Archive for the ‘LDW Clients’ Category

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New Site Launch – FairTradeWire.com

Saturday, September 4th, 2010

Greetings, loyal followers. (We know you’re loyal if you are still following us after this long absence!)

We have had a very busy summer with some new projects. One of them is about to launch and we wanted to share it with you.

Café Campesino, a long time client, has been growing in a nice organic way by merging Sweetwater Organic Coffee Roastery down in Gainesville Florida, and partnering with some great folks in Atlanta to open a coffeehouse. Café Campesino sends out a monthly e-newsletter with all these and other updates including a lot of news about their travels to coffee growing countries to meet with farmers and cooperatives. They usually have a ton to share, so why limit it to those who subscribe to their newsletter?

View the new site: FairTradeWire.comWe invite you to check out their brand new shiny blog, fairtradewire.com! Using WordPress as a platform, this was Lowthian Design’s first really challenging WordPress project. With new features to design and implementation twists and turns being thrown at us every week, we had a ton of fun customizing templates, experimenting with great plugins and finding ways to make WordPress even easier to use.

We have a couple more WordPress projects on their way, so stay tuned..

Posted in LDW Clients, New project, The Latest, WordPress, news | No Comments »

Zenphoto—on its own, and paired with WordPress

Sunday, June 13th, 2010

One of my recent projects has been creating a website that is both a blog and an art portfolio. The art gallery needs to be attractive and also easy for the end user to manage; the portfolio is being moved from Flickr to the artist’s new, self-hosted website, so my goal is to provide a more professional-looking portfolio while keeping the ease of use that online photo sharing applications like Flickr offer.

To accomplish this goal, I have started working with a content management system called Zenphoto.

Zen strives to be simple and user friendly. Uploads, gallery management, tagging and categorizing are all very intuitive and could be figured out just by browsing the administrator panel. There are several themes available through Zenphoto’s website, as well as plugins for extending the function of your website.

This project is both a blog and a gallery, so I am using Zenphoto alongside WordPress to make this happen. WordPress has a great plugin that links the two admin control panels together. This way I can get to the back end of Zenphoto from a link in WordPress. It is also possible to fully integrate the two sites on the front end, though this is not the goal of my project.

In my experience, Zenphoto lives up to its philosophy, “Simpler is better.” So if you, like many people, have a large collection of digital images that you would like to make the main theme of your website, I’d recommend considering Zenphoto as your primary or secondary content management system.

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Posted in LDW Clients, Zenphoto | No Comments »

Using Postie with your Wordpress Blog

Friday, May 28th, 2010

Cafe Campesino needed a way to post updates to their new blog while traveling to meet coffee farmers. I decided to try Postie, a WordPress plugin that allows posting by sending your post to a designated email address. There are some good instructions here about how to set up Postie.

This article is to help those using Postie to easily post articles, images and even movies to their WordPress blog.

Postie will only accept emailed items from a pre-approved address, so make sure you are using an address that is setup in the Postie configuration, let us know if you need to add a new address.

When sending an article, put the title of the article in your subject line, it will be converted by Postie into your title. If you are sending via SMS, put your title in hash marks “#your title here#”.

If you want to categorize the article in a single category, put the category followed by a colon (ex  News: Title) If you need to put it in multiple categories use  [Cat XXX]s (ex: ‘[Cat XXX] [Cat YYY] Title of My Article’ ). You can also wait to categorize your article until you are online and can log in to WordPress.

Start your article with “:start” and finish with “:end”, this will strip out any signatures etc. that follow your article, and only what is between these tags will be published.

If you want to add tags, add this at the bottom of the article in this format:
tags : one, two, three (must be in lower case). You can also add tags later when you get to a computer and login to WordPress

To add a comment to a post, use ‘Re:’ in your subject line. For example, if your original post had a subject line “New Post”. If you then send an e-mail with the subject line “Re: New Post”, it will get posted as a comment on the original post.

You can delay posting of the article with the following:

  • delay:1d – 1 day
  • delay:1h – 1 hour
  • delay:1m – 1 minute
  • delay:1d2h4m – 1 day 2 hours 4m

    • If you are sending a picture, with or without text, use the :start and :end tags and the following:

    #img1 caption=’caption for the image’# (the caption is optional)

    You can attach more than one photo, just make sure to attach them in the correct order to correspond to your img1, img2 etc.

    If the float is set up, the image will allow any text added after the tag to float around the image. If you want the image to float in the body of your text, include the #img1# at the place where you want the text to begin wrapping.

    Add video’s one at a time. Send them as and attachement and put any text inside your :start end tags.

    Posted in LDW Clients, WordPress, plugins, tips | No Comments »

    Kevin’s LDW Internship Reflection

    Wednesday, April 28th, 2010

    Recently, I had the opportunity to complete an internship for Lowthian Design Works. Currently a graduate student at Oregon State University, as soon as my finals were over and spring break began, I could barely contain my eagerness to begin….web work? That’s right. While many of my peers were spending their break on west coast beaches or simply relaxing at home, I was busy learning the ins and outs of web design – and I couldn’t have anticipated a more fun and fulfilling experience. It’s not that I had this mad love for designing web sites. In fact, I knew next to nothing on the subject before beginning my internship. But what I did know was that the guys of LDW were engaged in important and exciting work, and so I jumped at the chance to help their efforts.

    As an LDW intern, my days (and some nights) were filled studying Joomla and content management systems, trying my hand at PHP coding and HTML manipulation, and finally putting it all together to construct a web site from the ground up. All the while, I was being guided by two of the most savvy and capable individuals I know, J. and Geoffrey. Each day consisted of a considerable amount of time at the keyboard, and I was thrilled to gain first-hand experience of what it takes to be a web designer. The most memorable moments, however, were the many enlightening discussions I had with J and Geoffrey. While the topic of conversation varied, always present was the sense of teamwork, service, and purpose that drives the shared vision of LDW. While many companies gauge their success in terms of dollars, notoriety, or other internal measures, the members of LDW are motivated first and foremost by the success of their clients. This is because LDW believes in the valuable work that each of its clients are doing and strives to help those individuals and organizations reach higher and further than ever before.

    As I head back to complete my degree and pursue my interests in technology innovation, I will continue to lend a helping hand to LDW whenever and however I can. While my internship stint has concluded, I anticipate further collaborations and a continuing partnership. LDW is founded on integrity and forward-thinking, and I am excited to see what the future holds for this great company. I want to thank J. and Geoffrey for sharing their invaluable time, knowledge, and expertise with me. More importantly, thank you for all you are doing to make our world a better place – one web-space at a time.

    -Kevin R.

    *Click here to find out more about Kevin and his work at Oregon State University.

    Posted in LDW Clients, The Latest, collective, news | 1 Comment »

    Review of JFusion

    Sunday, April 25th, 2010

    My goal was to incorporate a discussion forum into one of our Joomla sites. In order to do this we would use a piece of software called phpBB as well as Joomla. PhpBB usually runs as it’s own website. However, we needed to visually integrate phpBB into Joomla creating what would appear to be one site with a forum included.

    The component I chose to handle this chore was JFusion. It offers web administrators a way to integrate a variety of software into a Joomla site without the stress of core hacks or bridging the two. Some of the currently supported software is phpBB, myBB, Moodle, docuwiki, Oscommerce, Magento, and vBulletin. After seeing this list and the good reviews that Jfusion received I thought that it would be a worthwhile component to get familiar with.

    I found Jfusion to be easy to install. The documentation provided was easy to follow and easy to understand. All the information that I needed on the project at hand could be found on Jfusions web site. This is a very well supported project and one that I will use again.

    If you are a person interested in installing Jfusion I would warn that the initial learning process is time consuming but worth it. Once you have read the documentation and been through the setup you will feel that you understand Jfusion. I know that future installs and setup will go very quickly now that I have learned this process. It is definitely worth reading the documentation and understanding the software you are trying to integrate before jumping in.

    All in all I feel that Jfusion is the only way to go when attempting an integration. If you have a Joomla site and are interested in adding a forum or other software to it please contact us. We would be happy to help you through the process.

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    Posted in Fixes, Joomla, Joomla Add-ons, LDW Clients, New project, The Latest, tips | No Comments »

    Why Joomla (CMS)

    Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

    While working in New Orleans after hurricane Katrina, there was demand for a lot of new websites to raise awareness and funds for the rebuilding effort. Through trial and error I learned that a content management system (CMS) was the best way to help my new clients interact and present themselves on the internet.

    Upon arrival in New Orleans as a web designer I realized that I could easily become overwhelmed with the amount of work. The first organization I began work with already had a website running on Drupal. They asked for my assistance with the site so I dug in and learned more about content management systems. I had seen and heard about CMS websites, but until then had always coded static sites in html and css. The downside of websites such as I had been working with is that clients had to either learn html, or contact me every time they needed something edited.

    So, the combination of the what could become overwhelming workload in New Orleans and this introduction to CMS, Most non-techies avoid learning html like cats avoid leashes. I soon saw the great benefit of my many New Orleans clients using a CMS. Each client was different. Each client had different needs. With a CMS I was able to streamline all of my clients into a content management system that could be tailored to each individual client’s needs. At the same time I was able to avoid cats, leashes and frustrated clients on the outer rim of html learning curves.

    CMS websites, are also often called – for good reason – . Once designed and configured the website is built in such a way that anyone who is provided access can use a simple wysiwyg editor (or MS Word, open office, or any other rich text editor) and make updates and manage the website. The use of CMS means that clients can take ownership of their websites in a day to day fashion, leaving us time to roll out the clients’ broader design ideas.

    Designers involved with CMS websites add features such as calendars, forms, photo galleries. All of these new features can be easily accessed and updated by clients. Upon looking at the extensions available I soon realized that my CMS websites could accomplish so much more than my previous statically designed websites. This is why I have converted almost all of my previous clients websites over to Joomla.

    Now finally we get to the title of this blog Why Joomla.. Drupal (the first CMS I learned) is very powerful. However, over time and with help of friends (Thanks Nick!) I came around the use of Joomla as my primary CMS. I have seen that Joomla has an easier user interface within demo sites. For this reason Joomla is less intimidating than Drupal for my clients.

    I have since realized that with Joomla there is a huge variety of available templates. I have learned how to apply my html and css skills to create custom templates and even take a client’s existing website and convert it to Joomla. In this way the site visitors see no difference, but the client can easily log in and edit their site.

    I am happy to report that the sites we rolled out in New Orleans have been met with great success. Though we still help with content updates on some sites, other clients have thrived with their new sites. I love to my clients’ sites and see all the new and changing content! These clients contact us for support, design changes, or to add new features. In this way we are left with more time to build and work on new sites.

    The CMS movement is radically changing how we as designers interact with our clients and how our clients ultimately interact with the world.

    Thanks to Sean David Hobbs for editing this article

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    Posted in Joomla, Joomla Add-ons, LDW Clients, The Latest, collective, web | No Comments »

    Campaign Monitor, our new partner for e-newsletters

    Thursday, April 15th, 2010

    We have been creating newsletters for several of our clients now for many years. After trying various services we have decided to move our clients to Campaign Monitor. We have been using this service for one of our clients for their last three newsletters and have been very impressed. Here are some of the reasons.

    1.Ease of newsletter creation.:
    We have been creating our newsletters in html which means the client has to send us the text and we convert it into a newsletter using a template that we have been using. With Campaign Monitor we can create a template using their tag system which creates a template that can be edited through a simply wysiwyg editor. This way our client can enter their own copy, and easily edit their copy if they need to make changes. They can also add their own images and the template has a means to automatically create a table of contents for the newsletter.

    2.Tracking:
    After sending the newsletter, Campaign Monitor has an easy to use reporting system which allows our clients to see not only how many “opens” they got, but exactly who opened it, which email clients are being used and which links were clicked. They even have an A/B split system where you can create two different newsletters or create two different subject lines and then compare the results of the two campaigns to help fine tune their campaigns.

    3.Subscriber Management:
    The management of subscribers couldn’t be easier, you can see you bounce reports and quickly move people into an inactive status. This way you don’t keep sending to these people with increased risk that systems will flag your email as spam.

    4.Other features:
    There is a testing service to see if your emails will be flagged as spam as well as what it will look like in different email clients, easy forms to add to your website to allow subscribers to sign up, and a fast easy to use administrative panel which we can create a separate login for each client.

    We were also impressed with the customer support from Campaign Monitor when we had questions for them. Their answers were timely and helpful. We have tried other services and software, both integrated into our websites and outside. These did not meet the same level of excellence that Campaign Monitor provides. We look forward to sharing this service with all of our clients that send out Newsletters, or are thinking about doing so. If you would like to give it a try, let us know and we’ll get you set up.

    Posted in LDW Clients, The Latest, e-newsletter | 2 Comments »

    Maintain Control of your Domain Name

    Wednesday, April 7th, 2010

    I hope this doesn’t turn out too much of a rant, but I want to take on an issue that has been bothering me as the last few days I have been once again dealing with release of a clients domain name and feeling like my hands are tied behind my back because someone else has control.

    Lets start with a little understanding of how your domain name works. Your domain name in simple terms is the address of your website, also known as URL. If it wasn’t for domain names we would have to remember the actual address of websites which would look something like 65.13.6.55. The internet would be a lot less friendly if we had to remember all these addresses. Well, in order for this to work, a service has to point your domain name to the actual address of your website. This is often but not always handled by the same company that handles your web hosting. Different companies offer different prices for this service, but the going rate should not exceed $10 each year. If you are paying more you should consider switching. So why don’t you go ahead and do that now. I’ll Wait….

    Having trouble? Do you know how? Did you even know that it was a separate service to your website hosting? This is often what we discover is the case with new clients. Would you buy a car that had a padlock on the hood so that only the person that sold you the car could look under the hood if something went wrong? Well this is the case of many who trusted somebody else to set up everything for them.

    The steps in releasing a domain name include contacting your current registrar, usually by logging into their administrative panel if you know your username and password, unlocking the domain name and then obtaining a authorization code that is then sent to the email address on file as the administrative contact on the account. So here lie a couple problems, are you the one that set it up? Do you know that email address?

    Before it leads to problems, make sure that you have complete control of not only your domain name but also your hosting. What happens if your current provider becomes difficult to reach, or in the case of one of our clients last year impossible to reach? Even if you don’t think you will be the one to make changes as it can be a confusing and intimidating process, make sure that you have the necessary access so that you can have somebody else do it for you. Do it now before it becomes a problem when things are expiring, or you want to move your site.

    We encourage our clients to use an affordable web hosting and domain management service, we have been using Dreamhost as they have good rates, good service and they offer to host all of our 501c3 organizations for free. They also have an easy to use control panel so we make sure that our clients are the primary contact on the account and then add us so that we have the necessary permissions to make changes to the account and get everything set up. However if somebody wants to switch their designers, they can easily log in and give somebody else permission to access their account including everything necessary to move the site.

    Keep your information up to date, the most important being the administrative email contact on the domain name. If you change this address it can sometimes lock the account for a period of time making a delay in releasing the domain so don’t wait until it is expiring to make a change.

    Your website belongs to you, don’t trust the “we’ll take care of everything for you” approach, unless you know that you will always know and be able to quickly get hold this person. Get hands on with your site and understand the basics of how things work so that when something goes wrong you don’t feel frustrated and especially don’t let your website go down, or lose your address, because you don’t have this understanding or access.

    If you are ready to contact your current provider, ask them how you change your domain name information. They should provide you with a login and let you go in and take a look. If you are having difficulty with this, please contact us or leave a message and we’ll see if we can help you regain control of your site and it’s domain name.

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    Posted in LDW Clients, tips, web | No Comments »

    Client Spotlight – Common Ground Health Clinic

    Thursday, April 1st, 2010

    Common Ground Health Clinic is a free clinic that started immediately after Hurricane Katrina in the Algiers Community of New Orleans.

    After the storm, there were no hospitals or clinics available to the residents of New Orleans that were unable to evacuate, or found there way back before the evacuation had ended. Many of these people were dealing with injuries and illness related to the storm. A group of street medics showed up when the organizers of Common Ground Relief sent out word that this was a great need. They set up a makeshift clinic in a mosque, and later across the street in a storefront and set up triage to treat as many people as possible. As the word spread, doctors and nurses showed up to offer their help as well as more volunteers to help with administrative tasks as the temporary clinic became a permanent fixture in New Orleans. Word got out and before long the clinic was treating over 100 people each week.

    The clinic continues to grow in it’s stability and plans to be a permanent free clinic offering immediate care to anyone who shows up, without any questions asked.

    The also begin the Latino Health Outreach program to treat the many new residents of New Orleans who came to help with rebuilding and to repopulate the city who speak English as a second language.  We enjoyed setting their website up for multi-lingual access.

    At Lowthain Design Works we feel honored to be able to offer our support for the clinic through assisting with their website. They have done a great job of adding their own content and are beginning to make the site a dynamic part of their work. We ask that you support the clinic in any way you are able as they continue their important work in New Orleans while offering a bright example of how to offer health care for all!

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    Posted in LDW Clients, Volunteerism | No Comments »

    Rates Renovation

    Wednesday, March 24th, 2010

    We have recently been discussing our rate structure. At LDW, we strive to provide high quallity web sites to individuals and groups who are engaged in good causes, regardless of their financial capacity. We realize that many organizations rely on volunteers and donations and simply cannot afford to employ a web design service. We hope to provide a solution to this dilemma by offering web designs that meet our clients needs and their budgets. Please check our rates page next week in order to see what the outcome of our conversations and edits are.

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    Posted in LDW Clients, The Latest, collective, news | No Comments »

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