Haseebzone template

Monday, 13 July 2009

Freelance Web Designers List

I often receive several requests from my readers that ask to me to collaborate to their web projects but because I'm totally busy with my "real" work, this blog and the book I'm writing, I can't accept their offers. Then, every time, they ask to me to suggest them a friend of mine that can work on their project. So I think could be useful to start on this blog a list of web designers interested to collaborate in freelance projects.

If you are a freelance web designer, please leave a comment with your main information (name, short introduction about you, link to your website/portfolio). Please NO SPAM. Thanks!

People I suggest you

CreamScope
Creamscoop is a small company focused on web developing, formed by two guys who started getting into web technologies since a very young age.

Daniel Howells
I'm a freelance web designer and developer, currently working as the digital director at YCN based in Shoreditch, London. Blog

Grace Smith
A Freelance Web and Graphic Designer in love with web standards and social media. An unashamed Apple Fangirl. Postscript 5 | Blog | Gallery project

Osvaldas Valutis
My name is Osvaldas Valutis. I develop and design functional, creative, details and usability oriented websites as well as web applications by exposing the simplicity and the latest web standards as the main principles. Portfolio

Steve Mullen
I am a web designer and front end developer from Tulsa, Oklahoma. I enjoy making the web a better looking place. Personal Portfolio

Twitter API: How to create a stream of messages Monitter-like with PHP and jQuery

This tutorial illustrates a very simple way to work with the Twitter API in order to implement a search in the Twitter public timeline and display search results with an animated stream of messages (tweets) similar to Monitter. In this example I used PHP, jQuery and a very useful Twitter Search API for PHP based on the work of David Billingham and actually developed by Ryan Faerman. This implementation is very simple to customize and integrate on your project. The result is something linke this:

You can download the full code here and reuse it for free on your projects.

I suggest you to take also a look at these posts:

- Simple PHP Twitter Search ready to use in your web projects
- Super simple way to work with Twitter API (PHP + CSS)
- Send messages from a PHP page using Twitter API

1. A little introduction

This package contains the following files:

- index.php: page with the search form + search results
- search.php: PHP search
- twitterapi.php: Twitter Search API for PHP
- jquery/jquery-1.3.2.min.js: jQuery framework

How it works? After submission the search form calls an ajax request to the page search.php that returns search results into an array. Each element of the array (every single tweet) appears into the div twitter-results with a nice fade-in effect. I set a delay between each tweet equal 2 seconds (2000 ms).

I suggest you to take a look at Monitter, and download the full code to try this tutorial on your local host. Now, take a look at the code.

2. index.php: HTML code

HTML code is very simple. Copy the following code in the tag <body>:

<div class="twitter_container">
<form id="twittersearch" method="post" action="">
<input name="twitterq" type="text" id="twitterq" />
<button type="submit">Search</button>
</form>
<div id="twitter-results"></div>
</div>

...and add into the tag <head> of the page a link to jQuery:

The result is a simple search form:

3. search.php

Now copy and paste the following code into search.php:

<?php
include('search.php');
if($_POST['twitterq']){

$twitter_query = $_POST['twitterq'];
$search = new TwitterSearch($twitter_query);
$results = $search->results();

foreach($results as $result){

echo '<div class="twitter_status">';
echo '<img src="'.$result->profile_image_url.'" class="twitter_image">';
$text_n = toLink($result->text);
echo $text_n;
echo '<div class="twitter_small">';
echo '<strong>From:</strong> <a href="http://www.twitter.com/'.$result->from_user.'">'.$result->from_user.'</a>: ';
echo '<strong>at:</strong> '.$result->created_at;
echo '</div>';
echo '</div>';

}

}
?>

$result is the array that contains search results. To display all elements of the array (search results) I used this simple loop:

foreach($results as $result){
...
}

... and to get a specific attribute of the array I used this simple code:

$result->name_of_element

Take a look at this post for info about the search on Twitter.

4. index.php: JavaScript Code

Now take a look at the following JavaScript code that enables an ajax request for the search and display results into the page index.php with a fade in effect and a delay between each tweet equal to 2 seconds:

function displayTweet(){
var i = 0;
var limit = $("#twitter-results > div").size();
var myInterval = window.setInterval(function () {
var element = $("#twitter-results div:last-child");
$("#twitter-results").prepend(element);
element.fadeIn("slow");
i++;
if(i==limit){

window.setTimeout(function () {
clearInterval(myInterval);
});

}
},2000);
}

$("form#twittersearch").submit(function() {
twitterq = $('#twitterq').attr('value');
$.ajax({

type: "POST",
url: "search.php",
cache: false,
data: "twitterq="+ twitterq,
success: function(html){
$("#twitter-results").html(html);
displayTweet();
}

});
return false;
});

});
</script>

This is a very basic implementation you can modify to get a real-time stream of messages for example calling a new ajax request (to search.php) every time the current array with the search results is totally displayed in the page.

That's all. If you have some suggestion please add a comment. Thanks!
You can download the full code of this tutorial here and reuse it on your projects.

10 Fresh tools and resources for web developers

In this post I want to suggest you some interesting tools and resources for web developers. This list includes a CSS framework to design sitemaps using HTML lists, some interesting JavaScript frameworks, some interesting jQuery plug-in, a PHP face detection script, a tutorial to work with the Twitter API and a tutorial about how to retrieve your Gmail emails using PHP.

1. SlickMap CSS, A Visual Sitemapping Tool for Web Developers
SlickMap CSS is a simple stylesheet for displaying finished sitemaps directly from HTML unordered list navigation. It’s suitable for most web sites – accommodating up to three levels of page navigation and additional utility links – and can easily be customized to meet your own individual needs, branding, or style preferences. The general idea of SlickMap CSS is to streamline the web design process by automating the illustration of sitemaps while at the same time allowing for the predevelopment of functional HTML navigation.

2. WaveMaker 5
WaveMaker gives you an easy and productive way to build Web 2.0 applications. Typical applications include a rapid prototyping and development, a form-driven database apps, a front end "face" for SOA architecture.

3. QuickFlip jQuery Plugin
QuickFlip is a jQuery plugin that uses a CSS trick to cause a div, paragraph or any other piece of HTML markup to flip like a card. With a result similar to the UI animation on the iPhone, this jQuery plugin is easily integrated into your webpage to make any portion appear to flip and show its back.

4. Face detection in pure PHP
Maurice Svay released this interesting face detection script to detect automatically faces in photos with PHP.

5. PHP.JS
PHP.JS is an open source project in which we try to port PHP functions to JavaScript. By including the PHP.JS library in your own projects, you can use your favorite PHP functions client-side. Using PHP.JS may speed up development for PHP developers who are increasingly confronted with client-side technology.

6. jQuery Blend
Blend is a jQuery based animation/effects, progressive enhancement plugin for CSS backgrounds (just 1.4KBs).

7. Twitter API: Simple Twitter Search using PHP
This post illustrates how to implement a simple Twitter search and display search results in a web page with a custom format.

8. Flapjax
Flapjax is a new JavaScript framework designed around the demands of modern, client-based Web applications. Its principal features include: Event-driven, reactive evaluation; An event-stream abstraction for communicating with web services; Interfaces to external web services.

9 Glow
Glow is a JavaScript library which aims to make working with JavaScript and the DOM easier. It tries to do this by abstracting common tasks, hiding cross-browser issues, and providing a set of user interface widgets.

10. Retrieve Your Gmail Emails Using PHP and IMAP
Grabbing emails from your Gmail account using PHP is probably easier than you think. Armed with PHP and its IMAP extension, you can retrieve emails from your Gmail account in no time! Take a look at this interesting post of David Walsh.

How to implement a launching soon page with PHP and jQuery

In this tutorial I want to explain how to implement a simple launching soon page using PHP and jQuery. What's a launching soon page? In general it's a page that informs the visitors of a website under construction about when the website is going to be online and allows them to leave their emails in order to be updated when the website is on-line. A typical launching soon page contains a countdown and a form that collects emails from interested visitors. In this tutorial I implemented a launching soon page like this:

Take a look at the live preview here.

This page is very simple to modify and customize using just some lines of CSS code. You can also add the logo of your company and all elements you want with some lines of HTML code. Download the source code of this tutorial you can customize and reuse in your web project for free!

A little introduction
How I said this package is ready to use and contains these files:

- index.php: the launching soon page final interface (countdow + form)
- config.php: enables database connection
- insert.php: PHP code to add emails into a database table
- js/jquery-1.3.2.min.js: jQuery framework
- js/countdown.js: the countdown script

1. index.php
index.php is the final interface of your launching soon page. How I said it contains a countdown and a form to allow users to leave their emails.

The countdown script
In order to implement the countdown I used this dynamic countdown script that lets you count down to relative events of a future date/time. This future date, while the same for everyone, occurs differently depending on the time zone they're in. The result is here and it's fully customizable changing some lines of CSS code:

The only thing you have to do is to add this line of code in the <head> tag of the page:

Then, in the tag <body> add the following lines of code to display the countdown:

<div id="count_down_container"></div>
<script type="text/javascript">
var currentyear = new Date().getFullYear()
var target_date = new cdtime("count_down_container", "July 6, "+currentyear+" 0:0:00")
target_date.displaycountdown("days", displayCountDown)
</script>

To set a target date you have to change this line modifying July 6 and the hour 0:0:00 with your target date (for example 25 december):

new cdtime("count_down_container", "July 6, "+currentyear+" 0:0:00")

...if your target date is 25 December the previous line becomes:

new cdtime("count_down_container", "December 25, "+currentyear+" 0:0:00")

If you want to change the style of the countdown you have to modify the following CSS classes:

.count_down{...}
.count_down sup{...}

In particular .count_down{} changes the format of the numbers and .count_down sup{} changes the style of the text "days", "hours", "minutes".

jQuery and the input form
Ok, the countdown is ready! Next step: add this line of code to include jQuery in the <head> tag of the page:

Now, in the tag <body> add a simple form with an input field:

<form id="submit_leave_email">
<input id="input_leave_email" type="text" class="input_bg" value="Add your e-mail address"/>
<button type="submit" class="input_button">Update me</button>
</form>

...and add this layer to display a custom message when an user submit the form:

<div id="update_success">E-mail added!>/div>

...the result after the submission is here:

The form with the input field disappears with a nice fade-out effect and a success message appears in its place. Now, in the <head> tag, after the line of code that includes jQuery, add this script to enable ajax functionalities to insert emails added from users into a database table without reload the page:

$("form#submit_leave_email").submit(function() {
var input_leave_email = $('#input_leave_email').attr('value');
$.ajax({
type: "POST",
url: "insert.php",
data:"input_leave_email="+ input_leave_email,
success: function(){
$("#submit_leave_email").fadeOut();
$("#update_success").fadeIn();
}
});
return false;
});
});

</script>

2. insert.php
insert.php contains some lines of PHP code to insert an email address into a database table. In this example I created a table EMAIL with just one attribute "email". PHP code is very simple:

<?php
if(isset($_POST['input_leave_email'])){
/* Connection to Database */
include('config.php');
/* Remove HTML tag to prevent query injection */
$email = strip_tags($_POST['input_leave_email']);

$sql = 'INSERT INTO WALL (email) VALUES( "'.$email.'")';
mysql_query($sql);
echo $email;
} else { echo '0'; }
?>

Now, remember to modify your database connection parameters in config.php and upload all files on your testing server. Than load index.php and see the result!

Take a look at the live preview here.

That's all! Download the source code of this tutorial you can customize and reuse in your web project for free! Leave a comment for your suggestions, thanks!

10 Interesting fonts for web designers

New month, new fonts collection. In this post I want to share with you some interesting fonts to make inspiration for your new websites or design projects. Take a look at this list with ten beautiful and free fonts you can download and use for your commercial/non-commercial projects.

1. 7 Days (download 7 Days)
7 Days is a free font design by Jakob Fischer (PizzaDude) for non-commercial use only. If you like to use the font in any commercial way, contact Jakob before doing it.

2. Caracteres L2 (download Caracteres L2)

3. Twilight (download Twilight)
Do you like vampires? :)

4. Charrington (download Charrington)

5. Elsewhere (download Elsewhere)
Elsewhere is a font Created by Brian Kent you can use for personal use, commercial use, or whatever.

6. Stone (download Stone)
Stone is one of my favourite fonts. It's elegant and versatile for a lot of situations:

7. Stewardson (download Stewardson)
Stewardson Regular is a nice font useful to design elegant headers.

8. Dorkbutt (download Dorkbutt)

9. Bronic Shadow (download Bronic Shadow)
Bronic Shadow is a font created by Daniel Zadorozny. This font may be freely distributed and is free for all non-commercial uses.

10. Copyright Violations (download Copyright Violations)

Simple PHP Twitter Search ready to use in your web projects

After my previous tutorial that illustrated how to implement a super simple way to work with Twitter API (PHP + CSS) I received a lot of emails from my readers that asked to me to write a post about how to implement a simple Twitter search and display search results in a web page with a custom format. So in this tutorial I want to illustrate how you can implement that using a very useful Twitter Search API for PHP developed by David Billingham.

Using this simple method you can obtain, just in some lines of PHP and CSS code, awesome results like this:

You can download the source code at the following link and reuse it for free in your web projects just in some seconds!

1. A little introduction
In this package you'll find two PHP file:

- index.php: the search page (search form + search results)
- search.php: Twitter Search API for PHP

You have to customize only index.php and your Twitter Search will be ready to be integrated into yor web projects in one minute!

2. Index.php
Take a look at index.php. This page contains a simple search form:

...and some lines of PHP code:

<?php
include('search.php');
if($_GET['twitterq']){

$twitter_query = $_GET['twitterq'];
$search = new TwitterSearch($twitter_query);
$results = $search->results();

foreach($results as $result){

}

}
?>

$result is the array that contains search results. To display all elements of the array (search results) I used this simple loop:

foreach($results as $result){
...
}

... and to get a specific attribute of the array I used this simple code:

$result->name_of_element

The structure of a tweet contains the following attributes (take a look at the Twitter API home page for a full list):

[text]: Text of the current tweet
[to_user_id]: User Id
[from_user]: User name
[id]: Tweet Id
[from_user_id]: User id
[source]: Source of the current tweet
[profile_image_url]: User profile image URL
[created_at]: Date of the current tweet

...so, if you want to display the text of a tweet you can use this code:

$result->text

The following line of code get the text of the current tweet and convert a textual link into a clickable link:

$text_n = toLink($result->text);

That's all! Now download the source code, open and upload all files in your test server, open index.php and try to search for something!
If you have some suggestion, please add a comment!

Super simple way to work with Twitter API (PHP + CSS)

In this post I want to illustrate a super simple way to work with Twitter API and PHP. In particular, this tutorial explains how to get public updates from Twitter public timeline and display them in a web page with a custom style using CSS. In order to get Twitter updates I used Twitterlibphp (a PHP implementation of the Twitter API) that allows you to take advantage of it from within your PHP applications.

Using this simple method you can obtain awesome results like this:

You can download the source code at the following link and reuse it for free in your web projects (you need PHP and APACHE):

1. A little introduction
Twitterlibphp returns Twitter timeline in XML format and with this structure (take a look at the Twitter API home page for a full list of available nodes.):

status

created_at
id
text
source
user

name
screen_name
description
profile_image_url
url
followers_count
...

...

So, if you want to display the user image, user status, and status date in your timeline you have to choose the following nodes:

But how you can display them? It's very simple! Take a look at the following code!

2. PHP code
Create a new file twitter_status.php and copy and paste the following code:

<div class="twitter_container">
<?php
// require the twitter library
require "twitter.lib.php";

// your twitter username and password
$username = "your_username";
$password = "your_password";

// initialize the twitter class
$twitter = new Twitter($username, $password);

// fetch public timeline in xml format
$xml = $twitter->getPublicTimeline();

$twitter_status = new SimpleXMLElement($xml);
foreach($twitter_status->status as $status){

foreach($status->user as $user){
echo '<img src="'.$user->profile_image_url.'" class="twitter_image">';
echo '<a href="http://www.twitter.com/'.$user->name.'">'.$user->name.'</a>: ';
}

echo $status->text;
echo '<br/>';
echo '<div class="twitter_posted_at">Posted at:'.$status->created_at.'</div>';
echo '</div>';
}
?>
<div>

How you can see, the previous code is very simple to understand. The line:

$xml = $twitter->getPublicTimeline();

get the 20 most recent public statuses posted. You can also use other functions such as:

getFriendsTimeline(): returns the 20 most recent statuses posted by the authenticating user and that user's friends.

- getUserTimeline(): returns the 20 most recent statuses posted from the authenticating user.

getReplies(): returns the 20 most recent @replies (status updates prefixed with @username) for the authenticating user.

Take a look at twitter.lib.php for the full list of available functions.

If you want to display different information, for example the source of the update (status->source) use this code:

$status->source

...or if you want to display the number of followers of the current user (follower_count) use this code:

$user->followers_count

3. CSS Code
Now you can customize the style of your timeline using CSS code. I used the following classes but you can customize the look how you prefer:

.twitter_container{

color:#444;
font-size:12px;
width:600px;
margin: 0 auto;

}
.twitter_container a{

color:#0066CC;
font-weight:bold;

}
.twitter_status{

height:60px;
padding:6px;
border-bottom:solid 1px #DEDEDE;

}
.twitter_image{

float:left;
margin-right:14px;
border:solid 2px #DEDEDE;
width:50px;
height:50px;

}
.twitter_posted_at{

font-size:11px;
padding-top:4px;
color:#999;

}

That's all! Download the source code, open twitter_status.php, change $username and $password with your Twitter username and password and upload the file in your test server.
If you have some suggestion, please add a comment!

Haseebzone template

Pages

Monday, 13 July 2009

Freelance Web Designers List

People I suggest you

Sunday, 12 July 2009

Twitter API: How to create a stream of messages Monitter-like with PHP and jQuery

Friday, 10 July 2009

10 Fresh tools and resources for web developers

Monday, 29 June 2009

How to implement a launching soon page with PHP and jQuery

Sunday, 28 June 2009

10 Interesting fonts for web designers

Saturday, 27 June 2009

Simple PHP Twitter Search ready to use in your web projects

Thursday, 25 June 2009

Super simple way to work with Twitter API (PHP + CSS)