15. May 2019

ZombieLoad Attack

“After Meltdown, Spectre, and Foreshadow, we discovered more critical vulnerabilities in modern processors. The ZombieLoad attack allows stealing sensitive data and keys while the computer accesses them. While programs normally only see their own data, a malicious program can exploit the fill buffers to get hold of secrets currently processed by other running programs. These secrets can be user-level secrets, such as browser history, website content, user keys, and passwords, or system-level secrets, such as disk encryption keys.” – zombieloadattack.com

There seems to be a new security related story every day. Read about the latest CPU related issues at CPU.fail.

11. May 2019

portalZINE goes Multi-Language

Since I started in 2002, all iterations of portalZINE have been pure english content websites. You can read about the why on my services page.

I had potential customers in Germany complain about that a lot over the past few years. But your own website often suffers, while your customers get all the attention. That is how it is and how it should be!

Creating Multi – Language websites has been part of my services & portfolio for years, with an extreme application setup handling 13 languages in 2014 for the soccer world cup.

Multi-Language setups have come a long way and it was time to showcase that on my own setup as well. Not only to calm those potential customers, but to testdrive new functionality and possibilities on my own setup. portalZINE has always been my testlab for stability and new feature sets.

Most of my static pages are available in English and German now, the blog itself will remain pure English.

Need help setting up a multi language website, get in touch!

Cheers
Alex

10. May 2019

Composercat – a GUI for composer

Composercat is a comprehensive GUI for the Composer package manager, designed both for professionals and people taking their first steps with Composer.

A nice entry point for everyone that is afraid of the console. The GUI application is currently in beta and available for Windows, MacOS and Linux.

“Composer is a tool for dependency management in PHP. It allows you to declare the libraries your project depends on and it will manage (install/update) them for you.”

Composercat
Composer

19. April 2019

Happy Easter 2019

I am taking a small easter break to join up with family and friends. We will have perfect weather up here in the north for the coming days.

I wish you all Happy Easter and many lovely days away from routine business life.

Enjoy
Alex

26. February 2019

VisBug – Hover inspect in the browser

Visbug is an amazing new browser extension that allows you to do a visual inspection of your website in development.

What they have to say about their tool and capabilities

Point, click & tinker
Edit or style any page, in any state, like it’s an artboard
Hover inspect styles, accessibility and alignment
Nitpick layouts & content, in the real end environment, at any device size
Leverage adobe/sketch skills
Edit any text, replace any image (hi there copywriters, ux writers, pms)
Design within the chaos: use production or prototypes and the odd states they produce, as artboards and design opportunities
Design while simulating latency, i18n, media queries, platform constraints, CPUs, screensize, etc
Make more decisions on the front end of your site/app (a11y, responsive, edge cases, etc)
No waiting for developers to expose their legos, just go direct and edit the end state (regardless of framework) and execute/test an idea

For Designers & Content Creators

A really nice tool for designers & content creators, helping them to optimize the look and feel of a website.

The extension is currently available for Chrome, but a Firefox Addon is in development.

Github
Chrome Extension

10. February 2019

Advanced Custom Fields – Free Your Gutenberg Blocks Data

Updated 25.03. : Some function names changed in the latest beta version.

IN BETA

ACF 5.8 Beta introduced an easy way to create your custom Gutenberg blocks. I am already using it heavily for a current project, to easily organize content and media assets.

Really powerful, when combined with Timber as well, which has been the foundation of many of my themes for years now ;)

ORGANIZE YOURSELF

Organizing data using ACF is nice, but sometimes you seek access to that saved block data directly. I hate it when I am confined to boundaries and the data flow is restricted or hidden. I need things to be accessible to choose the creative flow myself.

SIMPLE EXAMPLE

// Parse blocks from post content
$blocks  = parse_blocks($your_post_content);
$collect = array();

// Loop through the blocks
foreach($blocks as $block){

//Setup global block post data context
// before: acf_setup_postdata
acf_setup_meta( $block['attrs']['data'], $block['attrs']['id'], true );

// Get ACF fields
$fields = get_fields();

// I am using this to organize my assets.
// Each block of mine has a unique identifier as its first field:
// $uid = $block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]]
// I would do:
// $collect[$uid] = $fields; 

// Collection of fields using the block id. 
$collect[$block['attrs']['id']] = $fields;

// Restore global context
// before: acf_reset_postdata
acf_reset_meta( $block['attrs']['id'] );

}

// Parse blocks from post content

$blocks = parse_blocks($your_post_content);

$collect = array();

// Loop through the blocks

foreach($blocks as $block){

//Setup global block post data context

// before: acf_setup_postdata

acf_setup_meta( $block['attrs']['data'], $block['attrs']['id'], true );

// Get ACF fields

$fields = get_fields();

// I am using this to organize my assets.

// Each block of mine has a unique identifier as its first field:

// $uid = $block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]]

// I would do:

// $collect[$uid] = $fields;

// Collection of fields using the block id.

$collect[$block['attrs']['id']] = $fields;

// Restore global context

// before: acf_reset_postdata

acf_reset_meta( $block['attrs']['id'] );

}

There you go, enjoy some free block data :)

I was a big skeptic, when it comes to WordPress and the new Gutenberg editor, but combined with ACF + Timber its pure magic :) Looking forward to things to come!

Cheers
Alex

Enjoy coding …

Extended example:

$collect = [];
$blocks = parse_blocks($your->post_content);	
		
foreach($blocks as $block){
		
	if( isset($block['attrs']['data']) && !empty($block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]])){	
								
		acf_setup_meta( $block['attrs']['data'], $block['attrs']['id'], true );
			
		$fields = get_fields();
			
		 acf_reset_meta( $block['attrs']['id'] );
				
		$collect[$block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]]] = array('render' 	=> 	render_block( $block ),
																				 'field' 	=>	$fields,																							
																				  'block'  	=> 	$block
																				);
	}else{
          $collect['main'] .= render_block( $block );
}
}

$collect = [];

$blocks = parse_blocks($your->post_content);

foreach($blocks as $block){

if( isset($block['attrs']['data']) && !empty($block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]])){

acf_setup_meta( $block['attrs']['data'], $block['attrs']['id'], true );

$fields = get_fields();

acf_reset_meta( $block['attrs']['id'] );

$collect[$block['attrs']['data'][array_keys($block['attrs']['data'])[0]]] = array('render' => render_block( $block ),

'field' => $fields,

'block' => $block

);

}else{

$collect['main'] .= render_block( $block );

}

The $collect array will hold all data, including all ACF fields. You will have full access to any field, including repeater fields. The $collect[‘main’] will just collect the standard post content.

5. February 2019

SVG Cleaner – streamline your vectors

svgcleaner has been around for some time and is constantly being optimized! It helps you clean up your SVG files, keeping them free from unnecessary data.

Temporary data used by the vector editing application
Non-optimal SVG structure representation
Unused and invisible graphical elements

Github project.

The GUI application adds batch file processing, decompression & compression and parallel cleaning jobs, GUI application.

23. January 2019

GREENTONIC – Agency for design & consulting

GREENTONICs key concept is sustainability, which encompasses consulting, concept, design and implementation. I have a close relationship with the agency and have done a couple of projects with and for them.

WordPress Backend
Custom template based theme (TWIG / TIMBER / SASS / Turbolinks & Prefetch)
Custom plugin for internal functionality
Detailed Product Presentation
Analytics
On-Page SEO / Off-Page SEO
AMP
Social Integration
Maintenance

GREENTONIC

23. January 2019

Villa Anna Speyer – Bed & Breakfast 2.0

Villa Anna Speyer – Classic Bed & Breakfast offering, with 3 double rooms & bathroom.

WordPress Backend
English / German / French
Custom template based theme (TWIG / TIMBER / SASS)
Custom plugin for internal functionality
Detailed room / offer overview
Analytics
On-Page SEO
AMP
Social Integration
Maintenance

Villa Anna Speyer

21. December 2018

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas,
enjoy your off-time with friends and family, as well as the transition into the new year. Looking forward to our work together in 2019.

Even during this small holiday break, I will be keeping an eye on things :)
Kind regards
Alex

ps. During the christmas holidays, baked apples are a must-have for me. Quick recipe below:

Core the apples generously with an apple cutter
Fill the apples as desired, eg. with raisins , almonds or marzipan.
Bake in preheated oven at 200 ° C for about 30 minutes.
Remove baked apples from the oven and enjoy while still warm. Sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon. The brave among you, may also use some vanilla sauce ;)