Design Sojourn | Strategic Industrial Design Blog

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Thanks for visiting and please keep in touch? ~ D.T.

What if?
What would happen if every blog published posts on the same issue, on the same day?
For that one day, we could change the global conversation, raise awareness and act together to create a better world.

I was humbly invited by Collis, one of the brains behind Freelance Switch, to join this wonderful initiative and have also agreed to pass the word around to you dear Design Sojourn readers. So here it is from their website saying it better than I can:

On October 15th - Blog Action Day, bloggers around the web will unite to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind.

In its inaugural year, Blog Action Day will be co-ordinating bloggers to tackle the issue of the environment.

What Each Blogger Will Do

Bloggers can participate on Blog Action Day in one of two ways:

1. Publish a post on their blog which relates to an issue of their own choice pertaining to the environment.

For example: A blog about money might write about how to save around the home by using environmentally friendly ideas. Similarly a blog about politics might examine what weight environmental policy holds in the political arena.

Posts do not need to have any specific agenda, they simply need to relate to the larger issue in whatever way suits the blogger and readership. Our aim is not to promote one particular viewpoint, only to push the issue to the table for discussion.

2. Commit to donating their day’s advertising earnings to an environmental charity of their choice. There is a list of “official” Blog Action Day charities on the site, however bloggers are also free to choose an alternate environmental charity to donate to if they wish.

And that’s it.

If they choose bloggers can also promote the initiative itself. However they are also free to simply post on topic on the right day or discreetly donate to a charity without publicizing Blog Action Day.

As a participant of this initiative, I have decided that I will write an article on “green design” as well as pledge the day’s earnings of this blog. Unfortunately its not a lot of money, but at least I get to do my part!

So please do consider joining up, as well as passing the word along if you have a blog? If you need any more information or want to sign up, please visit the official Blog Action Day Website, or email collis [at] eden.cc.

I think that’s about all I can manage to write. Do check out my new archives and categories on the right, for great stuff to tie you over until I can think again…

I like to inform and apologise to all readers for the down time of Design Sojourn yesterday and today. This is due to 2 hard drive crashes on the server that is hosting this site. Sorry for any inconvenience caused if we missed any of your comments or uploaded content. Please feel free to repost them if necessary.

Unfortunately at this time, the server has not been given the full green light. So I thought I better squeeze this message in to let all readers know as well as to expect poor load times and intermittent site access. I hope that things get sorted out soon.

Once again sorry for any inconvenience caused.

Edit: Well the fixed server has been given a clean bill of health, but its still being closely monitored with a spare server on standby. Please do let me know if you are experiencing any site difficulties.

I’ve learnt a lot through running this Blog and managing its Wordpress backbone. Other than getting pretty good at setting up blogs quick, one of the interesting skills I have picked up is the ability to create, hack and modify theme designs, so that I can give all my blogs a unique face. At times its been a tough and frustrating experience (ie having to learn CSS), but at the end of the day its been satisfying and something I really enjoy doing. So I though that I would like to start sharing some of the theme designs that I have created/modified to meet my needs.

So without further adieu I like to share, with all of my Design Sojourn readers, my first Wordpress blog theme called “Brand-You”. It was inspired by the idea of the importance of creating a brand and blog network around you. The theme is colourful (I wanted to get away from Web 2.0 colours), simple, clean, fast and does not for any special plug-ins. It is 3 columns, Adsense and Widget ready, and tested with the latest Wordpress version 2.2. I’ve also added a lot of comments and “marked up” into the code so that its easy for non-programming experts like myself to change things.

The coding of the “Brand-You” theme was adapted and modified from the “Green with Envy” theme by ChiQ Montes. Additional CSS coding borrowed from Design Sojourn’s style sheet created by Aen Direct and Icons applied from Famfamfam.

Example of the Theme:
This screen shot of the theme in action as applied on this website.

Download and Release Notes:

Click on the icon to download.

Version 1.2: Flickr and CSS code fixes.
Version 1.1: Descriptions added and Spelling Errors cleaned up.
Version 1.0: Original Release.

Please download it here and do check back frequently as this blog will always host the latest version.

Instructions:
1) Download file on to your computer.
2) Uncompress the winzip file.
3) Upload it to your Wordpress themes directory.
4) Activate it in your “Presentation” section of your Wordpress Admin.
5) Enjoy or modify, but please leave the credits!

I love some feedback on the coding and design as I am interested in improving my CSS programming skills, however please be gentle and constructive as this is my first ever Wordpress theme release. Also do note that I am a designer right brain type, and my left brain coding is really not the best!

Fitting that this should go to long time reader and fellow designer Drew Kora, for his comment left on this post. Wow time really flies when you are having fun! Thanks Drew for all the great feedback and please keep do keep in touch.

Next stop 1000 posts! Hmm might be a while as we are currently only at 295 posts including this, well who’s counting yah?

Launched more than a year ago, the Nakamichi Lumos portable DVD, designed together with Tithima S. and E Chin, for Nakamichi, has been featured in the latest UK version of the T3 Gadget Magazine. (August 2007, Page 18). Very nice. The design was inspired by premium leather ladies handbags and the tactile textures found on it.

Check out the scanned magazine pages and the detailed review following it.

I’m currently back in Singapore on home leave and catching up with family and friends. So many apologies, as there will be a short blogging break till next week when I get back to Sydney. As always, if you need a design fix or just catch up with some of my older articles you might have missed, do click on my “Article Collection” link in my Navigation bar on the right or take your pick in the categories list below.

I’ll have to take some time off blogging for this and next week as I’m swamped with work! It’s amazing, how when work does happen, it all comes in at one shot. Anyways I’ll be taking some time off on the 3rd May 2007 to visit CeBit Australia. I’m looking forward to check out some of the latest product designs and technology innovations so do stay tuned for some juicy pictures!

One of the great things about this event, which I only found out about recently, is that the organizers have set up a blog and a blogging zone at the event. The blogger zone is apparently a cool area setup with wireless broad band, sofas and access to laptops for bloggers to update their blogs directly from the event. (More info here.) I’m definitely looking forward to write up some post from the event with my laptop!

It’s pretty smart that the organizers are taking advantage of the blog media to spread the word. Very smart people and I do hope to see more events taking advantage of this. So do stay tuned to this Thursday and after for some cool CeBit updates!

Sorry for the lack of postings lately. I’ve recently went into “sponge” mode and have been traveling around the internet (and the real world) visiting sites, leaving comments and catching up on the going-ons in the web (real world). I am building up inspiration to finish up my re-started mp3 project. I know I know, I threw the project out of the window a few months ago but I’ve recently figured out my angle and am going full steam ahead. I’ll be posting my thoughts on this soon, and as I’m receiving samples and working with the manufacturing vendors in the next few weeks I’ll be posting a blow by blow account on this. I’m finally actually doing more design than writing! Pictures to come and I’ll be hoping to enter it at Launch Pad as well.

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To all my dear readers, here’s wishing you a very Happy Easter with extra chocolate eggs on the top!