Get better at building websites
Hey friend,
Happy freaking new year!
I have a ton of plugin updates, a couple new tutorials, and a few announcement to my CSS Course students. But first, a pep-talk.
I’ll save you the whole “I’m so glad 2020 is over” spiel because frankly, things don’t change simply because we circled the sun. Clearly, those of us in the United States realized that yesterday…
I like to be relatively direct when I’m talking to myself (not so good at being direct with others, I’m working on it…) and since you’re reading a newsletter from me, I’m going to be direct with you.
2020 happened. It wasn’t a great year. 2021 is happening…
Take a breath, and don’t be so hard on yourself for not accomplishing your goals.
Life is chaotic. You can’t control tomorrow. But you can control what you’re going to do next, and what you send your time and energy on. Is the next thing you’re going to do truly beneficial for your business and your life? Or are you wasting your time? I hope you’ll put effort towards learning and developing something that will help you and others to be better.
Pep-talk over.
This is why I do coding, not motivational speaking.
Keep Building,
Will
PLUGIN DISRUPTION
Yesterday, I received a few reports that some of my plugins had suddenly stopped working (yesterday was exhausting…). It turns out my hosting provider was having an issue delivering the code to a limited number users. This issue was resolved at about 1:30am (EST) this morning and should be all good now, but if you’re still experiencing any problems, reach out and let me know.
CSS COURSE
1-on-1’s - For any of you in my CSS Course, I’m offering free 1-on-1 sessions this month (and to any new students that sign up this month). I want to hear from you, where you’re getting stuck, and what you’re trying to build. I’m currently just offering this in January, but I’m working to find more ways to connect with my students in the best way, so ideas are welcome! Just shoot me an email and we’ll set up a time.
The Ultimate Overlay Trick - This is the first article in what I’d like to be a series of articles where I talk about best practices in CSS. There’s often many ways to code things in CSS, some are better some are worse. This is the first of this series of articles where I talk about the best way to add an overlay to anything: images, videos, blocks, etc.
Curious about my CSS course? Learn more below.
TUTORIALS
Clickable Thumbnail Over Entire Section - I’ve had many people ask about how to make the entire slide a link in my sliding image banner. It’s a relatively straightforward thing to do, so I created a tutorial about how to do this for ANY section in Squarespace, not just sections that are part of my slider.
Loading Animation in Squarespace - This tutorial walks you through building and adding a loading animation to your website. The code will take your favicon and turn it into a pulsing loading animation, but you can adjust it to be any image. This tutorial uses vanilla javascript and CSS animations. Can you IMAGINE anything more fun?!
PLUGINS
Here are the most recent updates to my plugins since the last newsletter was released. To get the latest update on any plugin you’ve purchased, go to the email that was sent to you after purchase for the link and password to the installation guide.
Split Section Plugin
Installation Page || Purchase
Improved Editing Mode - Now you can add sections to an already-installed split section without having to stop the plugin.
Bug Fix - Error when installed on Squarespace 7.0 when backslashes were used in index page URL’s
Sliding Image Banner Plugin
Installation Page || Purchase
Improved Editing Mode - Now you can add sections to an already-installed slider without having to uninstall the code.
Accordion Dropdowns
Installation Page || Purchase
Feature Update - Now you can use this plugin with Markdown Blocks instead of Code Blocks so you can use this on Personal Plans instead of just Business plans.
Tabs (For Blocks)
Installation Page || Purchase
Bug Fix - Now works with a fixed header, where before the sticky tabs were hidden behind the header.
Mega Menu
Installation Page || Purchase
Fixed gap between header and menu
Fixed Summary Block items not displaying correctly
Blog Post Banner Image
Installation Page || Purchase
Fixed issue with banner loader when visitors came from Social media (issue related to URL parameters).
Overflow Carousel
Installation Page || Purchase
New feature - Now with buttons below to help you scroll!