About this guide

I ♥ Wordpress.

I use it for nearly everything now, and am delighted that its scope will be expanded with version 3, which is due out in the not-too-distant future.

One of the strengths of Wordpress is how user-friendly it is.  Clients of mine who are not particularly tech-savvy are using it and blogging and editing away.  Once they know the basics, I find that they rarely come back with problems.  However, the basics are sometimes tricky to find all in one place.  Wordpress.org’s documentation is comprehensive and excellent, but is aimed more at the expert/administrator/developer level and there isn’t much basic info there for people who simply want to post and edit their content.

I’ve created a Guide to Wordpress 2.9 for Editors, which I send to clients once their Wordpress site is set up.  I’m sharing it here as I think it might be useful to other designers.  It just runs through the basic functions of adding a new post or page, editing posts and pages, adding and editing links, and managing comments.  It also includes a brief introduction to Wordpress and explains the difference between categories and tags.  It’s a short (five page) pdf that can be saved and used as a reference.

So feel free to download and share this document. I just ask that you leave my credit on the footer, and that you comment below with your feedback if you have a spare minute.  Do you think the document is useful?  Any ommissions or errors?

Date created: Winter 2009

Web Address: www.sammcmahontrust.ie

About the Project: I built this website on a volunteer basis for the Sam McMahon Trust. Sam McMahon is an 8 year old boy from Dublin who suffers from Friedreich’s Ataxia, a degenerative neuro-muscular disorder.  Sam’s family set up the Sam McMahon Trust to raise awareness of the condition and raise funds for the Friedreich’s Ataxia Research Alliance (FARA).  Sam’s family are doing great work: it’s very inspiring to see how they are becoming advocates and reaching out to others with the condition.  The Trust runs frequent fundraising events, such as a cookery demonstration with Neven Maguire which is coming up in March.

The site is a simple Wordpress customisation, which I based on the free theme by Dimox.  The background pattern, illustration of Sam and Sam McMahon logo were designed by Elizabeth Davis.

Some of my high points from Offset 2009:

• Scott from AAD, who did a great job of balancing a presentation of their work with a wider discussion about design and creativity.
• Design legend Massimo Vignelli, who was extremely engaging and funny as he showed us decades worth of his elegant work. He had an interesting insight for me about why perpetual calendars (which I am constantly tempted by but never buy) don’t work: you have to tell them the date, which defeats the entire purpose of a calendar.
  
  House Industries: I’ve been a big fan of House Industries for a long time and it was great to see their presentation. The attention to detail that they devote to their study of type is mind-blowing. Their Photo Lettering project – the preservation of a huge archive of lettering – is fascinating, and their Photo Lettering online tool will be a great resource when it’s ready. Also, their Alexander Girard collection made me whimper with longing.  I bought this print the same day that I saw their presentation.
• Chip Kidd showed us some of his famous work and explained his creative process, and on top of that was just completely hilarious.  He’s quite similar to David Sedaris, an author that he has worked with many times.
• I probably took more pictures of Oliver Jeffers‘ work than anyones, and he did a lovely little doodle and autograph for my small girl.

Dave McKean, David Shrigley, Linda Brownlee and Anthony Burrill were also notably wonderful. And my pals Johnny Kelly, Chris Judge and Gisele Scanlon were all fantastic too.

I was really, really impressed with the polish and professionalism of many of the speakers, and how funny and charming they were.  I’ve been at a couple of presentations and conferences since Offset, and they’ve really emphasised how good the Offset speakers were.  These are clearly some people who are extremely skilled communicators, not just visually but verbally as well.

I can’t recommend Offset enough:  I’m still racking my brains as to how they managed to present such an amazing line-up and only charge €150 per ticket.  It inspired me in more ways than I could have predicted, and I’ll be there again for sure next year.

• Sign Oxfam Ireland’s petition calling on the Irish government to ensure a fair deal at the UN global climate change negotiations at Copenhagen this December.
• Donate. The world’s poorest people are the ones most directly affected by climate change.
• If you have a blog, you can write about Climate Change for Blog Action Day too.  Full details at www.blogactionday.org
• This is a design site, and I’ll repeat the call I made to designers on Blog Action Day 08: think about volunteering some of your talents and time to a charity or campaigning organisation.   A strong image may only take you a few hours to produce, but a non-profit can get years of value from it.

Date created: May 2009

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/clearurgear

About the Project: Brand new website for the ClearURGear project. The awesome posters were done by Hunter Design, I can’t get over what a great, fun, colourful redesign of the brand it is.

I put together this simple minisite to provide information about the campaign, and to promote its new look.

Oxfam shops are seeing a welcome increase in custom, but because of this, they are running low on donated stock to sell. If you have good quality homewares, books, music, clothes or accessories that you don’t use any longer, now’s a great time to do a clear-out and bring them to an Oxfam shop.

I just received my Postcard Box from Chris Judge in the post (things in the post! yay!) today.  Chris is a Dublin-based illustrator, a lovely chap and very very talented indeed.  He’s currently selling this collection on his website for an extremely reasonable €20.  I’m addicted to buying art on the web, and this might be one of the best deals I’ve come across.  Take a look at Chris’ site and blog to see his  colourful and joyous illustration work.

How is it done?

1. Go to your Facebook page (or create a new one here)
2. Click on the Notes tab in the top left hand corner (you  may have to click on the plus sign to display it)
3. Select ‘Write a new note’
4. Once you’re in this window, you can access the Notes settings.
   
5. On the right-hand side of the Notes area, you can choose to import a blog.
   
6. Copy and paste the location of your blog’s RSS feed.
7. The page will then import your blog.  After you have posted to your blog, the post will show up a little later in your Facebook page.

Updated – Dec 2009

Facebook changed this option slightly after I wrote this post, and many commenters ran into problems with their feed appearing on their personal page instead of on their fan page.  Big thanks to commenter Leela Robinson who identified the correct way to do this. In short – use the Notes tab at the top of the page, not the one at the bottom right.

Facebook page?

A Facebook page is different to a Facebook profile: a profile is a personal account and must be linked to an identifiable individual, whereas a page can be set up by an individual to promote a brand, product or service.   The advantage of a page is that people can become fans of that page and can be contacted en masse, sent updates, use discussion boards, upload photos, etc.  Updates to your page will then appear on their Facebook homepage.

Why import a feed?

If you are creating a Facebook page to promote your blog, importing the blog to the page means that all your blog posts will automatically appear on your Facebook page.

What’s difficult about it?

Facebook is strangely user-unfriendly when it comes to setting up and editing pages, groups, etc.  The process is a bit counter-intuitive, as you can see above.

Lots of blogs give pointers on how to import a feed into your profile, but I had trouble finding one that gave instructions specifically for a fan page.  So I noted down the instructions here in a rare fit of helpfulness.

Some of my Facebook pages:

• Oxjam Ireland
• Oxfamhome, Belfast
• CheapEats.ie

Date created: April 2009

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/drc

About the Project: Noted fashion and portrait photographer Rankin travelled to the Democratic Republic of Congo with Oxfam in 2008, where he photographed residents of refugee camps in the northern Kivu province.

These photos can currently be viewed by the public in a unique outdoor exhibition in Wolfe Tone Park, beside the Jervis Centre in Dublin 1.  The exhibition will run until Friday 31st July 2009, and is part of a fundraising appeal for the people of the DR Congo.

Date created: February 2009

Web Address: www.resonatepr.com

About the Project: I recently built this site for Orlaith Finnegan, a freelance PR consultant.  Orlaith did some PR work for us on the website CheapEats.ie, and I can’t recommend her highly enough; she did a really great job in a very short amount of time.  If you’re looking for PR advice or services, Resonate PR is an excellent choice.

Date created: March 2009

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/oxfamvintage

About the Project:  This was one of those responsive jobs for Oxfam – I have a million billion other things to do, but Oxfamvintage is currently getting a lot of coverage and the shop page became one of the most visited pages on our site, so I thought it needed a bit more than just a very basic information page.  I did the design above based on a kind of mood board/scrapbook, and am really happy with how it turned out.

Date created: November 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamhome.org

About the Project: A simple minisite for the Oxfamhome furniture shops. I used WordPress to set this up so that the shop staff and volunteers can update it themselves.

Date created: December 2008

Web Address: www.cheapeats.ie

About the Project: This is my new baby, a food blog edited by myself and my good buddy Peter McGuire. CheapEats is all about eating well in Ireland while getting value for money, and we’re covering everything from shopping tips to restaurant reviews to recipes. Check out the site, leave your feedback and send us your tips on the best places to get good food in Ireland.

Date created: November 2008

About the Project: These posters were created to raise awareness for World AIDS Day (Dec 1st) and to encourage people to show support by wearing a red ribbon. They were printed in A2 and A3 size and displayed in Oxfam shops around the country

Date created: December 2008

Web Address: www.dealmanagementlimited.ie

About the Project: A simple corporate site for Deal Management Limited, a Dublin-based consultancy.

A gorgeous, funny, evocative poster collage of one canvasser’s experience in the US election.

[ Via Social Design Notes ]

Date created: November 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/ecards

About the Project: I’ve just updated our ecard site with some free seasonal cards. Why not go green this year, and send virtual cards? And you can always make a donation to Oxfam instead…

The programming of our ecard site was kindly done on a volunteer basis by Juan of Instinct.ie.

Date created: November 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/oxjam

About the Project: We’ve started a Heroes of Oxjam series on our Oxjam website, to thank all the great musicians and organisers who did such a fantastic job this year.  If you were involved in Oxjam, keep an eye on the site; you may be one of our prize winners.

The superhero illustration is adapted from an istock image.

Date created: October 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/christmas

About the Project: Each year I create a Christmas minisite for Oxfam Ireland; it brings all our Christmas products and content together, and shows shoppers that they can do all or most of their Christmas shopping with Oxfam.

Date created: October 2008

Web Address: www.quadcore.ie

About the Project: A brochure site for a new Dublin-based IT Consultancy firm.

NB: I just installed the Lightbox plugin for Wordpress, so click the image above to see a larger version.

I’m the Web Co-ordinator and Graphic Designer for Oxfam Ireland, as you’ll know if you follow this blog. There can sometimes, for me, be a disconnect between the work I’m doing and the work that we do. Sometimes it’s hard to connect sitting at a pc drawing colourful starbursts for Oxjam with our partner programs doing HIV testing in Uganda, or buying school bags for children in Tanzania. It’s also hard to talk about it without sounding sanctimonious, as though I’m praising myself for the great work that is done by our organisation, when in fact nothing could be further from my mind. I get to spend most of my working week being creative and learning new things, and the job is so incredibly rewarding: I feel very lucky to be here.

So when thinking about how to blog about poverty for Blog Action Day, I decided to briefly cover just two things:

How Little It Takes To Help

It only costs €18 to buy a set of schoolbooks for a child in a developing country. €18! That’s about four pints. (Note to self: try to stop always using pints as main unit for measuring cost.  It looks bad.) We all know that education is the key to breaking the cycle of poverty. Small contributions can change lives; don’t be put off donating because you feel that you can’t donate very much.

Why You Should Volunteer To Design For A Charity

Anyone who works in or cares about design knows the power of a strong photograph, a compelling poster campaign, a striking slogan. Charities often struggle to find the budgets for design work, and are endlessly competing for attention with consumer advertising. If you can donate a few hours of your time to design something for a charity, it could provide the charity with a cohesive identity for a project, and potentially be used in lots of materials. If you’re a photographer, a high quality photograph can make a huge difference in mailouts and press (photography, particularly, is so important to charities). Check out Volunteering Ireland’s arts and culture / office-based work sections or contact your favoured small charity and offer your services. People often associate volunteering with a regular weekly commitment, but a one-off or infrequent donation of skills can be really valuable as well.

Oxjam blogs for Blog Action Day »

Irish bloggers on Blog Action Day »

Date created: October 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/oxjam

About the Project: I put this flyer together this morning for my colleague Pip’s Oxjam fundraiser. It’s a very quick and simple job, but I love the colour combination of black, white and aqua, and may try to use it for another project soon.

iPod photo from www.sxc.hu

Absolutely gorgeous poster work from Scott Hansen, the posters are gently distressed and textural without being overdone.  His site uses Flash beautifully as well.

Via Grain Edit.

Date created: Spring 2008

About the Project: Every year Oxfam Ireland prints about a billion Christmas cards, and our printers allow us to use the offcuts from these cards for other projects. This year we used them to print off little handouts for Oxjam; they’re business card-sized and can be filled in on the reverse with details of gigs. I’m really pleased with how they turned out, the colours are really vibrant and I ended up using the artwork in lots of other Oxjam projects.

I’ve seen the incredible illustrations of Jesse LeDoux around the place, but just found his website today through the lovely Design Freebies blog.

Date created: September 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org

About the Project: I’ve just redesigned the Oxfamireland.org homepage – I’d always felt that the original page was too cluttered, and usability research indicated that it needed less content and more clearly marked hierarchies.  I’ve changed it to a tabbed layout so that users can switch between categories of content, and have tried to use more colours and images.

I’ve also implemented other improvements across the site:

• wider layout
• larger font
• global header, linking to all of our main sites
• utilities menu on the footer
• seo-friendly filenames
• improved print stylesheet

I designed this voucher for Oxfam which was handed out at the Festival of World Cultures. It’s perforated; one half promotes a competition and the other has a ‘€10 off’ voucher for our Fair Trade Shops. The reverse (photo below) has the competition entry form and a map showing the location of our Dublin Fair Trade Shop.

Date created: Summer 2007

About the Project: I created a shed-load of large print materials for Oxfam last summer, for use at outdoor events. The above are large vinyl banners showing our logo and a welcome message, and our logo and the url of our website. The photos were taken at this year’s Electric Picnic; see our Flickr stream for more.

Date created: Summer 2008

Web Address: www.oxfamireland.org/oxjam

About the Project: I’ve just been working on a major redesign of our Oxjam site. I needed something a bit more dynamic than the flat html we used last year – our Oxjam Officer will be blogging and I also wanted to add some content-rich features like a gig calendar and a google map. So I set it up through lovely old trusty old Wordpress. Having said that, Wordpress did give me some rare trouble this time, but we won’t be falling out over such a small snafu.

I went plugin loopy for this installation, and found some really great addons out there. Big thanks to the geniuses who created the Event Calendar, the Contact Form 7 and MyPageOrder in particular; you’ve made my life a lot easier.

Date created: August 2008

About the Project: I’m feeling very inspired by and drawn to hand-drawn type at the moment – partly because it can look unique, personal and full of a charm that computer fonts rarely have. I also am trying to make more stuff by hand and spend less time at the computer.  So I drew this card for a friend’s wedding, and found it really enjoyable to do.  I forgot something that I would have known when I was eleven, however – markers make your pen lines bleed and it’s difficult to get smooth areas of colour.  I’ll try crayons or pencils next time.

I found this illustration on the brand new blog So Much Pileup – run by a designer who wants to share the piles of interesting paper from his studio. As opposed to hoarding them, crazy-hermit style, like myself. See the full post for more in the same series.

I was sent a link today to the site of ‘writer who draws’ Austin Kleon today. I really love his ‘Mind Maps‘; maps of impressions and memories.

Via the Ernie Pook mailing list.

A recent episode of This American Life really struck a chord with me. I’ll just copy the relevant bit:

A couple of years ago some friends were travelling through Europe, walking through these old buildings. And these people do not know anything special about architecture, but, you know how it is when you’re a tourist. So they’re walking through these buildings and they’re looking at these doorways and pillars and they decide that this one building has a very Moorish influence. They’re pointing out details, saying ‘the Moors this’ and ‘the Moors that’. And finally one of them turns to the other and says, “You know, we sound like we’re in a magazine. A magazine called ‘Modern Jackass‘.”

The person who originated the concept, Nancy Updike, disarmingly compares it to Post-It Notes – we didn’t know we needed them, but once they were introduced we used them all the time. Modern Jackass is exactly the same. I am a contributing editor to Modern Jackass, as are many of my peers; I blame it mainly on the Sunday papers, from which we half-digest bite-sized nuggets of unreliable information. I love the concept so much that last night I designed a cover for a mock edition. Maybe someday we’ll see Modern Jackass on our newsagent shelves? Until that happy day arrives, we’ll just have to make do with all the other ‘by jackasses, for jackasses’ magazines out there.

There are many other Modern Jackasses across the web, who have shared their thoughts on and moments of Modern Jackassery in these blogs:

• The Anchored Nomad
• Murfins & Burglars
• Wandermama
• f-words
• Nick Hornby

You can get a printable PDF of the cover if you click the image above. And if anyone has any suggestions for cover stories for Issue 2, please send them to me at Modern Jackass Towers (hello {at} jeanobrien.com).

So cute and lovely.  I want some.

One of the many great things about having a tiny sidekick is the pleasure of putting together a library for her. I’ve found some excellent vintage children’s books recently, and this is one of my favourites. I got it in a bookshop in Hay-on-Wye, which is like a town from a fairy tale (twenty-seven bookshops!).

It’s a lovely annual from the year I was born, showcasing the work of various Puffin writers and illustrators. There’s stuff from Quentin Blake, Roald Dahl, Raymond Briggs and Tove Jansson; a Professor Branestawm story (I used to love Professor Branestawm); and the obligatory story on a member of the Royal Family – this time the hunky dreamboat Prince Charles. I wonder if kids annuals still do this? When I was growing up, we had a box of annuals from the Fifties and Sixties that belonged to my mother, and at one stage there was a Princess Margaret Annual in the collection. I would love to get my hands on that now.

My moo.com minicards arrived this week – they’re very cute and dinky, and the print quality is lovely. An informal poll carried out outside the Royal Oak in Kilmainham on Thursday night confirmed that they’re a good size for catching people’s attention. Also, regrettably, the perfect size and texture for picking the teeth.

I’m currently subscribed to dozens of design blogs which provide me with untold inspiration. I thought I’d start posting some choice selections here. It doesn’t always have to be about me, honest.

I’m particularly fond of cartoony and kawaii graphics and illustrations, vintage and retro type, and crafts and craft-inspired design.

The picture above shows a gorgeous Flickr set – Typewriter Ribbon Tin Collection. Via the Creative Ireland forums.

Date created: March – September 2003

About the Project: Another one from my archives. I was employed by Riverdeep as Project Coordinator and Lead Artist on ‘Princess Snorebucks‘. This was a large project that involved a great deal of project management as well as the creation of original artwork and the animation of characters within the brand guidelines. I became very attached to the Powerpuff Girls while working on this project, particularly Bubbles, the little scamp.

The Powerpuff Girls are a trademark of The Cartoon Network, all rights reserved.

I learned two nifty new things this week- how to set up a Google Map, and how to install and customise a PHP calendar. I feel chuffed that I’ve crammed something useful into my poor tired brain, and both of these tools will come in very handy for lots of future projects.

Custom Google Maps are reasonably complicated, as they require a lot of javascript and the plotting of latitudes and longitudes. I created one on oxfamireland.org for our very popular Oxfambridal shop. But Google also have MyMap, a handy tool for more complex maps – and I used it for setting up a map showing the locations of all the Oxfam Ireland shops.

The first customised, editable calendar, also for Oxfambridal, was set up using Easy PHP Calendar. This is a nice little application that only costs $20 per domain, and which creates flexible and customisable calendars.

Date created: April 2007

Web Address: eoxfam.ning.com (however, this is a private network and is only open to Oxfam staff)

About the Project: I set up this custom social network with two of my international Oxfam colleagues to create an online meeting and discussion space for Oxfam staff who work in multimedia and ecampaigning. Ning.com allows you to set up and customise your social network for free, and is one of the most user-friendly web apps I’ve ever used; it takes about five minutes to get set up.