Here is how you list posts from a particular category in a wordpress page template, right before the “while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ” call add:

<?php query_posts('category_name=name&showposts=100'); ?>
<?php /*  change name to the name of the category posts you want to display   */  ?>

The reason the wordpress function query_posts() breaks the sidebar template is because its not a simple database query collecting posts from a specific category, but its resetting the query object as a whole to reflect a normal category query.

So to fix the sidebar template you have to go with creating a new query object through WP_Query() in your page template. So here is the before and after of the loop in a page template.

Page Template Loop BEFORE:

<?php query_posts('category_name=name&showposts=100'); ?>
<?php while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
       <!-- do stuff ... -->
<?php endwhile; ?>

Page Template Loop AFTER:

<?php $cat_posts = new WP_Query('category_name=name'); ?>
<?php if($cat_posts->have_posts()) : ?>
         <?php while($cat_posts->have_posts()) : $cat_posts->the_post(); ?>
                 <!-- do stuff ... -->
         <?php endwhile; ?>
<?php endif; ?>

Hope that helps someone, cya.

Yesterday, I finished developing another website called The Dreamy Spoon. The Dreamy Spoon is a Self Served Frozen Desserts Store located in Maumelle , Arkansas and it a full flash website that also has a wordpress blog with it. This has to be one the most fun websites I have done in a while, partly because of the silliness of the design (which was done by Cody Scott of  Kinetic Media Solutions ). Some of the special things about the website are they it uses SWFAddress to increase SEO and add the ability to go straight to a specific page, as well as a custom MP3 music player, and all the animations were pretty cool too. The website includes everything from a flavors page, a contact page, and links to the social media websites.

One of the hardest things to code for the website was getting the stage to resize correctly when the user resizes the browser window, because the grassy hills had to stay at the bottom and the cloud background had to scale correctly.

To increase SEO, I created the The Dreamy Spoon Blog (made from WordPress) that the owner could add news posts and I also duplicated the flash pages  into wordpress pages and basically hide them from the user (meaning no actual links to them), but when I submit a sitemap to Google Web Mastertools I will include those links so they get indexed.

This might be the best flash website I have done so far and it was a lot of fun to work on, let me know what you guys think.

Cya

I have finished working on another freelance website for a client, its called richardgodwin.net, and as you probably guessed it was for a person named Richard Godwin.  Richard is a really talented writer of dark crime fiction and noir,  and is about to publish his book, called ‘Apostle Rising.’  He had two blogs already that he consistently updated, so it was an obvious choice to build his site off of the WordPress Framework. Another reason I built the site using the WordPress framework is because of the awesome admin section it has. It really does do a great job in allowing the client to change the content on the website whenever they want, especially when they don’t have any coding knowledge.

As I worked on the site, Richard hired a graphic designer named Matthew Swann to finalize some graphics for the site. I usually do the graphics as well for the sites I work on, but it was a nice change of pace to have some help and it was really great working with Matthew.

There are a few special things I did for this site, that I want to list off here. There was a great plugin called WordPress.com Stats from their old site, that I implemented into their new site that lets them view their hits and pageviews from the WordPress dashboard. There were some problems initially with it but I fixed it by going into phpMyAdmin and messing with some fields in the SQL database.  For the navigation of the website and blog, they really liked the CSS Horizontal Menus I found on http://www.cssmenumaker.com. So I implemented one of those into the theme, and changed the color around to go with the rest of the site a little better. Another cool item on the site is the Steel Melting Flash Text Effect in the banner. I bought the file from activeden and added it to the site on two different pages. I think it looks really great and it achieved the flashy effect that Richard was wanting for announcing his upcoming book.

The last thing I want to talk about is the new default theme for WordPress called Twenty Ten. I created his blog theme from the Twenty Ten Theme and I just wanted to say that it was really easy to work with and modify, and that it comes with a ton more admin options in the dashboard area that the old default theme was really missing. My hat goes off to the WordPress team as they constantly raise the bar of their product again and again.

Cya

As you may know, I have completed quite a few projects and written several posts regarding the integration of Flash and WordPress. In fact, my latest project was a complete Flash and WordPress Website called RocFolio 2.

A few weeks ago I was excited to be contacted by Packt Publishing. They asked me to review one of their books, “WordPress and Flash 10x Cookbook”. I was honored that they contacted me and excited for the opportunity to read through their book and see what I could learn. Here is the book information followed by my review.

Book Information

Full Title: WordPress and Flash 10x Cookbook
Author(s): Peter Spannagle, Sarah Soward
Pages: 268
Published: April 2010
Publisher: Packt Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-847198-82-2

My Review

The book as a whole is written well and includes over 50 simple and effective techniques on how to control certain tasks relating to Flash content in WordPress. The easy-to-follow step by step instructions, and pictures to help out those of us who are more visual, that accompany the techniques make integrating Flash and WordPress a fairly straightforward process.

This book is aimed at new or intermediate WordPress users who are interested in learning how to create the unique and media-rich sites that using plug-ins and Flash can provide, so much of the book’s content I was already fairly familiar with.  But for the newer user looking to enhance their personal or business sites and blogs, this book definitely contains strategies and techniques to help you do just that. Just remember that a working knowledge of XHTML, CSS, and graphic design is helpful and familiarity with WordPress is required, because the book does not address the basic mechanics of using WordPress itself. Also, any previous experience with Flash is helpful but not necessary.

Honestly, the Cookbook focused more on how to add, edit, and embed Flash into WordPress than an actual integration of the two, which is what I had originally thought it was going to be about. It also mentions several really nice WordPress plug-ins, some of which were strictly for helping you add and control Flash on your WordPress site, while others mentioned are to help you with SEO, Google Sitemaps, and optimizing your WordPress site as a whole. The Cookbook also delves into some Actionscript 3.0 scripting which is followed by examples paired with actual code. Here are links to some of the plug-ins the book mentions that I found to be particularly helpful tools in building a WordPress site:

Kimili Flash Embed Plugin
Dean’s FKCEditor  Plugin
Google Sitemaps XML Plugin
SEO Title Tags Plugin
FLV Embed Plugin

If you don’t know how to use these plug-ins, or have an overall desire to learn more about Flash content within WordPress, the WordPress and Flash 10x Cookbook definitely explains in detail the best way to do so. Overall, this book is a great reference and would be a helpful addition to your desk or workspace, especially if you’re a new or intermediate designer/developer. Hey, even if you’re an advanced user it could still come in handy, teaching you something you might have missed along the way as you taught yourself… we all have something to learn. Right?

Cya

I have finished up another website for a client of mine (my wife), designed for her blog called housemadehome.net. The blog chronicles the renovations and decorating of our house, some recipes, and stories associated with the raising of our family. I worked really closely with her on the design of the site and I think it came out really well. I developed it using the WordPress backend, so she could easily make posts to it and handle the whole site by herself. We focused a lot on search engine optimization and the site has had a really good start so far… she has over 15 followers already. There are tons of home design blogs out there and they are getting bigger all the time. If you are looking for a custom made blog template, contact me so we can discuss the details of the project.

Cya

I have recently just finished working on another freelance website for a company called InVeritas. InVeritas Research & Consulting, Inc., is a national research and consulting firm specializing in strategic communications, political polling and research, government relations, grassroots/grasstops organizing, press relations and message development. This client had a very specific vision in mind about how they wanted their website to look and feel, and it was my job to make that vision come  true.

This website is built on top of a wordpress backend so they can easily make posts or news alerts whenever they want. I used several wordpress plugins in the development of this site. For the menu I used the PixoPoint Menu Plugin which is a really great wordpress menu plugin. This plugin comes with tons of customization options and allows you to easily add your own custom dropdown menu to any WordPress site. At first it was a little difficult to work with  but in the end it did exactly what I needed for it to do. Another plugin I used was the  Redirection Plugin which is used  to manage 301 redirections, keep track of 404 errors, and generally tidy up any loose ends your site may have.  I also used the Exec-PHP plugin to allow me to run any php code thats in posts, pages and text widgets. The final plugin I used was the .html on Pages WordPress plugin, which adds “.html” to the end of all the pages on the site.

I always try to learn something new from any project I undertake, and this one was no exception. The main thing to  realize when building or creating something for a client is that its really important to work with the client and give them exactly what they want, because in the end they are the ones paying for it. It i s hard sometimes because what they want isn’t always the easiest, quickest, or best solution. Its important to tell the client what they need to know to make the best decision though.

I worked with Kinetic Media Solutions again on this project and I enjoyed working with InVeritas as well.

Cya

I have just finished my second website template, it’s a Flash WordPress Template called RocFolio 2.  This Flash WordPress Template is perfect as a portfolio or if you want to display your latest featured work in a great way. If you use wordpress, then it automatically updates itself by getting the information from your wordpress site after you make new posts. If you don’t have a wordpress blog, a sample XML file is included that you can use. This template is very easy to use, easy to setup, and easy to customize all through XML . RocFolio 2 comes with a help file and 5 different themes. The different flash themes include a Dark, Light, Bokeh, Starfield, and Two-Tone version, or you can customize the look and feel of it very easily. Also, each templates include  a contact form with error checking, and a muic player with tons of features. This Flash WordPress Template includes navigation for going between multiple Feeds (or multiple sample xml files) or external links, and another navigational menu  that can be used as social media menu that has a special random letter hover effect. Like I have said before, if you use wordpress then it automically updates itself through the RSS feed of the site, and then it automatically grabs the first image in the post to display. This template can be customizable through 4 simple XML files, uses tweener for smooth transitions, and has a 3 column layout layout with headers that have the ability to add an image, use text, or both. There are tons of other features and options, and I hope you enjoy it.

RocFolio 2 is the second version of one of my best selling items on ActiveDen.net.  First first version, RocFolio, is more geared towards being a Flash and WordPress Portfolio Template, because it can only take in a single RSS Feed, unlike RocFolio 2 where you can go between multiple rss feeds or wordpress categories.  Below is a preview image of RocFolio. It its not fully customizable by XML like RocFolio 2 is but its still really easy to use and setup through  Flash.

Cya

I have recently created a Flash template that is integrated with the WordPress backend. Click the image above to be redirected to the preview and see the flash file in action. I have added it to my activeDen Portfolio for sale. This Portfolio Template is perfect for anyone wanting to display their latest featured work. It automatically updates itself by getting the information from your wordpress RSS Feed (You can even link it to a particular Category).

I have talked about WordPress Flash Integration before in several tutorials showing you how to do it, here are links to those:
Update: WordPress and Flash Integration part I (AS2)
Update: WordPress and Flash Integration part II (AS3)
Update: WordPress and Flash Integration part III (AS3)

If you don’t have a wordpress blog, a sample XML file is included that you can use. This template is very easy to use, easy to setup, and easy to customize. Here are some of its’ features:

• Includes 3 Skins: Dark, Light, and Colored. Or you can customize the look and feel of it very easily
• Includes Contact Form with error checking
• Resizes Automatically to fit any screen size
• One click linking
• Automatically Updates
• No XML Required (unless you want to use the sample XML included)
• Automatically Grabs the first image in the post to display
• Uses Tweener for smooth transitions

External resources used in Template: Function Icon Set

Cya

Cya

Cody and I each came up with a design for this site and I have attached the images below, mine is the second. For my design, I used an image called “Dark Wood” by ~zygat3r from deviantART as the background but in the end we decided to go with Cody’s Design.

The first thing I had to do was set up a localhost server to be able to test on, so I used WAMP. The second thing was to download the Zend Framework and put it on my localhost, and make sure it was working properly.  Patrick had been working on this a little while before me so he had a file structure in place already that I needed to mimic, so he setup a SVN on googlecode, and I downloaded it and am in the process of setting it up on my end.  Setting up the work enviroment will probably take the longest to do but as soon as we get that done it will be a lot of fun, and I look forward to it. Patrick wanted me to design a layout for the site and I came up with what’s below. I was pretty happy with the outcome, and I think I might create non-flash based WordPress template from it to sell on ThemeForest.net.

Cya

Here is the swf, and below is the actionscript 3:

package  {
    import flash.display.MovieClip;
    import flash.display.BlendMode;
    import flash.events.Event;
    import flash.net.URLLoader;
    import flash.net.URLRequest;
    import flash.text.*;
    import fl.transitions.Tween;
    import fl.transitions.TweenEvent;
    import fl.transitions.easing.*;
 
    /*
    * Redo of scott rockers's wordpress to flash integration but in AS3 and as3wordpressFlash class file
    */
    public class AS3WordpressFlash extends MovieClip {
 
        public var i:uint = 0;
        public var titleList:XMLList;
        public var linkList:XMLList;
        public var tf:TextField;
        public var format:TextFormat;
        public var tweenIt:Tween;
        public var tweenIt2:Tween;
        public var theXML:XML;
        public var loader:URLLoader = new URLLoader();
 
        public function AS3WordpressFlash() {
            loader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, loadXML);
            loader.load(new URLRequest("http://www.scottrockers.com/blog/wp-rss2.php"));
        }
 
        function loadXML(e:Event):void {
            theXML = new XML(e.target.data);
            titleList = theXML.channel.item.title;
            linkList = theXML.channel.item.link;
            createTextFields(titleList, linkList);
        }
 
        function createTextFields(titles:XMLList, links:XMLList):void {
            format = new TextFormat();
            format.font = "Arial";
            format.color = 0xFFFFFF;
            format.size = 14;
 
            for (i = 0; i < 5; i++) {
                tf = new TextField();
                tf.blendMode = BlendMode.LAYER;
                tf.width = 10;
                tf.selectable = false;
                tf.autoSize = TextFieldAutoSize.CENTER;
                tf.x = (stage.width)/2;
                tf.y = -20;
                tf.htmlText = "<a href="&quot;+ links[i] +&quot;" target="_blank">" + titles[i] + "</a>";
                tf.setTextFormat(format);
                addChild(tf);
                tweenIt = new Tween(tf, "y", Elastic.easeOut, -20, 50 + (i * 30), 30 + (i * 15), false);
                tweenIt2 = new Tween(tf, "alpha", Strong.easeOut, 0, 1, 100 + (i * 100), false);
            }
        }
    }
}

I did come across a few interesting things. When accessing the titles of each heading, I used “.nodeValue”, but when accessing the links of the headings I had to use “theNodePath.toString()”. I thought this was weird because all the information looked the same inside each node in the XML.

I will use this technology on my blog as well as my Flash site, once I get some time to work on them. Hopefully soon, because I am pumped that I figured out how to do this.

Cya

If you have a WordPress blog already setup, then you can do all this easy too.  All WordPress blogs have a RSS feed built into them, so what I did was access that php file that creates the RSS feed (which renders out as XML),  and thats all Flash needs to have to be able to do what we want.  The best part is that the .swf file updates itself automatically anytime it is called which makes the whole thing dynamic.

Click on the image below to see an example that retrieves every heading to every post on my blog and puts them into a simple list component.

Here is the code I used in the .FLA, its AS2:

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// Create new XML Object and set ignoreWhite true
var theXML:XML = new XML();
theXML.ignoreWhite = true;
 
//the function to check to see if the xml file was loaded
theXML.onLoad = function(success) {
     if (success) {
          trace('Your XML file was loaded! See its right here:' + '\n\n' + this.toString() + '\n\n');
          processXML(theXML);
     } else {
          trace('Your XML file was not loaded');
     }
}
 
//where to find the the xml file and loads it
//just change the url to your rss url
theXML.load("http://www.scottrockers.com/blog/wp-rss2.php");
 
//function that puts all the posts' headers into the list component
function processXML(xmlInfo) {
     // xmlInfo is now a reference to the XML
     // object where our information is stored
     for (var n = 0; n < xmlInfo.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes.length; n++) {
          if (xmlInfo.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes[n].nodeName == "item") {
               trace(xmlInfo.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes[n].firstChild.firstChild.nodeValue);
               theList.addItem(xmlInfo.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes[n].firstChild.firstChild.nodeValue);
          } else {
               //these are the parent nodes, do not print them
               //trace(xmlInfo.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes[n].firstChild.nodeValue);
          }
     }
}

I can even access certain categories by changing: theXML.load(“http://www.scottrockers.com/blog/wp-rss2.php”); to theXML.load(“http://www.scottrockers.com/blog/?cat=4&feed=rss2″);

Click on the image below to see an example that retrieves only headings to posts under the category “Portfolio” and puts them into a simple list component.

Since I now know how to access those node values then I will also be able to do anything with them, such as animate them on to the stage, make them links, etc. I am sooooo pumped about this.

Cya

I have been trying to find a way to integrate Flash and WordPress for a while now, so when I update my wordpress blog then it goes straight onto my Flash site.  Well, I have found some files from Tim Wilson’s website and I have learned a lot so far from them.  You basically have to integrate Flash with the wordpress’s xml and have some php communicating between the two.  Hopefully this will be a big help in redesigning this blog.

Also, if your interested in doing this I recommend watching a video on gotoAndLearn that basically has to do with integrating mySQL, Flash, and PHP.

Cya