by Nick Throlson | Nov 9, 2018 | Web Design
A web developer needs to understand how to create magic and productivity in his web development process. These magic make the workflow of a web designer time-efficient and better result oriented. However, there are no hard and fast rules for creating flow but there is some prerequisite that can smooth progress of work.Here I have taken views from the various developer and try to collect top 10 ingredients for a web developer. For better convenience here, I have divided the list into three categories like tools for a) UI & UX (user interface) b) SEO (on page guideline) and c) Content Placement, respectively.A) UI & UX (user interface)
A web developer builds a user interface that should have optimum user experience of looking good, as well as it is productive in its usability. These qualities are built with four important stages, which are persona Definition, Task Definition, Wireframing, and Mockups.- Persona: Persona of a website is agreed by its outlook and receptiveness. It also contains the quality of the website so that it resonates with visitors, kindles more content sharing, and transforms more email subscribers, donors, and volunteers in sales prospects.
- Task Definition: The next stage in the UI/UX Web design phase is the task definition phase. Task definition is commonly performed in combination with the user persona phase.
- Wireframing: It is part of the UI/UX Web design procedure as it shapes the first graphic representation of the ideas considered. Wireframing allows web designers to interpret their views and thoughts into a graphic interface.
- Mockups can be measured as a communicating version of the wireframe that comes with all the colors, graphics special effects added. Mockups are the closest form to the real Web page layout and content seen by the users when the website gets live.
B) SEO
People think SEO is an easy task, but in the real world, it?s not like that. ?It consists with lots of activities that and techniques. However, it is not possible as a web developer to do whole SEO but they can focus on some core activities while developing a website. So here we are going to cover some prerequisite that can help them to cover basic SEO.- URL Structure: Including search engine, friendly URLs for each of web pages is highly followed in on-page SEO, as these bring good crawling. Shorter URLs seem to accomplish better in search engine results, however; there are exceptions to this rule.
- Create sitemap: You can create both sitemaps (HTML and XML). HTML is user and XML is used by Google or another search engine. So try to upload basic sitemap and structurize it the proper way.
- Technical SEO: This involves the elements of a page that the user can?t see without looking at the source code of the website. Some of them are site speed, IP detection, 301 & 302 redirection, HTTP headers, Crawler access, Javascript and CSS. So you need to fix these all things before proceeding further. Here distilled mentioned awesome guideline on technical SEO wins for a web developer.
C) Content
It is truly said, ?content is the king?. For a web developer placement of the content matters a lot for optimum productivity. After developing a website, you must focus on how your content is displayed in search engine results and across social media. So you can check these options- Social metadata: Using social metadata can help to get the best possible click-through rate from the two most popular social media websites. So we need to add metadata for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn
- Rich snippet: Including structured data markup in web content helps Google algorithms better index and understand the content.
- Structured data: You can mark up data that you feel are important for users. Like any keywords, thoughts, references etc.
Along with these you also need to check these following points- Highlight some of the key points or services
- Choose best color options
- Choose the right combination of different color and also anchor text
- Continuously
Do you have any idea of other for a web developer? Share your comments with us here.Author Bio. :- Priya is a Technical SEO at Hopinfirst, a leading mobile app development company which provide best ios app development and Android app development Services. by Nick Throlson | Oct 8, 2018 | Web Design
Magento 2 is now almost three years old and despite the company pushing hard for businesses to migrate from Magento 1.x, there has been abysmal momentum till now. We?ll get into some of the reasons why businesses are so reluctant to move on to the next technology but it is worth noting at this point that as Magento 1.x reaches its end-of-life in 2019, they seem to have little choice but migrate. And while Magento has stepped in to alleviate any panic by announcing at least 18 months of additional support, the passive message it is sending is that it?s time businesses seriously start working on a migration plan.After all, depending on the size of your business, the actual migration itself may take around 3-4 months and if you throw in the extra few weeks for prioritizing tasks, negotiating with Magento developers, and post-migration troubleshooting, the entire process would easily skew over six months.Read Related: You Need to Know All About Magento 2So what if you refuse to migrate?
Well, technically there is no compulsion for you migrate to Magento 2.x. It?s not like that other software that simply stops working unless you update them. But it has its implications. First of all, you would stop receiving security updates, thus making your platform not just vulnerable but the prime target for cyber-attacks. From active attacks on servers and websites to passive snooping, you will be essentially on your own. Then there will also be the gradual degradation in performance, spiraling into a mediocre if not bad user experience. At such point, the store essentially losses all its leverage of using a sophisticated platform like Magento. This should make it clear for any business that migrating to Magento 2.x is now a matter of when not if.Why are businesses reluctant?
Upgrading an eCommerce store from Magento 1.x to Magento 2.x isn?t like updating your smartphone. It?s more like rebuilding your store with a new set of tools that comes with a whole lot of challenges:Disruption
The first concern that most businesses have when they consider migration is the disruption that it would ensue into. Many of them have a perfectly fine store but migration would mean:- Building new themes from ground up
- Building new extensions that aren?t supported in Magento 2
- Discontinuity in business operations
Cost
Migrating from Magento 1.x to Magento 2.x isn?t just a matter and inconvenience but also comes with considerable overhead costs including:Uncertainties
Along with the disruption and cost, migrating your well-running store to a new platform also involves some unforeseen risks which include:- Any change in indexing can cause problems in SEO with potential traffic and revenue loss.
- Magento 2 is still a long way from being mature and there are still many stability related issues that will uncover only after you start using it.
So what should you do?
Knowing that you have to migrate your store one way or the other, there is no use waiting for the last moment. Plus given that almost all stores running on Magento will now move to migrate. The sooner you act, the more chances are that any top Magento development company would be available for your project.
by Nick Throlson | Sep 19, 2018 | Web Design
What is personal branding?
A personal branding is a reference that we give off to our listeners while establishing or promoting thoughts that we stand for. A personal branding is a unique trait that combines our skill sets and the experience that we have accumulated over the years. A personal branding consists of features that make us who we are and thus establishes a unique feature that helps the world to judge us better.What is a brand?
A brand does not necessarily have to be an organisation or a company, anything and everything can be a brand nowadays. A brand doesn't have to be companies like Apple or Microsoft; it can also be a unique trait that showcases the skills of a person. You can have a brand both that has its presence both online and offline.Why is personal branding important?
Gone are the good old days where there were very few speakers and influencers in the market. In 2018 we have tons of people who are ready to leave their mark on the world and honestly, they are pretty good. But despite being good they might not just make it to the top. To survive the competition and to be the best, personal branding helps in leaving a mark on people. When done right personal branding can get you really famous.How can personal branding help you?
a.When you have a personal brand of your own and go on to an interview your potential employers will give you the first preference as you have some experience in the field.
b.Also while promotions your name will tend to come first up in the list of potential candidates.
c.You will get better job placements depending upon your skill sets.
d.You will be a preferred name for partnerships as your image will definitely help the company in increasing its goodwill.
e.If you run a business and it is online based then the good reputation that you have earned via personal branding will also affect your company. People will want to invest in your business and customers will get assurance. Being a media house affects your online image hugely.A guide to personal branding and why is it so trending in 2018?
Personal branding is surely not something that one can achieve overnight in a jiffy, branding needs a lot of work and almost years of experience to get it right. Only when you are famous among a certain group of people, they will know who you are and you will have a brand of your own.
There is no one single way to have a brand, there are tips and tricks that people in the field prefer but when done right anything can work. Many entrepreneurs across the world have successfully transformed into personal brands and have become as famous as their brand itself. You can take help from a branding agency, there are quite a few good branding agency in Chennai.
There can be many ways through which one can be branded and social media is one of the most important and powerful ones. In order to be famous in the social media circle, you need to revamp your entire account. Here are a few simple ways on how you can do that.
a.The most important thing is to create and curate the most engaging content.
b.Another good rule of thumb is to keep your thoughts and content positive. Try not to deal with super sensitive matters that might get you into trouble.
c.You can also join groups with like-minded people.
d.Try and keep your brand tone consistent.
by Nick Throlson | Sep 13, 2018 | Business, Web Design
Why did you create a blog? Was it something you wanted to use as a means to make money? Did you create a blog to give people an insight into your personal life? Is your blog a means to express interest in a particular hobby? Whatever the reason, your blog doesn't only have to stand as a means to provide you with wealth. It can go beyond an insight into your life, or a few tips and tricks on a particular topic. Your blog could stand for something truly meaningful. This could be your platform to make a positive impact in the world around you.One blog can make a difference. And that blog could be yours!But where do you start?It starts with an idea. What is that really stirs up your emotions? When you switch on the news, which stories provoke a strong reaction from you? What topics are impacting your life? There are people who blog about social change, raising awareness about hot topics - how black lives matter, police brutality, transgenderism, the #me too movement, as examples - giving a voice through their experiences, or giving a voice for others, promoting change and disruption. There are people who blog about global issues - world poverty, the environment, and global warming - looking to make a difference to the world through the power of the written word. You can do the same.Research the issue you are interested in. The more honest your blog is, the more credible it will become. Find out more about the topic that is driving your heart by reading other blogs (check our previous links for a start), watching the news, and picking up news journals. Don't rely on half-truths you may have heard elsewhere, but use genuine sources to gather hard facts about the matter at hand. Of course, you may have direct experience with certain issues, so the truth can also come from you and what you have been subject to first hand.Create posts that will raise awareness. With the knowledge you have received, focus your writing on stirring up the passions of others. Provide links to news sources and articles based on research and study. Write with conviction and courage and from the heart. You may not be popular in certain quarters with your writing, but if it really is an issue that means something to you, then providing there is truth and you aren't being libelous, go for it, and write with positive intent.Share your posts. After writing your posts, you need to spread the word about them, using marketing fundamentals to boost your readership. Your social media networks are a start, but also consider the issues you have been writing about. There are bound to be forums online that relate to your blog, so add your voice to the many and provide a link to what you have written. You may also want to connect to charities directly - if your blog could help their work, they may be willing to share what you have written on their websites. And speak to anybody you know who can get behind you, especially if they share your passion for change. Ask them to share the word with people and networks they are involved in.Provide actionable steps. People have read your posts, but what can they do next? They need actionable steps to help the cause. Therefore, link to any charities that are connected to your posts. Point them in the direction of fundraisers, such as globalfacesdirect.com. ?Give them ideas on how they can provide support. Create boycott forms or petitions that your readers can sign up to or link to similar online. And encourage people to share their stories, giving their opinion on the issues that matter. They can do this on their blogs or even contribute to yours. It's about paying it forward and ensuring your words make an impact beyond your corner of the internet.
One blog can make a difference. Can yours?
by Nick Throlson | Sep 10, 2018 | Off Topic, Web Design, WordPress
WordPress owns almost 30% of the websites present over the internet today. It is one of the most popular website builder offering dozens of plugins and features. If you are planning to build a WordPress website, then here are some of its popular plugins that will be beneficial for your website:
SEO can make your website discoverable over the internet and it is a compulsion to make your target audience find you. Yoast SEO plugin helps in auditing your website content to make it SEO-friendly. It is one of the best SEO plugin provided by WordPress with over 5 million installations. Although the basic version is free, the premium version costs you some money but it also provides you with a good return. You get one-year access to the support team plus expand the SEO scope to News, Video, Local and WooCommerce.
Spam can be anything that comes from a very unreliable source and it generally degrades your website. This can be avoided through WordPress?s Akismet Anti-Spam plugin. It automatically deletes unhealthy content that comes in the form of comments and content form submissions. Another anti-spam plugin which is popular for its intelligent filtering is Spam combat. It allows the website owner to manually flag the content as Spam or Not Spam.
Another must-have plugin for each and every WordPress website is JetPack and it also comes by default. It has ample of features to support your website from customization tools to site analytics and spam protection. Some of the other features include lazy image loading, high-speed CDN, and downtime-monitoring. This plugin has got everything to help you from the beginning until the very end.
As the name suggests, Broken Link Checker is a plugin offered for WordPress sites to fix broken links. Dead or broken links are the links that do not redirect your visitor to a useful site page. And it is in the best interest of SEO to resolve such links as it impacts user experience. This plugin makes sure there are no more such links in your website by finding them and notifying you through email. ?
WP-Optimize works for cleaning and maintaining your site database. It runs an automatic clean-up at a fixed time scheduled by you to remove unnecessary data occupying your database. This ultimately helps your website run smoothly and efficiently.
Image optimization is another part of SEO. Images with large dimensions are usually slow in loading and it creates a bad impression if your website if such images take forever to load. But the case is altogether different if you have WP Smush installed. It resizes and compresses your images to make it load faster and save up space.
To ensure the integrity of the site, WordPress comes up with the WordFence Security plugin. It has some of the very important features like:- Malware scanning
- Core file, themes, plugins, and backdoors scanning
- SEO spam protection
- Malicious redirect support
- Code injection identification
It identifies any hacking attempts by providing information like the IP address of the hacker, origin and time of hacking.
Caching improves both your website?s SEO as well as user experience. It enhances site performance and reduces download time. W3 Total Caches comes is with all the features to improve your site?s overall performance.
The uniqueness of this plugin is the aesthetic looks of social sharing icons that can help anyone stand out from the rest. Its lightweight code helps in loading icons quickly. Apart from this, it also allows you to display the count if your social shares. With the support of over 100 social media platforms, this is a must-have plugin for websites. Conclusion:
Though there are several other options alternatives available, the above-mentioned plugins are a must for efficient website setup. What?s your thought regarding the above-mentioned plugins? Share your thought in a comment section. by Nick Throlson | Sep 5, 2018 | Web Design
The rise of NodeJS can be summed up in a single statement- what PHP was in the last decade, NodeJS is today. For a detailed review, we?ll need to dig deeper.Internet, since its inception, has come a long way both in terms of how users connect and the services they use. If we talk about connectivity, dial-up connections and privately managed servers have been replaced by broadband and cloud while a similar seismic shift can be observed in services. But until recently, one aspect largely remained untouched- how those services worked. The browser sends a request to the server, to which server responds and waits for another request. While this architecture worked well in the early days, it now poses a two-edged problem:- Clients have to wait for server response despite their fast connectivity
- The server is highly underutilized given their huge multi-core processing power
NodeJS is popular and widely adopted primarily because it solves both of these problems. Plus the fact that it doesn?t cause any additional overhead by using an already popular language- JavaScript, makes it an appealing choice for even smaller projects that don?t necessarily face those problems.How NodeJS works?
Technically speaking, NodeJS works in a non-blocking I/O mode. If that sounds cryptic, consider this- the browser requests the server, the server while processing that request, doesn?t block other connections and keeps listening for any other requests. The first request when processed is sent back to the browser. This not only reduces the latency for many clients but also maximizes server utility.Now add to this the fact that NodeJS bridges the gap between the server and client-side programming languages, thus drastically reducing the rendering time for the browser, you?ll get the full picture of how NodeJS makes web applications faster and scalable.NodeJS at its Best
While these capabilities serve basically all categories of web applications, there are some cases where it is instrumental in enabling those services.Real-time applications
Services that need to work with data in real-time have minimal tolerance for latency and as discussed above, NodeJS excels in this regard. The fact that applications like Uber and PayPal use NodeJS at their backend is a testimony to that claim.Streaming application
Owing to its non-blocking mode with minimal rending, NodeJS enables applications to offer seamless streaming experience. If you ever used Netflix, you are already familiar with its underlying power and efficiency.Single-page applications
Single page apps are the new trend in web development due to its better user experience. And because such applications rely heavily on client-side, the minimal rendering ensured by NodeJS makes it a good fit for building such apps.Dashboard
NodeJS is capable of tracking and visualizing user action on an application and thus makes an excellent option for creating dashboards.Now if we sum it all up, we are sure you?ll get a definite answer to the question we begun with- why use NodeJS?- It?s easy to learn
- There are tons of third-party tools for JS, that make a highly productive development environment
- It offers cross-platform support
- Its use of Google's V8 engine ensures high performance
- Excellent for modern apps like chatting and streaming
- Open source tag and corporate backing guarantees consistent improvement
- Cheap development and hosting solutions
Overall, if you wish to build a robust, scalable web application, just hire a NodeJS developer and you won?t possibly regret your choice. In fact, even the long-standing web development companies who have experience working with all technologies are resorting to NodeJS as their goto technology for new projects.
Magento 2 is now almost three years old and despite the company pushing hard for businesses to migrate from Magento 1.x, there has been abysmal momentum till now. We?ll get into some of the reasons why businesses are so reluctant to move on to the next technology but it is worth noting at this point that as Magento 1.x reaches its end-of-life in 2019, they seem to have little choice but migrate. And while Magento has stepped in to alleviate any panic by announcing at least 18 months of additional support, the passive message it is sending is that it?s time businesses seriously start working on a migration plan.After all, depending on the size of your business, the actual migration itself may take around 3-4 months and if you throw in the extra few weeks for prioritizing tasks, negotiating with Magento developers, and post-migration troubleshooting, the entire process would easily skew over six months.Read Related: 
Caching improves both your website?s 
The rise of NodeJS can be summed up in a single statement- what PHP was in the last decade, NodeJS is today. For a detailed review, we?ll need to dig deeper.Internet, since its inception, has come a long way both in terms of how users connect and the services they use. If we talk about connectivity, dial-up connections and privately managed servers have been replaced by broadband and cloud while a similar seismic shift can be observed in services. But until recently, one aspect largely remained untouched- how those services worked. The browser sends a request to the server, to which server responds and waits for another request. While this architecture worked well in the early days, it now poses a two-edged problem:
