Web Development

jQuery Sticky (Fixed Position) Sidebar with Bootstrap 3 col-push Problem

The Issue It works on desktop browsers, but not iPad or Safari Using jQuery Sticky and Bootstrap 3, a "stuck" sidebar should stay at the defined distance from the top and in the exact place it started to the left/right. However, when using Bootstrap's column push and pull, a Sticky sidebar breaks. On the iPad, the sidebar jumps to the opposite side of the screen. If you are on an iPad 2 (and maybe other versions) or Safari 5 for Windows (and maybe other versions) you should see the issue … [Read more...]

What Is The Best Screen Resolution To Design For?

Ever wondered, "What is the best size to build a website?" As a developer I get this question all the time, typically from graphic designers looking to make a site that lasts at least a few years. One good resource to answer the question is StatCounter's Screen Resolution Data. It gives a nice interactive graph with the latest screen resolutions in use throughout the web. Here's how it looked for January 2010 through December 2012 June 2010 to June 2013. Source: StatCounter Global Stats … [Read more...]

CloudFlare vs BlueHost Performance: Is switching worth it?

A few months back (around September 2012), BlueHost and others started advertising--maybe even pushing--CloudFlare to its users. The promise was/is that CloudFlare will speed up your website using a content delivery network (CDN). They say it's a relatively easy thing to set up and BlueHost even has an integrated piece to facilitate it smoothly from with their own control panel. "I'm thinking of switching to Cloud Flare. Is this a good move or can this end up being a disaster? I've not read … [Read more...]

The Best Full Screen Background Image Sizes for Web Design

Last Updated: 4/30/2019 I frequently get questions on the best size for background images from designers I work with. Full screen backgrounds have become more and more popular in the last couple of years and, I think, will remain so for at least a few more. The question asked is usually something like: "If I want to put a background image on a website that will span the background regardless of the display size a user is using, what would be the pixel dimension of the image?" I've … [Read more...]

Relating Posts, Pages, and Custom Post Types in WordPress

I received a question from a fellow WordPress designer/developer recently on how I was able to bring content from related pages and posts into any page, post, or custom post type. "I like the way you pull in posts featured images and also page featured images on the bottom of pages.  It keeps the site hoping.  I wasn't able to find a plugin that would pull in featured images on both posts and pages and all of them seemed to be recent posts or random.  And then I tried to use categories in post … [Read more...]

Style Nth Word In a Phrase

The CSS Scenario Recently my graphic designer used a nice styling on a client's webpage headlines--all words in the headline were one color and the last word was a different color. It adds for a nice effect I think. Of course, as the developer I'm the one who has the responsibility to bring that to life. After a few quick searches on Google for phrases like, CSS Style Nth Word CSS style last word, CSS style first word php style nth word, php style first word, php get first … [Read more...]

Convert MS Access Date to Unix Timestamp to MySQL Timestamp

I came across a problem today where I needed to convert a date in an MS Access Database to a MySQL timestamp using PHP. The solution was pretty easy, but took some thinking through. Here is the answer to save you some time if you need it. Get the date from your MS Access database. If you're using PHP to do this, you'll likely use the odbc_exec($connection, $query) function and the odbc_fetch_array() function. Convert the MS Access date format into a UNIX Timestamp using PHP's strtotime() … [Read more...]

Website Font Replacement Options Comparison

The Website Typography Battle It turns out there is a battle raging on the best way to display fonts on websites. Most website owners today can choose from about 10 fonts. A lot of work has been done in the past decade to give website designers, developers, and branding folks a way to display any font they want. There is still no clear winner, but we're getting closer. If you're looking to go beyond the basic web fonts, here are the options I'm aware of today (condensed version): 1. sIFR Is … [Read more...]

Get All SQL Database Table Names and Fields Using VB.NET

VB.NET Problem You need to see (write out on your browser's screen) all of the table names and field names in your back end SQL database and the application is written in .NET, specifically VB.NET on an .aspx page. VB.NET Resolution Create a page that uses a connection to your database, the database schema, and the tables it finds to loop through and write the results your browser window. Background I came across this need working on a client's site recently and spent too long searching .NET … [Read more...]