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We’ve all used the above in our designs. Easier than writing actual content isn’t it?

Recently I was handed some designs to code up. Majority of content in lorem ipsum. Fine I said, went away and built the templates. And then the client copy came back…

Now, nothing lines up, some boxes look empty whereas some look over populated with text. Basically the designs don’t work with the content provided.

A couple of years ago, maybe three now. I was involved with a major overhaul of a social networking site. Blogs, forums, videos the lot. We used lorem ipsum in the designs and when it came to importing live data, it looked awful. The nice blocks of text were no more. This prompted several redesigns and filler content being provided, normally in the shape of an advert or button. From that moment on, I’ve tried to make content look real if I don’t have copy. Saves any heartache and surprises.

Content is king and its time we all saw it as that.

The camera phone as progressed to the point where I had a decent one ( HTC Desire ) but I still wasn’t really getting many photos and more often than not, I was rushing to get a shot.

Last year, I started to see photos on the web created using an app called Instagram. I was impressed. I couldn’t wait to download it for the phone and then it hit me. Instagram wasn’t available on Android.

Gutted.

So the camera was put back in the box so to speak. Until last month when finally Instagram hit Android. And wow, I’ve come alive as has the camera phone.

Now many will say, “Look at Dan, thinks he’s a photographer now.”

That’s fine, I accept many will think Instagram is bad with its filters but I’ve been using it for fun and am enjoying getting out and taking photos. Some good, some bad, it’s trial and error. I’m still learning but I’ve really got the photography bug and could easily take it up as a hobby.

Finally an app that has changed my life.

Thanks Instagram

You can find me on Instagram under danjdavies or download the app here

More often than not, when the developers get the first sniff of the job, the functionality that was discussed will either take a lot longer than the 5 minutes quoted by the project manager, there isn’t enough detail to build or isn’t possible in its current format.

Either way, the account manager isn’t thinking, “Why didnt I ask first?” By this point, he’s handed you the bomb and is walking off, job done.

STOP!

Something I worked hard to get put into place in the team I managed a couple of years back was for a dev and designer to be present when briefs were being discussed. This helped the process and ensured whoever was going to sell it / write it up knew the score and that there would be no nasty surprises when they hit send on the email.

So if you are an account handler or project manager, just because you can log into your Yahoo email and have a tumblr account doesn’t mean you know how things work.

Use your devs.

I’ve done diets before and exercised but nothing really kept me hooked. I did the Atkins diet and lost a load of weight soon to put it back on again.

A few weeks back, I was speaking to a mate about the “caveman diet”. I looked it up and read the food base. Looked ok but the recipes looked complicated and being in North Wales, I reckoned it would be hard to get the ingredients.

Now I’ve been ill for a good few months with various things and when I spoke to my mate again, he said flushing the system may be of benefit so I decided to give it a go.

I’m 2 weeks in now, ok so its not a massive amount of time and I’ll be honest, its hard to get motivated to make a meal but I feel like I am winning.

I’ve cut out bread, chocolate, pasta, potatoes, most of dairy and fizzy drinks. I’m drinking loads of water and now a treat is a cup of tea with 1 sugar.

Is it hard? I thought it would be but I am enjoying the salads and the veg. I find myself trying to invent new ideas and have been given some great ideas by people I know. I’ve picked the right time to do it too with summer just around the corner.

Already I am being told I’ve lost weight so that’s a good sign.

Have I fallen off the wagon? Yes of course, but not badly and I’ve been keen to rectify it.

Only downside is the cost. This country.

First off, (While I type this, my little girl is using a baby spoon to pick her nose) I have spent the good part of February and March in Manchester freelancing. It’s been amazing. I’d go as far to say it has shaped my future.

Up until January, I havent done many cities. London, Nottingham, a couple abroad but mainly I am a town boy and rarely venture out. My days were spent at home on the couch building websites so to suddenly be on a train at 6 every morning was a huge culture shock. I didnt know the city at all and being a Liverpool fan, the thought of travelling there didnt really appeal to me. How wrong I was.

I love the place.

I’ve made friends there, I know where to get a decent meal and where the sexy waitresses work. I have lunch with fellow devs and importantly have gained a confidence I never had before. I’d say I was bordering on being agrophobic but now I feel like I can do anything. Long may it continue.

Something I noticed recently when I had a couple of days at home was, whilst I did a bit of work, it was nice to be home and relax and I then realised that my home life and work life were just one entity and being away working meant I was able to split the two and so now when I am home, I tend to be relaxing.

Enough of that. What have I done with Javascript, WordPress and PHP?

I’ve been really getting into Javascript mainly thanks to the jobs I have been working on, same with WordPress. PHP I’ve yet to dig into properly. Still time though.

As always my blog post seems rushed but I tend to write better from the heart and in one take otherwise I’d never get it done.

How’s your year going?

Then one day I joined Twitter.

It took me a while to get into it. Finding the balance wasnt easy for me but I ranted about where I worked and I started to make tweets turn into followers…and more followers meant more people who knew the industry.

So for 2 years, I’ve been interacting with these people, talking, ranting and laughing at the web, the people in it, the redesigns, the new techniques and the latest meme. It’s been fun. I feel like I know these people. We all seem to get on and are out to help should we need it.

The web is cool like that.

And then a week ago. New Adventures happened.

This was the first time I saw the community in action outside of the internet. It was inspiring.

I’m quite a shy person to begin with but people were engaging (well most were but that’s another post for the future) and although we were chatting face to face, it felt like we were friends before we’d even met. Quite strange. It was here that I realised that I wasnt really alone and that we’re not all working against each other for work but rather we were all in it together and we were trying to make it work for all of us.

Now I’ve been doing some freelance in Manchester of late. I’d met a few guys before Naconf a few weeks back. We had a pint and pizza and it was nice. A one off maybe?

Anyway in Manchester, I was free for lunch. The agency I am at, I’m fairly new so being the shy guy I am thought I’ll just slip out and grab a sandwich. Then it hit me.

I knew a few people in Manchester. I wonder what they are doing. So I tweeted and @gablaxian responded (he always does) so we met for a pint and a chat. We did it 2 days on the trot. It was great. Someone I hardly knew took the time to grab a pint with me.

Last night, I went to a small do in Liverpool called BigSwig. I caught the train with another front end chap called @madebymagnolia. We met up with a load of other front enders from Liverpool/Manchester/North West. Again, it was like mates around a pub table.

This is turning into a long winded and boring story for many but the point I think I’m trying to make is that in my head, the community is a new and exciting thing. Obviously its been there for years, I just never took it to the next level.

I feel part of something now. I feel part of a community.

I started out writing a whole story about the days in Nottingham but gathered not many would read it, so instead…highlights.

Wednesday highlights

1. John and his exploding cans of Guinness.
2. The girl on the train with perhaps the shortest skirt ever ( my best moment).
3. Catching up again with old faces and meeting new ones at the curry. Nice to meet Rachilli finally. And she wasn’t wearing that god awful coat either. Tim Harbour, Jon Gold, Anthony Casey, Ginger Jamie from Newcastle/Leeds/Hull, Alex Sexton and Robert O ‘Rourke, Tom J Nowell and so many others.
4. Dylan trying to retrieve a bowling ball and falling on his arse as he slipped on the lane floor.

Thursday highlights

1. Talks by Dan Moll, Naomi Atkinson, Travis Scmeisser, Robbie Manson, Cameron Koczon, Trent Walton, Denise Jacobs and Frank Chimero. Best of which was Dan’s but they were all good. Some positives and great advice to take from all of them.
2. Seeing my old mate Jon from Blackpool and catching up with @malarkey (snazzy hat)
3. Meeting more people off Twitter – a few mentions. Ben aka @ilmv and Shane aka @shanegriffiths are two of the nicest people I got to meet. Jake Smith IS Justin Lee Collins and Cole Henley looks as cool in the flesh as he does his avatar. Others but only briely were David Roessli, James Greenwood, @Mr_Stezz, Denise Jacobs, Paul Annett and Jon Hicks ( I shook his hand but that counts as meeting to me. He won’t remember me mind.)
4. Free booze.

Friday highlights

1. Getting home to shit load of emails and no milk.

Sad that I didnt get to meet all my twitter contacts. Laura Kalbag, Zach “la” Inglis and Elliot Ross (and others I am sure I forgot), you managed to escape. Next time it is.

All in all, a great time was had. Would have been nice to have met newer faces but it’s hard I guess trying to keep up with so many people.

@colly.. same time next year please.

Starting this week, I began getting to know Javascript. Being able to do some jQuery is fine but I’m seeing more and more roles require Javascript so that has to go top of my list.

Then comes WordPress. There is so much I don’t know about this badboy that I need/want to know. I want to push on with this as I see no need to use any other CMS.

And finally PHP. You could argue that it’s not a required skill for front-end development but it would be nice to be able to add this to my bow especially with WordPress.

So that’s it, Javascript, WordPress and PHP. Getting to know you.

So what have I learnt, what are my standout moments?

1. Responsive design.
This year I started to use media queries. I’d heard a bit about them and I’ll be honest, was very perplexed by it. But I had two very good teachers in @malarkey and @simon180 who have given me invaluable support and knowledge in applying it to my own designs. I’m still getting to know it but I am smitten with it.

It is still a new way of working but I expect it to be used by more and more people in 2012. I also expect the hype around it to calm down and before long, responsive will just become the norm.

2. How hard freelancing can be.
I’ve touched on this before but running a business is hard. It’s made hard by the fact that you rely on other people to do things for you. This year financially has been tough. Getting people to pay up for work seems to be a harder process than I realised. The emotional drain of sending email after email and seeing no effort on the other party’s side can send you loopy. Especially when the sites are live and being used. It’s not just me, I know that. The problem won’t go away either.

Something else that was a drain was relying on work coming in and it then not appearing. Nothing is guaranteed these days so come 2012, I’m not going to be making the mistakes I made this year.

3. Designing in the browser
When I worked full time in Chester, it was expected of us to provide PSD’s of all designs. Fine if its 1 or 2 but I was once asked to provide close to 100 designs for pages that were essentially the same but for images and content. At the time I said no, I built the template and we added content via the backend. Saved me hours / days even. I got a severe bollocking for “changing from the plan”.

This year I made the conscious effort to spend less time designing sites in Photoshop and focus on building in the browser. It has paid off for me. I spend less time worrying about layout and less time tweaking and amending stuff that will be done in code.

There is no right or wrong way when designing / building. It’s what works best for you.

4. The community
An up and down year it seems. But every week, you could bank on some argument or other. The majority of the time I enjoy conversing with everybody but sometimes it’s a drain hearing the trolling and the nit picking. Hopefully 2012 will be focussed more on the good work the community and the industry gets up to.

I’ve made some very good friends though and come February, I will have met a few in the flesh. Despite the fact that the majority of us are competing for business, it still amazes me how sometimes people can go beyond the call of duty to help.

5. WordPress
I knew very little of WordPress until @simon180 showed me the power. Through his guidance, I’m really starting to get to grips with it. It’s a great setup, easy to use and the support for it is fantastic. 2012 is a year I want to push on and get to the next level with it as I doubt I’ll use any other CMS again.

So that is it from me for 2011. A big thanks to everyone who have been in touch, who sent me work, who listened to me moan.

Enjoy Christmas.

Communication.

Is it me or are people just really bad at it? Twitter, emails, you name it. People seem to not bother anymore.

I follow a fair few people on twitter and a fair few follow me. One thing I’ve always tried to do is reply to anybody who gets in touch. I genuinely feel bad if I miss someone. I don’t ignore people intentionally, my door is always open as they say.

I’ve contacted a load of people in the past and got nothing back. Some were about work, some were answers to questions, some were questions themselves. Maybe they didn’t get my email? Maybe they were not online and missed the tweet?

Who knows.

I sent a load of emails out earlier this month to agencies in my local area. In all about 15 emails went out introducing myself, what I do and seeing if they worked with freelancers. 1 got back to me.

I’ve read over and over what I put and what I wrote was polite, straight to the point and they had enough evidence of what I could do so I know I wasn’t offensive or cocky or didn’t give them enough detail.

I found the same last year too when I was looking for a job. Hardly anyone got back to me. Not even a thanks for your email, we dont have anything / we will keep your files on record.

It wasn’t just email. Twitter users are just as bad. For some companies, they are selling Social media as a service yet their own social media awareness is shocking. Some asking if freelancers are available and not even responding to your tweet. Even down to tweets congratulating someone or asking a question about something that person is doing.

I hate moaning would you believe. I’d rather we all got on with our lives and did what we are paid for, but at times things happen that shouldn’t. Twitter is a great platform for keeping in touch, engaging with people, and the majority of people I engage with are fantastic people yet I see some that clearly want to self promote and not engage, many only engaging with their innercircle.

Maybe if we eradicate some of the above, there will be less bitterness in the industry.