News

Posted on February 8, 2012 by Rich Cooper

New site launched: MX Consulting Services

MXCS Logo stripingWe were very happy to be approached by one of our existing clients and asked if we could create a new web presence for them. The goal was to improve on overall design, search engine optimisation and, most importantly, the addition of content management facilities in the form of WordPress.

Using the striking lime green of the brand as a highlight colour, combined with simple yet effective icons we were able to improve on the overall impact of the site. We have retained many of the existing brand features such as the pin striping in the blue areas and the use of subtle gradients, but by adding subtle shadows and cleaner typefaces, the site now feels more professional, established and modern.

You can vist the website here: www.mxcs.co.uk

MXConsulting Site design

Posted in Company News, Site Launch |
Posted on February 7, 2012 by Rich Cooper

ClearType – make text more readable in Windows Vista (and XP)

Cleartype Example

A while back we discussed how to improve the readability of screen fonts in Windows XP – but we have recently discovered many of our clients running Windows Vista are also affected.

The process of switching on ClearType is actually relatively painless. Just follow the steps below:

  1. Right click on an empty part of your desktop.
  2. From the drop-down menu that appears, Click Personalise.
  3. In the Personalise window, Click the Windows Colour and Appearance option.
  4. In the colour and appearance window, Click the open classic appearance properties.
  5. In the classic appearance properties window, Press the Effects button.
  6. A small effects window will now appear.
  7. Under the use the following method to smooth edges of screen fonts section you will see an option box.
  8. Click the arrow to the Right of the box and select “cleartype“
  9. Next click OK followed by OK again to close the classic appearance setting window.
  10. Finally Close the personalisation window.

You will now notice just how much smoother and clearer type appears on screen.

Posted in Support, Tips and tricks |
Posted on October 21, 2011 by Rich Cooper

Wattbike .dat to Garmin .tcx file converter

We have just built a small tool for (serious) cyclists who own both a Wattbike and a Garmin bike computer. The tool converts Wattbike sessions into Garmin TCX format, for upload onto Garmin Connect.

The tool is free to use, and although has a very small potential audience, is already proving very useful in this office.

You can see the tool here:

wattbike2garmin.com

Posted in Company News, Site Launch, Tips and tricks |
Posted on September 15, 2011 by Rich Cooper

New site launched – Hatley Park Estate

Hatley Park Estate - traditional farming estateWe have just launched a website for a traditional farming estate. Set in stunning grounds Hatley Park Estate offers office units and cottages on its grounds for short and long lease rental.

The website brand employs the Octavian Roman typeface, the designer of which, David Kindersley, lived in the Hatley Park locality.

The website was to retain the class of the typeface, whilst appealing to those looking for office space and short term leased cottages. Being within a 45 minutes of Luton and Stansted airports, and 2 hours from Gatwick, Heathrow and Birmingham airports the location was to be promoted as an ideal base. The site was also to highlight the conservation assets of the estate.

The location is very much in the middle of the countryside. With ancient woodlands, wildflower meadows, ponds, lakes and wetlands right on the doorstep. If we were going to relocate, this would be our ideal!

You can view the website at: http://www.hatleyparkestate.co.uk/

Posted in Company News, Site Launch |
Posted on September 15, 2011 by Rich Cooper

Moving WordPress sites to a new domain

When developing new WordPress websites we often host the site on a temporary domain. When we are ready to go live we then switch to the live domain. However, a problem occurs with this approach as WordPress remembers the domain it was installed on, and is very reluctant to move.

All of the site links, img src tags, stylesheets and essentially every other object used in the site build, will be directly pathed to (will still point at) the old domain.

The simple answer is to either manually change these settings within the interface and reupload the images. This is very inefficient and not necesary, these URLs can be amended directly within the WordPress database. Correcting these errors manually, however, can be time consuming.

This is the bit where we tell you that we have a faster solution. You simply need to run these four queries against your WordPress database. Remember to replace “olddomain.com” and “newdomain.com” with your existing and new domains.

UPDATE wp_posts SET post_content =
REPLACE(post_content,'www.olddomain.com','www.newdomain.com');

UPDATE wp_posts SET guid =
REPLACE(guid,'www.olddomain.com','www.newdomain.com');

UPDATE wp_postmeta SET meta_value =
REPLACE(meta_value,'www.olddomain.com','www.newdomain.com');

UPDATE wp_options SET option_value =
REPLACE(option_value,'www.olddomain.com','www.newdomain.com');
Posted in Tips and tricks, WordPress news |