Crunchy Melon » Miscellaneous

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Tyler — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 16:55:02 +0000

We hope you have a wonderful Christmas and blessed New Year!

Handy WordPress Template Tags

Tyler — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:54:59 +0000

If you do any work with WordPress, then this page on the WP Codex is super helpful: http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags

It has a list of all the WP template tags that you might need for setting up or modifying a theme. I refer to it constantly when working with WordPress.

Office Design Inspiration

Tyler — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 15:17:49 +0000

If you need some inspiration for designing an office, check out http://www.officesnapshots.com. They have pictures of company offices from around the world (many of them in the tech industry). I also like the Featured Workspaces on Lifehacker. Great places to look when you’re out of ideas or just getting started.

A shelf for your iMac

Tyler — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 12:32:33 +0000

Ok, so normally I try to keep posts on-topic around here, but I couldn’t resist posting this. It’s a cool little metal shelf for an iMac or Apple Cinema Display called “BackPack.” It lets you store a hard drive or other accessory behind your computer and out of sight. How cool!

Alright, back to regularly scheduled posting.

Send text messages via email with an SMS gateway

Tyler — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 13:36:41 +0000

Here’s a handy Wikipedia page I came across the other day. It lists a bunch of email to sms gateways that are offered by cell phone companies. Why would you want this? Well, here’s a few handy uses I thought of:

Have a web app or desktop app that can send reminders via email? Send them via text message so you’ll be reminded while you’re out.
If you have a contact form on your site, you could send yourself a text message to alert you of a new submission (maybe an important RFP??).
Send an email when a client’s web app has an error, so you can get a fix put in place before they complain (which is always nice).

There are tons of other ways to use this technology. The best part is that it’s super easy to send an email via backend code like php or via desktop apps like iCal. This makes it easy to turn that email into a text message.

Beware the LCD burn

Tyler — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 12:14:09 +0000

I love looking at pictures of office setups, it gets me inspired to change mine. Here’s a crazy setup that will probably give you an LCD-burn. Well maybe not, but that sure would be a fun setup to have.

Easy favicons with favikon

Tyler — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:39:52 +0000

If you’ve ever had a client ask for one of those little icons that show up in the browser title bar, you might try Favikon. It’s a really easy way to create favicons from a gif, jpg, or png file. You can see the one in the title bar I just created. The nice thing about favikon (over some of the other favicon services I’ve seen) is that you can crop an image to just the portion you want. Makes it easy to grab a portion of a logo or design without firing up Photoshop.

Keep your screen clean!

Tyler — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:38:05 +0000

Be it your computer, your phone, laptop, or other device, you don’t want to show a design comp to a client on a smudged up screen. To clean it, try iKlear. It’s a kit that comes with a super soft cloth and a spray bottle of cleaner. I’ve been using it for years to keep my computer and iPod screens clean and free of smudges.