I liked the dark look of Pixel and it seemed like an easy to read template. For the most part that template has worked. There were two issues though that just seemed to rub me the wrong way.

I wasn’t sure I really liked the background graphic but that is something that can be changed rather easily. The problem of course is that the background image wasn’t just the graphic itself but also included the area for the text and heading as well.

Still I didn’t have a lot of time to mess with things so I quickly created a graphic and put the theme in place. Since I was already in Photoshop I decided I would make a few other graphic files as well so that I could swap them out when I got tired of one.

That of course led to a modification of the Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) whereby the site would pull a different background graphic for each day of the month. After all why should I spend time changing background graphics when I can let the system change them for me automatically?

This theme was working and I figured I would just add the content and let it go its merry way. The more I started looking at it though the more I was bothered by the static width of the theme.

I’ve gotten used to the fluid width that CSS can provide and I really wanted my blog to be more fluid. The problem is that Pixel was based specifically on a static width. With a little time on my hands now that baseball season is over I decided to rewrite the code and make it a fluid theme.

I changed out the various areas and removed the static widths from the CSS. I recreated all of the graphics to be more fluid in width and in the end I had basically rewritten Pixel but as a fluid width template.

I really liked the rounded corners of the original graphics of Pixel but did not want to deal with the hassle of rounding corners with JavaScript, image files, and other hacks. Given CSS3’s corner rounding abilities I made a conscious decision to forego CSS 2.1 compliance and instead utilize the CSS3 code.

I used to stress over my coding making sure every single line was compliant but recently that has become less important to me. Life is too short to worry about whether my design looks good on old browsers.

Most of the users who visit my blog are using the newest generation of browser so I am not missing out on too much. For those who insist on still using Internet Explorer all I can say is I’m sorry but I refuse to cater to inferior technology so things look good for you.

It might sound harsh but if you want to experience this site and others around the Internet with the best experience possible I recommend upgrading to FireFox, Safari, or Google Chrome. You have no idea what you are missing.

For those with a next generation standards compliant browser I hope you enjoy the new fluid theme. This time I think I am content. Of course I said that three revisions ago so there’s no telling how long before I change it again.

I used Joomla as the content management system to give the site it’s form and structure. The content was categorized and laid out in a way that would make it easy for the Webmaster to manage and maintain.

There was one area that was of paramount importance. The club needed an online calendar system where they could enter all of the various rides and activities to allow the site visitors to quickly see what was coming up.

Joomla does not have a calendar feature per se but through the use of extensions it offers the ability to augment core functionality with new features. I began searching for a calendaring module and finally settled on JCal Pro from Anything Digital.

This Joomla extension provides not only an online calendar but also modules to display the next few activities in a bulleted fashion. JCal Pro began as a non-commercial product but has since moved to being a full commercial implementation.

Anything Digital offers a subscription plan that allows you to download the latest version of JCal Pro for a specified time. I selected the Develop Special 1 bundle, which gave me access to JCal Pro version 1.5 as well as the newer JCal Pro version 2.

Besides download capabilities the subscription also allows you forum access to post questions and get product support. The Developer Special 1 bundle will grant you access not just to JCal Pro but also for Anything Digital’s application RSVP and Advanced Search.

I downloaded the software and installed it onto the Foothills HOG Joomla site. The installation was fairly simple and follows the standard implementation using the Joomla Administration module.

It did not take long to get the system up and running but there are some caveats to be considered. Joomla does not recognize the concept of daylight saving time so twice a year the JCal Pro gets a little confused. This usually means having to go in and manually adjusting the dates or times to get things on the right track.

JCal Pro manages time itself and Joomla does likewise. Trying to get your hands around how each interact is a logic puzzle that can at times be frustrating. The JCal Pro development is fairly active meaning there have been several upgrades during the first year of implementation.

It has been a little frustrating because the bugs that I have encountered in the application seem to come and go with each successive implementation. There are also some features that are missing that you would just expect to be there. Printing a calendar resulted in a creative hack uncovered through the forums otherwise that was not included in the base package.

The types of data that can be displayed is also incomplete making it confusing to the inexperienced administrator. With each successive upgrade there have been issues regarding the existing data. In some instances it has required re-inputting the data, a very tedious process.

Many of the bug fixes and changes show up in later releases but as beta versions requiring the Joomla Administrator to run beta extensions on a production server. This is ripe for problems and has come into play in more than one occasion.

Despite all of the trials and tribulations JCal Pro has performed adequately. Of all the calendar extensions currently available, it seems to be the most feature-rich and stable. I’m continuing to use it but cringe every time I have to make changes to it since you never know what will break next.

I’d love to give this extension a raving review but given its track record I hesitate recommending this to all Joomla administrators. If you need a calendar system and you don’t mind a little extra work JCal Pro could be just what you’re looking for.

Once a framework has been established, the reader is now ready for a more Macintosh specific book to help them learn application development. A follow-up book to Learn C on the Mac is Learn Objective–C on the Mac (Learn Series) by Mark Dalrymple and Scott Knaster.

The Objective-C book, like the Learn C book, is published by Apress publishing. They do a very good job of editing the text and organizing the books to make them understandable and flow appropriately.

It should be noted that the Objective-C for the Mac book is not a beginning programming book. It rightfully assumed that the reader has experience in software development and specifically in C. Without this experience the subjects covered in this book will quickly go over the reader’s head leaving them confused and frustrated.

Learn Objective-C on the Mac begins with a description of the extensions to C that make up Objective-C. This affords the reader with necessary background information for what is different over and beyond the standard C language.

After an introduction to object oriented programming the book discusses the Macintosh development tool suite that makes up Xcode. The Xcode environment is integral in the text of this book and provides a good reference for the toolset.

Besides basic coding, Learn Objective-C on the Mac offers good information on memory management and optimization techniques that will be invaluable to the budding Mac developer.

This book is not an easy read. The best way to utilize it is as a reference and a companion while attempting the code on a computer. Unless you have tremendous amount of prior software development experience it would be hard to follow the examples just on paper.

From a perspective of learning Xcode and the nuances of Objective-C on the Macintosh this book will do a decent job of introducing the terms and gives you enough information that you can delve in further in areas you might find interesting.

This may not be the ultimate Macintosh development manual but it contains enough good information and programming examples that it will get you up and running in minimal time and by the end of the book you should have the knowledge necessary to be a Macintosh developer.

As a child I remember the neighborhood was a community. Your family interacted with other families living around them. Yards rarely had fences and everyone congregated in front of their houses. When they saw neighbors out they went out of their way to greet them and engage in conversation.

As I’ve gotten older I’ve noticed that neighborhoods and communities have changed. Now there are gated communities where people are locked behind enclosed fortresses. Everyone has a walled fence around their property and few people venture outside of their home or converse with anyone outside of their family.

Perhaps this is a function of growth and change or perhaps it is indicative of the fear people are developing about the horrors of society. No matter the reasons, people have become closed off from others.

Humans are by nature social creatures and this isolation is difficult for many to manage. With the proliferation of the Internet and immediate communication channels, communities have emerged in the digital world. People feel safe hiding behind a keyboard and screen knowing that if they are rejected there are thousands of others who will accept them.

These social media communities are similar to those created on this continent during the expansion westward in the early days of this country. Rather than travelling by wagon train or horse, the adventurers are arriving via the browser.

If the traveler feels comfortable, they may stay in the community building it up adding another resident. Many though are just passing through trying to find a place to settle where they feel comfortable. In this case the traveler may create an account in a community then wander away to continue searching for the right place.

In some cases like myself, I am more of a mountain man. I may be gone for an extended period of time then return to one settlement or another trading my wares with the local citizens then disappearing again into the wilderness.

From this perspective it sometimes becomes hard for a community to find you since you come and go with the seasons. What is needed is a mailbox or some way for the other settlers to know who this mysterious man is that wanders into their community.

For that reason I created a Social Media Hub. This is a type of address book where settlers can go to find out what my address in the various Social Media communities. The hub resides on my personal web site and graphically displays each of the social communities where I belong.

This is a Joomla module that I wrote. In the administration tool the Social Media Hub module will track your social media profile for 56 different social media web sites. For each of these you can enter your user name and it will direct site visitors to the appropriate profile page on each service.

So far it has worked quite well. I have set it to be able to adjust the icon size and icon type. Through testing on the 26 different social media sites I personally have accounts for it seems to be working as designed.

Now when someone wants to find me on a specific social media site all they have to do is visit my web page and click on the appropriate icon and it will redirect them to my profile allowing them to send me a message. The next time I wander out of the wilderness and visit that social media community I will have a message.

I have also become a big fan of Twitter as a communication tool. Within its 140-character limit you are able to share all kinds of information and reach people you may not otherwise be in contact with.

Through using Twitter I have made several friends and contacts. Many of these contacts want to be notified whenever content changes on my web site. Out of the box, Joomla does not offer the ability to broadcast site changes to Twitter.

Like many other features though, the development community has come to the aid of web site owners and have developed Joomla extensions that will incorporate this new functionality. A quick search of the Joomla Extension Library showed that there are several modules capable of integrating with Joomla.

I think I tried each of the modules attempting to find a good balance of functionality with minimal interaction by the web site owner. After all, what good is a solution if it requires you to spend more time managing the tool than the benefit you derive from it?

Initially I used an extension called Twitter Status. It would allow me to post a Twitter message each time I published a new article. It did not allow posting of updates and was relatively basic in its functionality. The developer first introduced Twitter Status as a free extension but then decided to make it commercial leaving early adopters hanging unless they paid.

From my research I could not determine whether the newer version would allow any additional functionality and I was unwilling to purchase the extension without knowing whether it would meet my needs. I attempted to contact the developer but his response was basically that I was not a paid customer and therefore he had little or no time to answer my inquiries.

Based upon his responses I decided I needed to look for another solution. After installing and testing several Twitter extensions I settled on Auto Tweet written by Ulli Storck.

Auto Tweet acts as a Joomla plug-in installing through the Joomla Administration module. Once installed the plug-in is quickly configured. Besides securely storing your user name and password, the configuration page also allows you to decide whether you want the page URL appended to your Twitter message and how many attempts the plug-in should make if it is unsuccessful in posting.

You can define specific sections and categories that will be tweeted and you can exclude sections and categories. You can post just new articles or modified or private articles. You can also include static text and hash tags to your messages to make sure the tweet reaches the appropriate audience.

Overall Auto Tweet has worked flawlessly and I have received several comments from friends thanking me for keeping them informed of changes to my web site. It is one of those set it and forget it kind of extensions that make managing a web site easier while driving traffic to your pages.

Suffice it to say there is no easy answer to what is the right book or training that will make you a Macintosh developer. The good news is there are many avenues you can take to learn programming on the Macintosh and many of them will be dependent upon what your level of knowledge is going into the development process.

Recently I have found myself trying to get developers up to speed quickly not necessarily on the Macintosh OS X operating system but to get them through the basics so that they can begin developing for the iPhone.

Many of those asking for a recommendation come from a background of design or other non-programming related background. From that perspective it is necessary to begin to build a foundation of programming while introducing the tools they will ultimately utilize for development.

When the Macintosh was first released in 1984, many of the routines in the Mac ROM were Pascal based. A thorough knowledge of Pascal helped when developing applications that ran on the original Mac. As the Macintosh evolved, the development platform migrated to a more standard based set of tools.

With the introduction of OS X, Apple moved the underpinnings of their operating system to a Unix kernel, which allowed tighter integration with C as the preferred development language. C was well on its way to being the de-facto standard long before this time but in my opinion the move to OS X sealed the deal.

So anyone wanting to learn Macintosh development now really should have a basis is C and specifically in Objective-C which most of Apple’s tools will utilize. Since Objective-C is based on C I find it easier to recommend a good C book as the beginning introduction to Mac programming.

I have been recommending Learn C on the Mac (Learn Series) written by Dave Mark. This is a very good introduction to the C language and the examples all use Apple’s XCode tool suite as the editor to give the reader a good basis for using the tools they will have to be familiar with in the long term.

The book is a good mixture of history, theory, and common sense and was written not for the techie but for a typical user who has little background or knowledge for programming. This is definitely a beginning-programming book.

If you have prior C experience or any C-type language for that matter, this is not the book you want. If however you are a computer user who wants to begin to learn to develop applications this is a good primer that will begin your journey to becoming a developer.

The programming examples are fairly simple and are not Macintosh specific. The code output is primitive and uses just the console. It does not delve into the power of the Macintosh specific calls nor does it explain the nuances of UI development. It simply teaches the constructs of C.

Having this basis though will allow the reader to gain a basic knowledge and understanding of the C language, which can then be built upon by a follow-up book such as Learn Objective–C on the Mac (Learn Series) by Mark Dalrymple and Scott Knaster.

Learn C on the Mac is a fairly quick read if you are just scanning the book. The benefit really comes from building the example code and getting a hands-on experience with the XCode integrated development environment (IDE).

For those who do not want to type the code themselves, Mark provides a link to the Apress web site that has a zip file of all code examples contained in the book. This way the reader can open the files without actually having to do any keyboarding.

I’ve seen computer users with no background in programming emerge with at least a framework of knowledge they can build on by using this book. It will not make you a full-fledged Macintosh developer but will begin you down that path. For that reason I would recommend Learn C on the Mac as a good book to help anyone regardless of their age learn programming on the Macintosh.