, CSS, bbPress

front end:

The client approached me wanting a grey and red three column design and I put the rest together. This site is going to be loaded with image posts so the themes for bbPress and WordPress needed to be minimal and non-distracting to the content. The client also wanted something that would be easily customized per blog in the future so I put together a theme that would be easy to modify in the future to only require a few changes for a new color scheme. The theme for the WordPress Mu site and the bbPress site use the same basic CSS so global updates are also easy and quick.

back end:

This project uses bbPress for the forums and then is integrated with WordPress Mu for a single sign on solution. There are plugins used in both bbPress and WordPress Mu to tie the two sites together as well as to aggregate content between sites.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

We are based in Chicago and love Chicago sports and we look forward to following the news and stories that come out of this site!

url: http://www.boldcareer.com/blog

SDAC Inc. provided:

• Custom web design
• XHTML/CSS programming
• WordPress theme
• WordPress plugins

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, PHP

front end:

The client wanted to create something that tied into his web site (boldcareer.com, but also make the blog distinguishably different so that it stood out. The client found a header image he liked (the fish) and I used that in combination with the newsletter signup and the master site navigation (left side nav) to create a blog theme that worked for this site. Other than the custom header, the client knew exactly what he wanted and it was just a matter of me implementing it for him.

back end:

This theme uses WordPress widgets so that the client can easily add more and change the existing sidebar content. There is not too much fancy about the backend. The client had a list of plugins he wanted installed for added functionality so most of the client ’s needs were taken care of by existing plugins.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

It is always nice to work with someone who knows what they want, and what is available to them. This is a great blog!