I have recently been working on a highly versatile premium theme for WordPress which is due for release soon. As part of the project I wanted to test how the theme (and WordPress itself) could work with sites of various different genres. My intention was that the theme would be configurable enough via it's Options Menu that it could easily be styled to suit corporate sites such as recruitment, blue chip company, technology site  & product portfolio, media sites such as magazine, news, image & video gallery and also youth oriented sites such as music / band website,  games website.

The theme also features simple integration for banners and advertising,  so creating a couple of  'working example' sites was not only a good way of testing the theme's versatility but also a potential source of a few extra quid!

I had been wanting to do a games & videos website for a while, and I had built the theme's default settings around a 'corporate magazine' look & feel, so I decided the games site would be a great way to test the theme. Here is my wordpress games arcade site so far:  Zap Gamez

I decided to look around and see what articles I could find about creating a games arcade website with wordpress, or if there was a plugin that allowed you to easily insert games into your WordPress blog. I found this article by Emanuele Feronato:

• Creation of a Flash arcade site using WordPress

It describes a method of populating your WordPress blog with games via a feed from MochiAds (A source of free games for websites) using custom fields. However, for my site I wanted to be able to integrate games from various free content suppliers and host games on my own server as well as embedding games hosted by content suppliers. What I really wanted was a plugin that could embed games into posts or pages using shortcodes.

THE PLUGIN

The prototype plugin I have built includes the following features:

4 Different views:

1. Grid view - a grid of thumbnail images linking to each game (can be restricted to a single category or parent category)
2. Category view - this view includes a medium sized image and a written description of the game
3. Single page view - the page where you play the game itself
4. Featured Game view - a page with a list of featured games

Different embedding modes:

1. iFrame embedding - embed iFrame content using code provided by free games sites, or use this method to display games from your own server where an html file has been provided with the free game download.
2. Flash embedding - embed Flash content using embed codes provided by other sites, or embed flash games directly from your own site. You can even upload them easily using the wordpress 'Add Media' tool.

The beta version of the WP Game Embed plugin can be found here.

The WP Background Tile Plugin for WordPress applies a tiled background image to your blog.  It is as simple as this:

• Create a background image
• Upload it
• Apply it as the background via the WP Background Tile options page

Applying a repeat pattern to the background of a webpage is easily done using css:

body {background-image: url(example.jpg);}

However, if you're not into writing code, or don't know where to insert the css into your wordpress theme, then you will find this plugin much easier. It can also be an easy way of testing out lots of background images before deciding on one you are happy with.

INSTALLATION:

1. Download the plugin from the link at the bottom of this page
2. Upload the wp-background-tile folder to your wp-content/plugins folder.
3. Activate the plugin from the Plugins page in WordPress.

USAGE:

1. Upload your background image via 'Media => Add New' in Wordpress (or via FTP)
2. Go to 'Settings => WP Background Tile' in WordPress
3. Paste or type in the URL of your background image (explained in more detail below)
4. Press 'Submit'

CREATING A BACKGROUND TILE:

A background tile is an image which is repeated in both directions over the background of a webpage. Look closely at the background of my site and you will notice the green background is not a matte colour, but a subtle texture. Right click on the background of my site and choose 'View Background Image' (Firefox) or 'Save Background As' (IE) and have a look at the image. You will notice that it is small (16 x 16 pixels), as you don't need much of the pattern to make it tile. Stripes and other geometric patterns can work well for a subtle effect.

Tip: Check out the free online Stripe Generator tool, it's a really easy way to create striped background tiles.

Background tiles can also be used for larger images such as a logo repeat. An example of this is www.mrdupes.com. To achieve this type of result using photoshop the 'offset' filter can be very useful.

GETTING THE URL OF A FILE YOU HAVE UPLOADED WITH WORDPRESS:

1. Go to 'Posts => Add New'
2. Click on the 'Add Media' button (a little star type icon next to 'Upload/Insert')
3. Click on the 'Media Library' tab
4. Click on the word 'Show' next to the file you want the url for
5. Under 'Link URL' click on the button 'File URL'
6. The file url should now be in the 'Link URL' text box so you can copy it.

DOWNLOAD PLUGIN:

Admin76 is a powerful and versatile web content management system (CMS) designed and developed by 76 Creative. It is a PHP / mySQL driven project, for which I developed it's coding framework.

The main difference between Admin76 and other commercial CMS's is it's potential to be tailored exactly to the website it is powering. It can be transformed into a very 'bespoke' system, and so can be used to power many different genres of website, from a simple 5 page website, to a large news site, image or video gallery or a recruitment site. The only controls available in the CMS will be the exact controls you need to manage your site, nothing more, nothing less!

Other CMS's have certain 'tendencies' which relate to their intended user-base. For instance, WordPress is very much associated with blogging, Drupal is associated with community-driven sites. This is reflected in the possible themes, plugins and addons available for each.

Admin76 on the other hand is more flexible in this respect.  It can power a site with static pages, and news with categories and date based archives in the same way that WordPress can, but it can also power all sorts of different types of lists, with as many custom fields as you wish, e.g. address lists, list of file downloads, event diary, mp3 playlists, video playlists, etc. It can even be made to output XML, so it can be used to fully manage Flash Sites too.

As Admin76 is currently only available to customers of 76 Creative it has no 3rd party features, like plugins etc., available. This, however, is another strength of the system. All of Admin76's features are built in. It has an advanced image gallery system, with multiple file upload, medium size and thumbnail image creation.

Other standard features include RSS Feeds, Multiple Authors / Administrators, Flash Slideshow System, Flash Video Gallery System.

For more info about Admin76, and to enquire about getting your own self-managed, elegantly designed website get in touch with 76 Creative.

Some of the mySQL and PHP functions I have utilised in Admin76 will soon be available as tutorials on my site.

I have updated my site with my new 76 digital remix theme for WordPress.

The new theme is built on a model I have created for a highly configurable, versatile set of premium themes which I will be releasing this summer. The premium themes will each come in three different versions – Editorial, Media and Ultimate (which combines the features of both editorial and media versions). The themes features will include:

I will also release a free 'light' version of the theme set, so watch this space!

This article is an extension / improvement upon another article I published on my site previously: {{post id="simple-javascript-for-image-mouseovers" text="Simple Javascript for Image Mouseovers"}}. As I am always looking for improved methods, I was discussing the pitfalls of the javascript method with a friend (and occasional comment writer / contributor to my site) who pointed me in the direction of CSS and image sprites. This lead me to research the topic further, and I found two articles in particular which were incredibly useful:

Read on…