andreasviklund.com

Here is a screenshot of the single column template mentioned in my previous post. Click the image to go to the template demo and download page:

Coming up next: Daleri Document - a multi-layout template in the same simple style, but with the possibility to use 1, 2 or 3 columns in the layout. To be released in a few days.

Activity will be low here until I get the new design up. It is actually going well, even though other design projects take up a lot of time right now. In the meantime, I want to share a couple of links that may be intersting to you.

First of all, the 1024px, Daleri Selection and Daleri Mega templates have been ported into Drupal themes by Nick Young. Since I don't use Drupal myself I haven't been able to try the ports myself, but the live demos look very interesting. For one example among others, the 1024px theme includes the left/right sidebar option that is included in the original template. Nick also writes that he has got requests for more ports of my templates, and that more Drupal themes are underway - including one theme that will include all andreasXX (00 to 09) designs in one theme package using subthemes. I'm looking forward to see that!

Second, I've released a new template called Daleri Single. It is a simple one-column design, made with simple code that is easy to understand and easy to work with. It is currently only available on GetFreeWebDesigns.com, but I will add it to my own template gallery soon.

And finally, the 1024px theme for WordPress is moving into an interesting direction! It has been adopted by Matt Martz, who has given it a massive and very promising update with numerous new features. More about this soon!

Johanna decided to rebuild her kennel website into a WordPress site, after running it as a manually coded HTML site for over a year. She wanted to use the Daleri Structure template design, so I converted it into a WordPress theme for her. It took three days to get the site completed. I worked on the theme, while Johanna did all the content work. The result looks pretty sweet! The english version has not been added yet, but feel free to take a look if you want to see what our four-legged family members look like.

Regarding the Daleri templates, I have got updated versions of the templates from Jason Cole, who fixed an error that broke the layout when the template was viewed in IE6. I will upload the updated templates soon, along with updated versions of the other templates. Jason has also made a range of alternate versions of the templates. Those can be found .

Other priorities now is redesigning this site, updating all WordPress themes to work with the new comment system in WP 2.7 and releasing new templates. I will try to get a public WordPress theme version of the Daleri Selection template released as well, but I need to find a way of getting the main menu (which is based on a definition list) to work with WordPress. The menu on Johannas site is currently managed manually, and while that works well for a custom theme it is not a good solution for a public theme. We'll see about that. Regarding this site, I've been ashamed over the lack of updates for a long time. But Johannas great redesign effort has given me a boost of inspiration and motivation, so I'm in for another attempt to get it all done. I will also upload my updated templates to a new template site called GetFreeWebDesigns, which keeps up the spirit of the free CSS template community.

Finally, I want to thank everyone who has contributed with donations. The donations in January actually covered the hosting cost for February, and I appreciate that a lot. It is also inspiring to know that my work is appreciated even with the lack of updates that this site has had for a long time.

In my ongoing online re-organization work, one of many projects is to reduce the number of domains and minor websites I manage in order to use more time and energy on a few high-priority websites. Several of my sites are non-public and used only for specific purposes, such as developing and testing free WordPress themes or showcase a custom template, theme or marketing idea for a client. It is useful to have a separate development site for WordPress themes, but impractical to have six such sites because of all the extra maintenance work it takes to keep the sites up to date.

I also have a couple of small and public sites that don't have any actual purpose. One such site was andreasviklund.se where I made an attempt at writing a Swedish blog some time ago, only to give up on that plan after a few days. Instead, I ended up using the site to promote a couple of Swedish WordPress themes and a free MP3 album with 12 short and instrumental songs that could be used as ringtones on mobile phones.

My .se site had about 50 visitors per day in average over the last 6 months, despite the lack of updates. The themes (which are hosted by the official Swedish WordPress portal WP-Support.se) were downloaded in 1.800 copies in the same period, while the ringtomes were downloaded in approximately 7.000 copies. Those are actually surprisingly high numbers. But compared to the stats of this website and the amount of maintenance that every WordPress-based website needs over time, it was a lot of work for a very limited effect.

With the Swedish blog idea abandoned, the Swedish themes hosted successfully by WP-Support (where I used to provide free theme support during last summer - something I will need to take up again) and the ringtones soon being included in the big music collection I mentioned in my previous post, I could not come up with any good reason to keep the WordPress site online. I decided to take it down and replace it with a single template-based website with contact information and links to my high-priority websites. I decided to go with my andreas07 template.

Setting up the template site

The process was really simple. I used andreas07 in its original form, changed the language to Swedish, removed everything that I wouldn't need (including the navigation menu) and added my own content. I also changed the default link color fron red to blue, and added a photo in the left sidebar. It took me only 10 minutes to create the page from the template. I know it doesn't look very pretty, but it will definitely do the job for now. I can always improve the design at some later point.

Adjusting the new site to work with the history of the old site took a little bit longer since I wanted to do it in a proper way. Before I deleted the WordPress site, I made sure to copy the generated XML sitemap. I created a custom .htaccess file where I made manual 301 redirects for the URLs in the sitemap, to make sure that people who try to reach the deleted pages of the WordPress site are automatically redirected to index.html instead of seeing an error message. I also created a separate "Error 404" file which I made into the default 404 document in the .htaccess file. And finally I added a rewrite feature that removes the "www." from the address if a visitor has entered it.

With the template-based site and the .htaccess adjustments ready, I uploaded the new site and tested it live. It worked as intended and validated without any errors, and after saving a last backup copy of the WordPress site I deleted it. The new andreasviklund.se is now live. Feel free to take a look and comment on my first own andreas07-based website!

The re-organization continues tonight with an upgrade of andreasviklund.com and the two Swedish humor blogs Tjuvlyssnat and Tjuvtittat to WordPress v2.7. There is still a lot of work left to do, but I'm on it and it feels very good since it has been needed for quite some time now..

170+ MP3 songs in various genres, adding up to more than 12 hours of music, sorted into 9 (or possibly 10) MP3 albums. Every single file is fully ID3-tagged and includes the proper cover art. And the entire package (which is still untitled) will soon be free to download from this site, free to share and free to use for non-commercial purposes.

It will be an almost complete collection of the music I have created - or been involved in creating. The collection will include almost all Lagoona releases, along with a large number of remixes, co-productions and maybe even a few live tracks. It will be my way of finally putting an end to the amazing music adventures of my past, and let me move on to the next adventure in the world of melodies.

Expect the release and a longer post about this topic in a few days.