Luckily for WordPress bloggers there are a couple of plugins that let you set up such a solution, allowing you to serve your CSS, JavaScripts, pictures etc, from CDN:s like Amazon or Google.

W3 Total Cache is a great plugin that helps you improve your site´s preformance and also set up a way of serving only some of your files through these types of network.

• Mirror
• Mirror: NetDNA / MaxCDN
• Rackspace Cloud Files
• Amazon CloudFront
• Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3)
• Self-hosted / File Transfer Protocol Upload

Of all the options of improving speed on your WordPress hosting, using a CDN is most likely the most effective way. Good luck! This impatience with “non-speedy” technology reminds me of this video;

Theme Selection

In this post there are number of classic magazine style themes that, eventhough featured in numerous of similar posts like this, simply cannot be excluded. There are also a couple of more recent additions to the community. Enjoy!

Infinity

• Info
• Download

Arthemia

• Demo
• Download

The Morning After

• Demo
• Download

Newspress

• Demo
• Download

Aparatus

• Demo
• Download

Kazza

• Demo
• Download

Fantics

• Demo
• Download

DesignPile

• Demo
• Download

Mimbo

• Demo
• Download

Metamorphosis

• Demo
• Download

Premium News

• Demo
• Download

TheLatest

• Demo
• Download

myMag

• Demo
• Download

IsoTherm

• Demo
• Download

Home

1. home.php
2. index.php

Single Posts

1. single-{posttype}.php
2. single.php
3. index.php

Pages

1. {pagename}.php (custom template)
2. page-{slug}.php
3. page-{id}.php
4. page.php
5. index.php

Category

1. category-{slug}.php
2. category-{id}.php
3. category.php
4. archive.php
5. index.php

Taxonomy

1. taxonomy-{taxonomy}-{term}.php
2. taxonomy-{taxonomy}.php
3. taxonomy.php
4. archive.php
5. index.php

Tag

1. tag-{slug}.php
2. tag-{id}.php
3. tag.php
4. archive.php
5. index.php

Date

1. date.php
2. archive.php
3. index.php

Archive

1. archive.php
2. index.php

Attachment

1. {MIME_type}.php (text.php, image.php, audio.php, video.php)
2. attachment.php
3. single.php
4. index.php

Author

1. author-{nicename}.php
2. author-{id}.php
3. author.php
4. archive.php
5. index.php

Search

1. search.php
2. index.php

404

1. 404.php
2. index.php

Graphics and info taken from the WordPress codex.

Custom Taxonomies

With version 3.0 WordPress took a giant step towards becoming more of a full blown CMS. Introducing custom taxonomies, WordPress is no longer limited to categories and tags. There are many great guides on how to implement your own taxonomies out there, such as this one, so I won´t go into details on how to. Now the only thing missing in my book is getting better editing capabilities for taxonomy pages. Currently there is a field to put text in, that can be called by <?php echo category_description(); ?> – No HTML without hacks…

Why use category pages?

The most common option is to use a mix posts and pages, where static content is represtented by pages and news content by posts. This is fine for most websites but if you´re looking to build something where you want content to be structured into topical hierarchies, then you need to look towards different taxonomy pages to represent your static content.

Template customization needed

Say for example that you have a website about Vehicles where you want a landing page set up for Racing Cars. On top of that you want to be able to associate different news flash content with this landing page, i e you want to list related news items somewhere on this landing page for racing cars.

The hierarchy might look something like this:

Vehicles > Cars > Racing Cars

Vehicles > Cars > Racing Cars > Ford Racer X10

For this type of setup the Racing Cars page would be a category page and the Ford Racer X10 page either a single post or a custom post.

Now let´s say you have a landing page for motorcycles like this:

Vehicles > Motorcycles

First off, in order to fit into the previously built category hierarchy, being primarily a landing page with static content it still needs to be a taxonomy-page of some sort. Rather than a static page. Now, let´s say you want the Motorcycles landing page layout to be different than the Cars landing page. In that case the you´d need a custom template for one of them:

category-motorcycle.php

The easiest way to create this custom template is to copy the content of the category.php or archive.php (whichever you are using), into a new file called category-{slug}.php and then start customizing from there.

If you are using an earlier version of WordPress, then you might need to use category-{ID}.php instead of the {slug}.

The bottom line

I´d like the next steps in the WordPress evolution to be, as mentioned previously, better editing capabilities for taxonomy-pages and on top of that template inheritage. Say what? Well, it would be very neat to out of the box have the ability to create a custom template and then optionally have all the child categories (or whatever taxonomy) automatically inherit its parent template. All in all I believe that “page”-pages and category pages needs to merge their functionality into one flexible “page”-type.

But still…

With a little hacking and tweaking all this stuff is already possible within WordPress. So, using WordPress as a CMS is already a good option. For a number of reasons – most of them beyond the scope of this blog post. Happy tweaking!

Tales From The Crypt (1989)

A classic HBO series that rocked a classic opening title sequence. Typical scary music plays as the camera sweeps through the graveyard, into the house and up the stairs. The big climax comes about a minute into the opening sequence when the iconic Crypt Keeper pops out of his coffin and shrieks with fiendish delight. It may not look so impressive now, but back in the day? This was a groundbreaking opening sequence for HBO.

Watch Intro

The Sopranos (1999)

The Sopranos opening title sequence still stands as one of the most famous of all time. Abstract, random but strangely mesmerizing … the opening sequence mirrors the themes of the show. The song that plays (Woke Up This Morning by A3) as Tony Soprano drives from NYC to New Jersey became infamous, and was even sampled for a Jay-Z rap. The ominous nature of the lyrics (“woke up this morning, got myself a gun”) set the tone for the violent and unpredictable nature of The Sopranos.

Watch intro

Six Feet Under (2001)

Six Feet Under is Alan Ball’s brilliant series about a family of undertakers, life and death in LA. Using color-washed images of toe tags, embalming fluid, graveyards and finally a huge tree… Six Feet Under’s opening sequence creatively demonstrates what happens when you die, from a literal perspective.

Watch intro

Treme (2010)

From the images and music for the opening sequence of Treme, the audience immediately gets the impression music and New Orleans are inextricably linked. The title credits juxtapose shots of musical instruments and musicians with the horrors of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Ending with the poisonous mold that consumes the lives of so many characters in the show.

Watch intro

The Wire (2002)

For each of the five seasons of The Wire, HBO chose a new opening title to reflect that season’s themes. Whether it was a look at Baltimore’s drug trade from the streets, the point-of-view of the police, or journalists, The Wire’s opening credits always featured a bluesy song accompanied by images of the day-to-day jobs of those being profiled that season.

Watch intro

Carnivale (2003)

An HBO show that ended far too soon, Carnivale dealt with religious fervor and national panic in the dark days of the Great Depression. A deck of tarot cards falls into the sand, while lush images of the tarot deck’s characters interact with one another, foretelling the mystery and magic that Carnivale offered up each week. The tarot cards are intercut with images of the Dust Bowl era (KKK, Stalin, Babe Ruth, etc) to set a tone of desperation. The opening sequence for Carnivale won an Emmy for the creative design team of A52.

Watch intro

Entourage (2004)

Entourage is an HBO show about dudes living the good life in Hollywood, what better way to kick that off each week than a rocking song (Jane Addiction’s “Super Hero”) coupled with the guys driving through town in an amazing car (1965 Lincoln Continental). The names of the show’s stars are emblazoned on LA’s most famous signs.

Watch intro

True Blood (2008)

True Blood is another Alan Ball series with creative opening credits. This vampire drama is set in the swamplands of Louisiana, and the opening sequence demonstrates the thin line between sex and violence, pleasure and pain. The singer’s deep voice croons “I wanna do bad thing with you” while raunchy images of dancing girls are juxtaposed with hungry gators and dead fish.

Watch intro

How To Make It In America (2010)

Aloe Blacc’s “I Need A Dollar” may sound like a vintage B-side, but the modern song sets the stage for HBO’s How To Make It In America. The song’s rhythms compliment the stop-and-go style of the time-elapsed New York City imagery that accompany the opening credits.

Watch intro

The Pacific (2010)

This HBO mini-series focused on the Pacific arena during World War II. Hollywood heavy-hitter Hans Zimmer composed the title song called “Honor” which is intercut with extreme close-ups of a charcoal drawing that slowly fades into a real photograph of the brave men who fought in World War II. The remaining credits are black and white depictions of an invasion, ending with an image of a soldier carrying one of his injured brethren.

Watch intro

PHP vs HTML

First off, what is PHP? Some people have the mistaken impression that PHP is just like HTML, but they are two totally different technologies. HTML is basically a highly modified markup language, which means that it’s just bold and italic tags at heart. Of course, HTML has been greatly expanded over the last decade, so it’s capable of things far beyond just structuring text. However, the major flaw with HTML is that it can only produce static code. In other words, you must make all changes manually. For example, let’s say you wanted to have a greeting for your clients on your website. If you use HTML, all the users will see the same greeting. But what if you want to have a customized greeting for each of your customers?

This is where PHP comes in. PHP is a programming language specifically designed for use on web servers. When a person visits a webpage that only uses HTML, they can view the actual code that their browser is using to display the page. For instance a simple HTML line of code may look like this: This is in bold. When a person views a webpage, that line is displayed in bold in the browser. Most browsers will allow a user to view the entire code for any page they happen to visit. A webpage designer must create a separate HTML file for every different page on their website, and the links on webpages simply tell the browser which HTML page to display next.

PHP works quite a bit differently. Rather than a simple page that is viewed by the browser, the code that is used is generated on the fly whenever a viewer visits a PHP page. This means that each time a viewer goes to a website a new page is created right on the spot for their particular visit. Instead of just reading the HTML code, a PHP page actually sends a list of instructions to the webserver. The webserver then generates all the HTML code and sends that back to the browser. This means that a visitor never sees the PHP code. They only see the HTML code that is returned. For example, to display the same code that we used above, a PHP would actually read

IF – ELSE STATEMENTS

So far, it would appear that PHP just does what HTML does. However, IF-ELSE statements, also known as conditional statements, show the real power of PHP.

An IF – ELSE statement is a piece of code that changes the actions of a program if certain conditions are met. For example, a movie site may display the titles of R rated movies ONLY IF the user is old enough. Here’s how it works.

if (IF statement) {
stuff to do when if statement is true…
}else{
stuff to do when IF statement is false…
}
?>

So, if we want to show age-appropriate movie titles based on whether a user is an adult or child, it might look like this:

$KidMovies = “Muppets, Anne of Green Gables, Toy Story”;
$AllMovies = $Kidmovies . ”, Rambo, Braveheart”;

$UserAge = “adult”;

if ($UserAge == “adult”) {
echo $AllMovies;
}else{
echo $KidMovies;
}
?>

This code would display “Muppets, Anne of Green Gables, Toy Story, Rambo, Braveheart”.
Note that to check if an IF statement is true, you use two equal signs, not one. If you use a statement like this:

if ($UserAge = “adult”)

PHP only checks to see if the string “adult” can be assigned to the variable $UserAge, which is always true, so the page would not react the way you desire.

WORDPRESS

Though it appears far more complicated, a large portion of the code you see on a WordPress PHP page will be IF statements that are nestled within each other. You can add your own customized code in almost any place you wish. For example, what if you wanted to use a different database for different languages? In the file called “wp-config.php”, you will find a line of code that says:

define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘database_name_here’);

You could actually replace this with an IF statement to change the database.

If ($language == “Spanish”) {
define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘SpanishDB’);
} else {
define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘EnglishDB’);
}

Thus, if the variable $language was stored as “Spanish”, WordPress would use the SpanishDB database. Otherwise, it would use the EnglishDB database. You can do the same sort of modification for almost any code in WordPress. However, please note that WordPress is fairly complicated piece of coding for a beginner, and modifications might have unintended consequences. If possible, make sure you test your changes before publishing them to your blog.

Follow these simple steps to change to a new hosting provider

1. Dowload all the files using an FTP software like for example FileZilla (If you are moving a local WordPress installation you can disregard this first step.)
2. Goto your current hosting providers cPanel for your account, navigate to phpMyAdmin locate the database for your blog and export it.
3. Upload all files to your new directory
4. Create a new database in your new hosting cPanel and import your old database into it
5. Change details in wp-config.php to fit your new domain and database properties
6. Goto to phpMyAdmin and run the following scripts to update the database with your new domain details:

Query To Update WordPress Settings

UPDATE wp_options SET option_value = replace(option_value, ‘http://www.old-url.com’, ‘http://www.new-url.com’) WHERE option_name = ‘home’ OR option_name = ‘siteurl’;

Query To Update Permalinks

UPDATE wp_posts SET guid = replace(guid, ‘http://www.old-url.com’,'http://www.new-url.com’);

Query to Update Any Links Embedded In Content

UPDATE wp_posts SET post_content = replace(post_content, ‘http://www.old-url.com’, ‘http://www.new-url.com’);

Don´t forget to replace old-url.com/new-url.com with your own data!

WooThemes – The Morning After

- Demo
- Download

Organic Themes – Structure Theme

Note: The image above is a screenshot of the commercial version of Structure theme, some features may not be included in the free version.

- Demo
- Download (Full, small, black, white)

GraphPaperPress – Mansion Theme

- Demo
- Download (links to GPP’s sign-up form, choose Membership type Freebies for free download)

WordPress Crew – TwentyTen Theme

Comes as default theme with the WordPress 3.0 upgrade. We just had to include it as it is such a great upgrade from its predecessor Kubrick.

WeFunction & Smashing Magazine – Magazeen Theme

We couldn’t find any official announcement that this iconic and beautiful magazine is WordPress 3.0 compatible. So we went ahead and tried it out. While it doesn’t support the new header, menus and background features it works just fine.

- Demo
- Download

Digital Nature – Mystique Theme

- Demo
- Download

FthrWght (Allan Cole) – AutoFocus+ Theme

- Demo
- Download

ThemeJam – Gadget Theme

- Demo
- Download

Theme Junkie – Channel Theme

- Demo
- Download

Museum Themes – Erin’s Sketchbook Theme

- Demo
- Download

ThemeHybrid – Hybrid

- Demo
- Download

Musemum Themes – Simple Gray Theme

- Demo
- Download

Bavotasan.com – Magazine Basic Theme

- Demo
- Download

ThemeShift – deStyle Theme

- Demo
- Download

So there you have them – 14 free WordPress themes that ought to be fully compatible with WordPress 3.0. At least all themes should work on the new platform but may or may not come fully integrated. If you have any thoughts on this list you know what to do.

However, if you are curious or making a plugin for WordPress, you may want to learn exactly how WordPress stores data and about the relationships with different databases. In the event that you have tried using the WordPress Application Programming Interface (API) to gain access to data but found it impossible without getting direct database access, we have provided the wpdb Class that will make this job possible and quite simple to do.

Diagram of the WordPress database

Here you will see a diagram which provides you with a look at the WordPress database and the relations which are automatically created between tables when you perform a standard installation of the WordPress software. We have also provided an overview which shows some more details on each table and column.

It is important to know that when you do a standard installation of WordPress, there is no integrity verification that is done between different tables, such as between comments and posts. If the plugin that you are designing makes changes to the WordPress database structure, the code within your plugin should automatically check that no records get orphaned in the tables. This can be accomplished by coding SQL commands that will remove records in the relevant tables when certain keys are removed. It is important to perform a complete backup of the database in order to prevent data loss when this operation takes place.

Tables used by WordPress version 3.0

Name: “wp_commentmeta”
Description: Every comment entered on your site contains meta data which is stored in the table wp_commentmeta

Name: “wp_comments”
Description: This table contains all the comments which have been entered on your blog.

Name: “wp_links”
Description: The table wp_links contains all data relevant to the links which were entered in the “Links” section of the administration panel.

Name: “wp_options”
Description: All the options that you have set by using the “Settings” portion of the administration panel are stored in this table.

Name: “wp_postmeta”
Description: Every post entered has meta data and is stored in the wp_postmeta table. There are certain plugins which add additional information into the wp_postmeta table.

Name: “wp_posts”
Description: The majority of the content of your site will be based on posts, which are all stored in this table.

Name: “wp_terms”
Description: Both posts and links can be put under different categories. Posts may also have tags attached to them. These will be stored in the wp_terms table.

Name: “wp_term_relationships”
Description: When a post is made it is associated with tags and categories that are stored in the wp_terms table. The table wp_terms_relationships stores these associations as well as those of links.

Name: “wp_term_taxonomy”
Description: The purpose of this table is to describe entries in the wp_terms table, in order to identify them as categories, links or tags.

Name: “wp_users”
Description: The wp_users table contains the lists of users for your site.

Name: “wp_usermeta”
Description: Each “user” entry that is stored in the wp_users table contains meta data, which is then stored in the wp_usermeta table.

Changes that are made via the administration panels are stored in one of these tables. For example, when you create a new user in the “Users” panel, the data that you enter will be stored under the “wp_users” and “wp_usermeta” database tables.