1. Close Wamp
2. Open Skype
3. Go to Tools > Options > Advanced > Connection
4. Uncheck ‘Use port 80 and 443 as alternatives for incoming connections’
5. Save and restart Skype
6. Start Wamp
7. Hey presto

That should fix any conflict between Wamp Server and Skype.

We’ll keep it simple. Either extract/install as I do below letter for letter, or amend the filepaths accordingly to match your own.  This is just how I did it on my local machine – no settings or instructions are intended for live sites, and any changes you make to your system are at your own risk.

First off, I have installed:

Wamp Server 2.0
Apache Version : 2.2.11 as shipped with Wamp Server
PHP Version : 5.3.0 as shipped with Wamp Server

1. If you need to, download Wamp Server and install.

Set Up Zend Framework

1. Download Zend Framework – Register with them first if you haven’t yet done so.
   Go to http://framework.zend.com/download/latest, click on ‘Zend Framework Full Package’ free download.
2. Download the .zip for Zend Framework 1.10 full (recommended) 1.10.8 as at the time of writing
3. Assuming your wamp directory is the same as mine “C:\wamp\www”  unzip the Zend Framework so you have this file structure “C:\wamp\www\zend” – within this folder you should have folders  bin, demos etc :-
   

   Wamp and Zend Framework folder structure

4. Now don’t get too excited – that’s the Zend Framework set up within your C:\wamp\www\zend directory. Next, start Wamp Server.

Set Up Wamp / Apache

1. Click on the Wamp icon in your Taskbar
2. Go to Apache > Apache Modules > make sure “rewrite_module” has a tick next to it.
3. Restart Wamp (Click Wamp icon in Taskbar > Restart All Services is simplest.  Or you can go click on Wamp icon in Taskbar > Apache > Service > Restart Service
4. Now we edit php.ini.  Click on Wamp icon > PHP > php.ini
5. Click Ctrl F, or go to Edit > Find in Notepad – find “include_path”.  We need to amend the line:include_path = “.;c:\php\includes”If this line has a semicolon before include_path, remove it.Now add in:”;C:\wamp\www\zend\library”(without the quotes) to the very end, but just before the closing quotes.  Mine looks like this (with the quotes):include_path = “.;c:\php\includes;C:\wamp\www\zend\library”Note the semicolon between the two filepaths.  This separates the two paths- don’t forget it.
6. Now we need to edit Windows Environment Path variable.
   Go to Start > Search > search for “System Environment Variable”.  Click on Edit System Environment Variables.
   You should get this window.  If not, open your Control Panel > System > Advanced System Settings.  (I’m on Win7 x64, maybe different for Vista / 32 bit users)
   

   Advanced System Settings.

7. Click on Environment Variables, then find “Path” in the System variables, click Edit:


Environment Variables

8. The Edit System Variable window pops up – and we want to add the highlighted text below to the very end of the Variable Value:;C:\wamp\www\zend\bin
   
   *Don’t forget the semicolon at the end of the existing text to separate the path you are adding.  Click OK.  This will allow us to run the Command Line later on.
   

   Edit System Variable window

9. Re-boot.

Create a test domain for development.

Instead of using localhost, this is how to set up a test domain called dev.local for your development environment.  Then you just hit dev.local into your browser for testing as opposed to localhost

1. Open httpd.conf – Click Wamp icon in taskbar > Apache > httpd.conf
2. Find this line, and uncomment it by removing the ‘#’ from the beginning of the line.  This tells apache to then include the httpd-vhosts.conf file.  Save and close.

Now open httpd-vhosts.conf – if your directory structure is as we’ve been following above, then it should be in C:\wamp\bin\apache\Apache2.2.11\conf\extra.  (Apache2.2.11 is version specific if you have a different version choose that folder).



Open it with notepad.

1. Then add this domain as highlighted to the file as per the text and image below.

#first Domain

NameVirtualHost dev.local

<VirtualHost 127.0.0.1:80>
ServerName  dev.local
ServerAlias dev.local
DocumentRoot C:\wamp\www\zendtest\quickstart\public
ErrorLog “C:\wamp\www\zendtest\quickstart\public\error.log”
CustomLog C:/wamp/www/zendtest/quickstart/access.log common
<Directory “C:\wamp\www\zendtest\quickstart\public”>
Options -Indexes FollowSymLinks Multiviews
AllowOverride All
<IfModule mod_access.c>
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
</IfModule>
</Directory>
</VirtualHost>

If you don’t have the text setting VirtualHost 127.0.0.1 for C:/wamp/www, (the ‘not highlighted’ text) then add that too.

Save and close.  Restart Wamp services.

One other thing – check your Zend framework and library folders aren’t read-only.

Create Zend Project

1. Create a new, empty folder for your new Zend project in C:\wamp\www – call it zendtest
2. Open your Command Prompt – type:cd C:\wamp\www\zendtest*You should now see:C:\wamp\www\zendtest> in your command prompt window.
3. Now we want to run the zf.bat file we added to the Environment Variables above. Enter:C:\wamp\www\zend\bin\zf.bat create project quickstart*Your full line of text in the Command Prompt should look like:C:\wamp\www\zendtest>C:\wamp\www\zend\bin\zf.bat create project quickstart.This tells Windows to run zf.bat, and create a new project in a new folder called quickstart, within zendtest folder.Open windows Explorer and check that your C:\wamp\www\zendtest\quickstart folder has been created.
   Within that folder should be the folders/files below.

   

Now, when you go to http://dev.local in your browser, hopefully you’ll see this!  You should be good to go to carry on with the rest of the Zend Framework quickstart guide.



Thanks to Tawfekov for instructions on setting up dev.local – see his video here (HD) or here at zendcasts (plenty of user comments) for further info on Wamp and Zend Framework.

If you want to set up Zend Framework with Xampp, go here.

I love the functionality of posterous though – images in the right order etc.

My problem with the Postie WordPress plugin seems to be that images go in at either the beginning or the end of the post. Not much use if you’re writing a ‘how-to’ with screen shots.

Default WordPress functionality seems useless for me as it’s limited to text only.

Anyone else know of a way to post to WordPress via email with image-order intact without the post showing up on some other site first?

If you’re working in a development environment where the number of developers > 1, then the likelihood is you’ll want some kind of SVN / code repository / revision / version control in place.  Or failing that, a good yoga teacher and some valium.  We’re currently using GIT for our web development projects.

GIT has a Windows client installer that you can hit up and the installation wizard runs pretty nicely.  Yes, it’s free, Yes, it’s open source, and Yes, legendary Linus Torvald is largely responsible for Git’s development.

If this is what you’re after, go get the GIT client, download and kick off the install.

Do I need to say ‘click next’ / agree to the licence / change your default installation location if required? Okay.

Some options here that are good for us Windows users:-

Make sure you check on the Git Bash Here and Git GUI Here to integrate with Windows Explorer context menus.

Now, I chose the safe option here, however if you need to be able to use Cygwin prompt – option 2.

I haven’t touched option 3 myself yet.

I’m going with option 1- on Windows desktop, but punting up to a ‘nix server, I think this is the option for us.

Hit next > scratch scrotum > pick nose >

And voila, bingo-bongo.

Hit the Release Notes if you’re particularly interested in a problem you had with a previous version.

Otherwise you’re good to go and set up your code repository, or tap into the existing code repository you’re using for a current development.

Happy Days.

Posted via email from bournemouthwebdesign’s posterous

So, you’re developing your shiny new WordPress theme with Dreamweaver CS5…

Here’s how you enable site specific code hints for WordPress.  Dead simple.

We’ll assume you already have your site defined for your web design and have set your Testing Server server model to PHP MySQL

Now, do the following:

1. Click on Site > Site Specific Code Hints

2. Dreamweaver should pick up you want WordPress in the Structure dropdown at top (as you’ve already defined your site and assuming you’re currently working on a theme / other wp project).  If not, just select it.

3. Click OK

Now, when you hit Ctrl & Space, codehints specific to WordPress appear:

4. Voila. Bingo.

Posted via email from bournemouthwebdesign’s posterous

Neat software to add your laptop or 2^nd PC monitor as an extra display monitor.  Free trial, but it’s so smooth I’ll be shelling out the $39 on this one immediately.

If you’ve already got 2 screens set up, and it’s not enough (it never is…), and you’ve run out of card slots in your PC for an extra graphics card, and the 2 machines are networked already – then try it, it’s sweet.  Perfect for any web design / web development work.  No, I’m not affiliated, I just think it’s great.

You can also take control of the second machine from the one you’re on, and view files, copy / paste, run programs etc etc.

Love it.

Posted via email from bournemouthwebdesign’s posterous

See the video below once you’ve opened Outlook up.

Video Transcription:

• Select your Contacts folder, then individual contacts within that folder by Ctrl / Shift selecting as you wish.
• Click New>Distribution List and give it a name.
• Click Select Members, then the Address Book from the drop down.
• Select the individual Contacts you’d like to mail.
• Click the Members button to add them to the list.
• Click OK, then Save and Close.
• Create a new Mail.
• Click the To button, then select the Address Book you created the Distribution List in.
• Your new Distribution List will show up as a Contact within that Address Book.
• Happy Outlook Mass Mailing with your new Distribution List.

This works nicely with a few caveats.  I’m not sure how well it works if you have thousands of contacts to email – something like phplist may work best in that situation.  Also I’ve had problems after upgrading my Windows operating system or Outlook itself.  The address books sometimes disappear, and the remedy is removing the data files (Tools>Options>Data Files), then setting up your mail accounts again.  This can cause ‘Minor Ball-Ache’, easily treated.

To find out more about how we can help you with your internet marketing visit this website: web design bournemouth

When developing a graphic template for your new web design, a good place to start is with colour.  Decide on a primary colour, then use lighter or darker shades of that primary colour and/or a complimentary colour that goes well with the variations of your primary colour.  Once you’ve made your colour decision, think about creating a pleasant, clean design, that makes it easy for your visitors to find their way around your website.  Don’t use huge images or photographs as background images, as this will slow your site down.  You want your pages to load quickly, this is now slightly more important than it was in the past, due to a recent Google update.

Make sure that the images you use makes sense in terms of the text content that you use on your website design.  A great website to use that this is iStockPhoto, which allows you to search for images by category and has thousands of high-quality images that you can use on your website.  You can even download example images to use in your layout design before purchasing them for a few dollars each.

Make sure your webpage is designed with modern accessibility standards in mind.  Currently, XHTML and CSS are the flavours of choice in terms of laying out your web page for Internet browsers.  You can go to the W3C validator web page to check there are no major errors in your web design.

You really want your homepage to be the primary focus of your main keywords, or keyword phrases for your business.  Make the navigation consistent across all pages of your website so that a user will find it easy to navigate back to the homepage and to other areas of the website – and try to make sure that a user can reach all the pages on your website within three clicks of the mouse from the homepage.

Having made all the decisions about colour and layout, you can proceed to lay out your graphic design in the image editing program of your choice.  Popular programs include fireworks, photoshop and the popular free image editing program called GIMP.  If this is your first web design, and then gimp may offer all the functionality you require.  A common size for webpages is currently around 1000 pixels by 800 pixels, once you’ve laid out all the elements of your webpage and a graphics editor, use the splitting or splicing function within that program to output the elements in the correct format for an HTML page.

You can then use the outputted HTML from your graphics program to produce multiple pages from this template.  Popular HTML editors include Adobe Dreamweaver, Note Tab pro, and free editors such as Coffee Cup.

Using the individual graphics programs, and HTML editors is well beyond the scope of this article, but there is lots of online help, communities, and forums out there to help you on your way.

Visit this website to find out more if you need help with your website: web design bournemouth

There is a bit of a movement on at the moment – with a lot of bloggers wanting to remove the no-follow from links on their blogs.  I’m not quite sure what the stats are at the moment – I presume most WordPress blogs are still no-follow, seeing as that’s how it comes out of the box.

What was the internet all about to start with?  Let me think here a minute…yeah, linking to other sources of information!  That was it!

PR sculpting and blog spam are regularly cited as a couple of the major reasons most blogs and bloggers started using no-follow.  I haven’t noticed any let up in spam with no-follow applied – I don’t suppose spammers check for this….and most of us would probably have more luck with an ice sculpture than attempting PR sculpting…

Down with no-follow, I say.

Tools like Twitter, Stumble, Digg and Facebook are no longer ignored as passing fads or fashions.  Youtube is up there heading towards Google traffic in terms ofvolume of searches, and Facebook is now reaching incredible numbers of website visitors around the world.  (Two of the guys who rowed in this year’s Cambridge / Oxford boat race certainly did quite nicely out of it!)

Social media certainly looks like it is here to stay, and the interactivity, which allows users to comment on, rate, and publish their own content instantly online makes this an extremely powerful medium.

I’ve heard a lot of things about a lot of social media recently, one of them being that Facebook will soon be approaching over 1 billion members.  Seems a big number to me!  Whether there is any truth in it or not, the fact is still the Facebook is now a massive part of people’s online experience.  A lot of people say that twitter is reaching the top of the curve and may even be on the downward slide, but it is still a huge part of what people do online every day, every hour and every minute.

Bearing all the above in mind, it certainly makes sense to provide as much interactivity as possible on your own website or blog.  There are many tools available to enable you to integrate these types of services on your own website with the minimum of technical knowledge.

A couple that I use on my own site and blog (Bournemouth Web Design) are:

1. add this-is a tool that with the minimum of setup allows you to place an icon on your website or blog, which will enable visitors to share your content via websites such as Digg, Facebook, twitter and buzz.
2. disqus -this is another kind of social media hub that I came across online, which allows you to pull commenting from your blog or website, and link to your Facebook, twitter and other social media accounts instantly.

the debate about whether social media is beneficial for any business website now seems to be a non-debate, it just seems to be a question of which particular social media is best for your particular business.

Random Matrix theory seems to be useful everywhere – I’d bet a few pounds that Google are using it somewhere in their algorithms to rank websites….

First we had the web, and websites.  Then we had social media, and social media websites.  Now – we’re going full-circle, back to TV, and social media TV.  Do I want to be chatting online while I’m watching Jack Bauer turn around an impossible situation again?  I don’t know…..

it’s not just a case of choosing the right colours, which complement each other.  You also need to think about whether colours should be in relation to each other on the screen.  There are a number of things you can do, that will help when it comes to selecting colours for your new web design.  Sometimes it’s just a case of trial and error to discover a combination that works well for the client you’re designing a website for.

If there is a primary colour that exists for an existing clients logo or current web design, then you’ll be able to use this colour as the primary colour and adjusted slightly, to give your secondary colour by making it darker or lighter.this is a very simple way to get started in terms of developing a colour theme or swatch.

there are a couple of websites that are particularly handy when it comes to choosing colours one is called colourschemer.com and the other is called templatemonster.com.  These are websites that I came across whilst watching a video on mlwebco.com.  This is also an excellent video with some very useful information with regards to choosing colour schemes and swatches for your web design.

And all I needed to focus on when trying to rank my websites was……HITS!

Google have released their new Analytics package, and a book is also being published to help us with the complicated business of adjusting to the ‘new way’.

Read it and weep here