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Let’s Make it Official… Introducing WPMU DEV Hosting!

After two years of development, a solid year of testing, and 6 months of perfect performance behind the scenes we are delighted to finally, officially, launch WPMU DEV hosting.

What makes WPMU DEV Hosting different?

Yep, there isn’t exactly a shortage of WordPress hosting options out there, so why, you might ask, are we launching another one? Well, when we originally looked at the hosting landscape, we figured there were actually a bunch of things that could be done better, a lot better.

So, we gave these a shot.

Dedicated hosting, made stunningly affordable

Up until now if you wanted fully dedicated hosting — with absolutely containerized memory, CPU & SSD resources — you either needed to get a Computer Science degree or pay a hefty premium.

Well, not anymore, because right now every single WPMU DEV member gets 3 (yes, that’s THREE) fully dedicated hosting accounts (1 GB dedicated Memory, 1 vCPU, 10 GB SSD storage and 1 TB of bandwidth… each) as part of their membership, at no extra cost.

No shared hosting. No shared IPs. Completely isolated and separated from any other sites. Object caching by default, optimized for WordPress, and blazingly fast.

Extra sites at that level are $10/m and you can get up to 16 GB of RAM, 6 vCPUs, 140 GB of SSD and 20 TB of bandwidth for $100 (or just $70 if you don’t use your 3 basic sites). Here’s the full pricing table.

Like I said, unless you’re prepared to unleash your inner Sysadmin you simply will not find anything even close to these specs out there (I dare ya, post them in the comments if you can). This is because we’re doing this pretty much at cost and based on the very latest Digital Ocean architecture (who are amazing, btw, 👋 guys <3). Your other hosts are either making too much of a margin or using (shared) architecture that’s too outdated – you won’t find that problem here.

And even better, if you’re an existing member you can go and enjoy those 3 sites right now for free. Yep, they just got added to your account at no extra charge now or in the future :).

And if you’re not a member already, as we’ve got a 30-day free trial (with no tricky cancellation steps) you can try it out now for absolutely nothing by clicking one of the bazillion CTAs plastered around the site. Don’t take our word for it, take it for a spin!

We really, really know what we’re doing (and this is years, and years in the making)

We’ve been hosting and running Edublogs, with over 4 million sites, since 2005 and CampusPress (formerly Edublogs Campus) since 2006 which now hosts millions of sites for over 250 major universities (like Cornell, Penn State & RMIT), school districts and government departments (like the State of Victoria Department).

We’ve been the biggest WordPress Multisite dedicated and managed host for almost 15 years and now we’re bringing all that experience to you.

And this isn’t just by chance, this is something we’ve been working on since 2016 when we first ran a big old survey of WPMU DEV members and the number 1 request, by some distance was for HOSTING.

In fact, you can check out this special Hello WP video episode that goes into all of that in some detail:

Oh, and if you’d like to tap into that experience even more, we also now offer enterprise WordPress (Multisite and single) hosting to non-educational customers as well.

So, if you’re looking for experience (and effort) you can count on … we’re it!

Talking about Multisite… you can run that on every plan we offer!

Yep, you are reading that correctly, we certainly haven’t forgotten our roots as the MU provider of choice, and as such Multisite (both subdirectories and subdomains) is available on all of our plans.

Multisite on a $10/m dedicated plan. Yes, you read that right.

And setting it up is as easy as ticking a box after installation.

Security, Optimization, SEO, Reports all white label, all included

Of course, you can use pretty much any plugin on our hosting, but if you’re interested in: a) not paying for a bunch of other services & b) a completely integrated experience containing all the core WordPress plugins and services you are after, then you might well be interested in this.

Devman demonstrating our all-in-one-ness

Every WPMU DEV hosting package comes with the complete WPMU DEV plugin pack, plus all of our services like white label reports, automated (and safe update protected) updates, our CDN and plenty more besides.

If you haven’t already, take a look through our navigation to find out everything a WPMU DEV membership gets you… all at no extra cost.

Migration? We have got that.

One of the reasons we’ve been running hosting behind the scenes for so long is we took the extra time to get migration right, and we think we’ve nailed it for you.

So, first up you can migrate to a staging (or test if you prefer) site on our hosting for absolutely nothing using our internal migration tool, Shipper, SFTP, SSH or any other method you like.

And if you run into any problems, we will troubleshoot it for you and manually migrate your site for you, for free.

And emails? YAAASSS EMAIIIILSSS!

Now, most hosts steer clear of emails beyond recommending G Suite or similar, which we like, but… it costs.

With WPMU DEV hosting you can simply forward your emails to any account (like Gmail) you want and then use that account to send as an alias, here’s a super simple way to get that working in Gmail… it’s amazing and free!

Currently, it just requires you to add an MX record to your domain (amazingly easy) but in the future, our DNS hosting will make it even easier.

Techy, techy cool stuff

Beyond everything else, there’s SSH, phpMyAdmin, and SFTP access. There are automated free SSL certificates via Let’s Encrypt. There is GIT, Composer and NPM integration. There is a one-click staging environment. And you can choose, per site, to use data centers in multiple countries and regions too.

Yep you can choose on a per site basis to host either in:

  • US – East Coast
  • US – West Coast
  • Canada
  • Germany
  • India
  • Netherlands
  • Singapore
  • United Kingdom

And we’re adding new locations all the time.

Naturally you get a dedicated IP, running IPv6 alongside WP-CLI with custom commands included. Oh, and we heard you like logs and analytics, so we’ve included completely comprehensive logs of every aspect of your hosting site alongside some really nifty server analytics that’ll tell you everything you need to know.

And covering all the bases, we’ve designed a new way to handle backups from the ground up — using ZFS file systems which allows you to make or schedule unlimited instant incremental snapshots of your site with no load or downtime. Restores are just as fast as we don’t need to unzip files or import databases.

Find out more here and please feel free to ask us any questions over live sales chat or post a comment… orrrr as I may have mentioned, feel free to take it all for a spin for 30 days for free :D

And last, but by no means least, 24/7 expert support

I’m not one to brag but have you looked at our Trustpilot and Reviews.io ratings

It’s basically a big love-in for our amazing support team, who are there for you, live, 24/7.

Live 24/7/365 expert WordPress support is pretty cool

It’s not like having your own WordPress development team, it is having your own WordPress team there at the drop of a hat, whenever you need them.

If your site has been hacked, we’ll help you fix it up. If you’re having trouble getting the perfect site speed, come along and let us have a crack at it.

And, as with everything WPMU DEV, you can try that out free for 30 days. Yep, free support, for 30 days, and if you don’t like it there’s no obligation to stick around whatsoever.

Plus, should you not like talking to people (I understand), well we’ve got great documentation too, feel free to have a stroll around our docs right now, we’re improving them all the time too.

And there’s more coming soon

If you’re familiar with WPMU DEV you’ll know that we basically don’t stand still, just look at the recent releases at the bottom of our roadmap in addition to the stuff coming up.

And the same is absolutely true of our hosting. We’re constantly working on improving every aspect of what we do, including bringing you some pretty special security features such as a real, genuine (rather than just saying it is) WAF alongside DNS and some mind-blowing integrations with The Hub that will make managing hundreds of WordPress sites in one area – hosted with us or elsewhere – an absolute breeze.

You should also expect to see some different pricing options in the future based around bulk orders and possibly annual options too. However, one thing I should note is that future members won’t necessarily get 3 free sites with their membership but we will, as we always have done, completely grandfather over any existing members on this plan as long as you’re part of it now (:waves: at members still paying 2010 prices who we are currently losing money on lol, we got ya).

So there you go, 2 years of work, ready to roll. I’ve got all my personal sites on it and I absolutely love it (plus I love not paying somebody else for hosting, which makes me very happy).

So why not give us a go and let us know how you like it in the comments and, of course, how we can improve / what we can do to persuade you to use WPMU DEV as your dedicated WordPress host.

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New Attock WordPress Meetup Empowers Pakistani Women Freelancers and Business Owners

WordCamp Lahore is getting rebooted on November 30 – December 1, at the National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences. The first edition of the event was planned for 2016 but was derailed by local disagreements and ultimately canceled. For the past three years organizers have worked to strengthen their local meetup groups and follow suggestions from the WordPress Foundation before reapplying. The Lahore WordPress meetup group now has 4,383 members who regularly meet in various groups across the area.

WordCamp Lahore lead organizer Muhammad Kashif said his team is expecting more than 350 attendees, with the majority of them coming from the local community. The Lahore WordPress meetup group is thriving and has grown to 4,383 members who regularly meet in various groups across the area.

“We still have attendees from other cities and in closing I encourage them to start local chapters and offer any help they need,” Kashif said. He works as a Master Trainer for a government training program called eRozgaar that trains unemployed youth in more than 25 centers across Punjab. The program was launched by the Punjab Government in March 2017 and WordPress is a major part of the eRozgaar curriculum.

“I manage the WordPress curriculum and in a recent update I have included community building, which is about Meetups and WordCamp events,” Kashif said. He reports that eRozgaar trainees have collectively earned more than $1 million US dollars to date after going through the 3.5 month-program.

“The program is making a big impact, especially for women who can’t go out for jobs,” Kashif said. “They are making good money from freelancing and WordPress is playing a big part in that.”

Kashif attributes some of Pakistan’s current economic challenges to a rapidly growing population and poor planning from past governments. The job opportunities have not grown as fast as the population, which was one of the reasons the government created the eRozgaar training program.

As the result of having WordPress in the curriculum that is used across so many areas of Punjab, new meetups are starting to pop up in other cities. Salma Noreen, one of the program’s trainers who Kashif worked with, started a meetup in Attock and is the first female WordPress meetup organizer in Pakistan. She plans to apply for WordCamp Attock in 2020.

Salma Noreen
Salma Noreen, first female WordPress meetup organizer in Pakistan

“Attock is a small city but love for WordPress is big and I am so happy to see other women participating in the WordPress community,” Noreen said.

“Every year, 1000+ people graduate in this city after 16 years of education. But we don’t have many jobs in this small city, so a small number of people who are backed by financially good families can move to other big cities like Lahore and Karachi for jobs and learning opportunities. The remaining people’s future is always a question mark.

“Being a woman, I was more worried about women, as we have a cultural barrier that most women cannot get permission to relocate or go out of home for a regular 9 to 5 job. Introducing them to WordPress and then guiding them on how to find online clients has helped many to earn a decent living from home.”

For the past 10 years, Noreen worked primarily as a freelancer and has completed more than 3,500 projects in web development. She is mentoring new WordPress users in her city to become successful freelancers and online store owners using resources like Udemy courses, YouTube, public blogs, and the WordPress codex.

“I am still struggling but yes I am confident that one day everyone will be making enough from home,” she said.

The Attock WordPress meetup is averaging 60-70 attendees in recent months, where members share their knowledge, experience, and best practices. For many of those attending, the meetup group was their first introduction to the software. Noreen describes the local community as “crazy about WordPress” and eager to have their own WordCamp in 2020.

Attock WordPress meetup

One meetup member, Uroosa Samman, is a graduate of Environmental Science studies but is now working with WordPress after attending the monthly meetups.

“I didn’t have any WordPress or coding background during my education,” Samman said. “It was difficult for me to learn tech things. The meetups were very helpful and motivational for me, so I decided to start working in tech. Since the events were organized by a female organizer, it was comfortable for us to attend. I am able to provide my services as a freelancer and I am developing my own WordPress e-commerce store. If I get stuck in any issue related to WordPress, I immediately contact this community and they are always ready to help each other.”

Women attending a recent Attock WordPress Meetup

Shahryar Amin, a recent college graduate, was uncertain about his future until he discovered WordPress through Noreen’s support and the Attock meetup:

Just a few months ago, I was completely devastated financially. Pakistan is going through turbulent time, and its economy has never been performing this low. So, fresh graduates like me had their dreams absolutely shattered, when after four months of rigorous effort, we were unable to find a source of livelihood. That was truly a testing time.

Moving back to my small city, I was not much hopeful for the future. My hometown, Attock, is a remote city with limited opportunities to advance one’s career. But ironically, that turned out to be a wrong assumption. I moved back to my city after nearly four years, and it had some phenomenal changes which I couldn’t resist noticing. The most
impressive of them was WordPress meetups.

That was the first time I became familiar with the platform. I was curious, and that got me to the very first meetup organized by Ms. Salma Noreen. She is a remarkable soul, and I can’t thank her more for putting up such effort for an ignored city like ours. I learned my basics from these meetups, and as my interest become my passion, I was spending more and more hours on learning WordPress through the internet. I had no programming skills, but fortunately one don’t need any to setup a website on WordPress.

As I delved further into it, I discovered some very useful plugins, like Elementor, Divi and Visual composer, and at that moment I decided to become a designer using WordPress. I won’t say that I have become an expert in WordPress, but I am paying back the community by sharing my knowledge as a speaker at the very last meetup on July 30. Also, I have been working as a freelance designer on various online platforms, and WordPress expertise has truly been rewarding me financially.

Shahryar Amin speaking at a recent Attock WordPress meetup

Attock resident Sania Nisar has a degree in software engineering and used to spend several days creating a simple website before discovering WordPress. She has never had any formal training through paid courses but is now working as a WordPress professional with the knowledge she gained from attending WordPress meetups and online resources.

“WordPress Attock is playing a vital role in empowering women in my vicinity,” Nisar said. “It is difficult for the women of Attock to travel to big cities like Islamabad to gain knowledge. However, WordPress Attock has efficiently solved this problem by providing an engaging learning platform for the women of this city. Today I am a successful freelancer and a WordPress professional.”

Noreen said her team hopes to bring 15 to 20 people from Attock to attend WordCamp Lahore. The trip is expensive and takes approximately seven hours so not many will be able to make it but there will be other camps in the region that are nearer for Attock residents.

Last year a WordCamp was held in Islamabad, and the second WordCamp Karachi took place in August 2019. WordCamp Lahore will be Pakistan’s fourth WordCamp, held in the country’s second-most populous city. Attendees will have the opportunity to meet and connect with WordPress professionals and enthusiasts from across Pakistan. Speaker applications are open and sessions will be held in Urdu and English. Regular admission is Rs 1,700.00 and tickets are now on sale.

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CSS-Tricks Chronicle XXXVI

This is one of these little roundups of things going on with myself, this site, and the other sites that are part of the CSS-Tricks family.

I was recently in Zürich for Front Conference. It was my first time there and I very much enjoyed the city and the lovely staff of the conference. I was terribly jetlagged for my opener talk so I feel like I didn't quite nail it how I wanted to, but whattyagonnado.

It's named "How to Think Like a Front-End Developer" but it's really more like an adaptation of "ooooops I guess we’re full-stack developers now."

I've packed in several more conferences this fall:

  1. - Web Unleashed - Toronto, Canada
  2. - Dot All - Montreal, Canada
  3. - ARTIFACT - Austin, Texas - Use coupon code LASTCHANCE200 for this one.
  4. - All Things Open - Raleigh, North Carolina
  5. - JAMstack_conf - San Francisco, California

Speaking of conferences, if you know of any coming up that aren't on our master list of front-end related web conferences, please do a pull request or contact me.

If we've got anything at ShopTalk Show, it's consistency! I don't even remember the last time we've missed a week, and I enjoy making the show just as much now as I ever have.

Perhaps my favorite show of late was just chatting with Dave about what technology we would pick if on a greenfield (from scratch) project under different circumstances.

But mostly we chat with folks like Tyler McGinnis, Adam Argyle, Rachel Andrew, and Lara Hogan.

We're moving right along at CodePen as well!

  • You can now export Pens with a build process, meaning after an npm install, you have an offline version of CodePen to work with. Need to spin up a little processing environment for like Markdown/Sass/React/Babel? Just set up a blank Pen that way, export it, and you've got it.
  • We're building more and more of CodePen in React, and I think we're past the tipping point where the value in that becomes more and more clear. It's a good technological fit for our type of site. For example, we re-wrote how items are displayed and grids-of-items across the site. So now we build some little feature into it like "pinning" items, and it instantly sprinkles out to all the grids on the entire site. Same with filtering and view options.
  • Along those same lines, little moments like this feel very satisfying to me. That's related to our "Private by Default" feature.
  • We released a feature so you can block other users if it comes down to that (as well as report them to us).
  • We released some high contrast syntax highlighting themes that are both more accessible and darn nice to look at.

I got to be on Giant Robots!

We started an Instagram account at @real_css_tricks. The plan is just little educational tidbits.

The post CSS-Tricks Chronicle XXXVI appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

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Apple Updates Developer Guidelines for Sign in with Apple and Kids Category

Apple has updated its developer guidelines for Sign in with Apple and the Kids category. Sign in with Apple is the feature that allows users with an Apple ID to sign in to third-party apps and services with that Apple ID and password. Apple's update alters when apps listed in the Apple App Store are required to use the Sign in with Apple authentication feature. Apple had previously updated guidelines for its Kids category to better protect children.

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(Why) Some HTML is “optional”

Remy Sharp digs into the history of the web and describes why the <p> tag doesn’t need to be closed like this:

<p>Paragraphs don’t need to be closed
<p>Pretty weird, huh?

Remy writes:

Pre-DOM, pre-browsers, the world's first browser was being written by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. There was no reference implementation and certainly no such thing as a parsing specification. The first browser, the WorldWideWeb.app, parsed HTML character by character applying styles as it went along. As opposed to today's methods whereby a document object model is built up, then rendered.

[...] The paragraph tag (yes, in upper case) was intended to separate paragraphs, not wrap them.

<P>
Paragraph one.
<P>
Paragraph two.
<P>
Paragraph three.

Weird, huh! Remy wrote this in response to Chris’ post the other day about optional HTML and how browsers will close certain tags for us or even insert the right elements in place.

Direct Link to Article — Permalink

The post (Why) Some HTML is “optional” appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

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Collective #549

C537_divi

Our Sponsor

The Ultimate WordPress Page Builder

You’ve never built a WordPress website like this before. Divi is more than just a WordPress theme, it’s a completely new website building platform that replaces the standard WordPress post editor with a vastly superior visual editor.

Try it

C549_doka

Doka: Free Online Image Editor

Quickly edit and crop your images online using this free mobile-friendly image editor. Apply filters, rotate, resize, and flip images, adjust colors, and add markup.

Check it out

C549_tiler

Tiler

Tiler is a tool to create an image using all kinds of other smaller images (tiles). It is different from other mosaic tools since it can adapt to tiles with multiple shapes and sizes (i.e. not limited to squares).

Check it out

C549_PHP

25 Years of PHP

Join Rasmus Lerdorf, the creator of PHP, for a fun look at the highlights (and lowlights) of an amazing journey.

Watch it

C549_number

MNIST Draw

Draw a digit by hand and have it classified in real time, as you draw, by a machine learning model trained against the MNIST dataset.

Check it out

C549_3dengine

ROYGBIV

ROYGBIV is a WebGL game engine for motivated programmers who do not have the budget for buying fancy 3D models or licensing a popular engine but still want to make 60 FPS web games for both mobile and desktop.

Check it out

C549_kenburnspaper

3D Ken Burns Effect from a Single Image

Simon Niklaus, Long Mai, Jimei Yang and Feng Liu introduce a framework that synthesizes the 3D Ken Burns effect from a single image, supporting both a fully automatic mode and an interactive mode with the user controlling the camera.

Read it

Collective #549 was written by Pedro Botelho and published on Codrops.

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Justin Tadlock Joins WP Tavern

The kid scampered ahead of his classmates. He wanted to be one of the first to set foot in the building, but he stopped as he got to the first step. He looked up to count the floors. One, two, three…it wasn’t The Times. He was awestruck all the same. The Birmingham News.

Truth be told, the kid was a man grown in 2007, but he was still a kid at heart. His graduation was fast approaching. He’d soon leave The Plains, his home of Auburn, Alabama. He needed to get some experience at smaller, local papers before landing a job at The Birmingham News. He didn’t know it while standing on those steps, but before the day was out, he’d return home and start filling out applications for every small paper across the state.

His only real experience with newspapers outside of university was reading about J. Jonah Jameson and Peter Parker or following the exploits of Clark Kent and Lois Lane. He had this 1950s-esque picture in his mind of a cigar-smoking reporter wearing a cheap suit and fedora while pounding the keys of his typewriter. He’d be working toward a Pulitzer-winning story. Other reporters would sprint by his desk with their next big lead. The editor would yell orders across the room as everyone rushed to beat the deadline.

Reality didn’t exactly match the picture in his mind. The kid knew it wouldn’t. On those steps of the recently-built news office, he’d need to let go of the fantasy. He breathed deep and stepped forward at the instruction of his professor.

Field trips were a rare occurrence in college, but this professor was different. His classroom was merely a part of the learning process. Journalism was more than memorizing rules and writing a few papers each semester. The only way to understand journalism was to step foot into an office and observe.

That’s the day the kid’s life changed forever. He knew what he wanted to do after he graduated. He wanted to work at a small-town newspaper by day and pen the great Southern American novel by night.

The roads people travel are rarely the direct route they set out on.

A few months later, the kid was living in Atlanta, Georgia, and traveling to Home Depots across half the state as a vendor. During his summer in the Peach State, he got an opportunity to visit the CNN Center. It was a thing of beauty. With renewed vigor, he put in more applications at small papers. Either no one was hiring or he didn’t have the experience.

He applied for other jobs. Once he interviewed to be a used-car salesman. However, he landed a job teaching in South Korea. While imparting the few things he picked up about the English language to young minds, he began building his reputation in the WordPress community. Before leaving the country, he’d bootstrapped his own WordPress theme shop in 2008.

After 11 years, the kid stumbled upon an opportunity to join the staff at WP Tavern, a chance to combine his passion for WordPress and writing.

Now a new chapter in his life begins.

Allow Me to Introduce Myself

My name is Justin Tadlock. I’m the new staff writer for WP Tavern. It’s my hope that I can bring a different perspective and produce many engaging stories for you to read long into the future.

You’ve probably used at least a few lines of my code to run your web site. I’ve contributed to WordPress in some form or fashion since I started using the software in 2005. I formerly ran Theme Hybrid, which was one of the earliest and longest-running theme shops in the WordPress ecosystem. I also co-authored Professional WordPress Plugin Development.

Over the coming weeks and months, I plan to get to know more of you within the WordPress community. I’ve been an avid reader of WP Tavern since its inception. It’s always held a special place in my heart, and I want it to be an environment where everyone feels welcome to discuss all the things happening in the WordPress world.

It will take me a bit to get a feel for the new writing position and find my voice. I may have a few hit-or-miss stories out of the gates, but I’m always open to feedback and criticism from our readers. Ultimately, it’s my job to serve you the stories that you enjoy reading.

I’m stoked for the opportunity to get to know more of you. I want to help you share your stories. I want the community to know the people behind this platform that so many of us rely on in our personal and professional lives.

I hope I exceed your expectations for quality reporting and feature stories for WordPress. Stay tuned.

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Web Development Merit Badges

Changed a DNS record and everything worked just fine
Comprehended someone else's RegEx
Built an accordion from scratch
Exited VIM
Accidentally created own CMS
Pulled off a design you didn’t think you could
Told a client/boss "No, we're not doing that."
Wrote an HTAccess redirect that included a capture group
Refactored a large portion of CSS and didn't break anything
Centered an element vertically and horizontally
Migrated a database without character encoding issues
Pushed to production on Friday and didn't roll it back over the weekend
Merged master into a six month old branch
Had a neglected site get hacked and spammed
Used CSS Grid in production
Someone you don't know starred one of your GitHub Repositories
Hand-coded a HTML email
Gave someone useful feedback on a Pull Request
Debugged something for over one hour where the fix was literally one character
Solved a bug by taking a nap
Became extremely confused by a CORS error
Quoted the exact number of hours it took to do the job
Renewed an SSL certificate without any drama
Found an answer to an issue on StackOverflow
Rocked the Checkbox Hack on a project
Your personal website hasn't been updated in at least 5 years

The post Web Development Merit Badges appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

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5G Will Definitely Make the Web Slower, Maybe

Scott Jehl has written this wonderful piece about how 5G is on the horizon and how it could cause problems for users. But first, he starts by talking about the overwhelming positive news about it:

[...] as it matures 5G is predicted to improve network speeds dramatically. Carriers are predicting download speeds in 2019 for anywhere from 100Mb to 1 Gbit per second on average.

This is...bonkers! Numbers like this make it seem as though the web’s performance problems are merely a matter of infrastructure. But Scott continues:

Faster networks should fix our performance problems, but so far, they have had an interesting if unintentional impact on the web. This is because historically, faster network speed has enabled developers to deliver more code to users—in particular, more JavaScript code.

During the years 2011 through 2019, 4g coverage spread from 5% to 79% of the world. During that same time period, the median average JavaScript transfer size to mobile devices increased by 611%, from 52kb to 372.9 KB.

When I read this, I thought of how adding extra lanes to highways actually causes more traffic, which is equally weird and counterintuitive. But networks are like highways in this way, as Scott shows above. He continues to look at how most phones won’t be using the latest and greatest tech and we’ll always have to consider the users that are using the slowest devices on the slowest networks, regardless of how fast our connection might be:

As networks improve, we have a huge opportunity to improve the web we build, but it’s on us to take that opportunity, or squander it.

Direct Link to Article — Permalink

The post 5G Will Definitely Make the Web Slower, Maybe appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

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40+ Motivational Quotes for Creatives

Sometimes we all need a little motivation. The road to creating something great can be tough. There are many twists and turns, failures, trials and tribulations. We all grow a little weary.

The goal of this article is to reinvigorate your creativity with empowering quotes from creators, inventors, and entrepreneurs of all backgrounds.

These quotes vary in nature. Some apply to work ethic, some for inspiration and determination, and others are just great phrases to live by. Get inspired with these quotes for creators below and then get creating!

View more inspirational articles on 1stwebdesigner →

A bridge crossing over water.

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Be Inspired to Create

“…If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours…If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” – Henry David Thoreau

“To know your life purpose is to connect with a higher power.” – Shannon L. Alder

“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” – Pablo Picasso

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – Albert Schweitzer

“It’s never too late to be who you might have been.” – George Eliot

“If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.” – Napoleon Hill

A person holding a small plant.

“With the advent of spring and beginning of the new harvest season the creators of abundance, our peasants, come out to the fields to sow with good aspirations and hopes.” – Islom Karimov

“To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself.” – Soren Kierkegaard

“Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

“The other side of every fear is a freedom.” – Marilyn Ferguson

“Opportunity is missed by most because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” – Thomas Edison

“Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them.” – Albert Einstein

“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.” – Ayn Rand

“What we see depends mainly on what we look for.” – John Lubbock

A rocky coastline.

“Whether you think that you can, or that you can’t, you are usually right.” – Henry Ford

“I always prefer to believe the best of everybody; it saves so much trouble.”  – Rudyard Kipling

“You don’t need money to be creative. The ghetto builds champions every day.” – DJ Snake

“The most dangerous idea is silencing people.” – Naval Ravikant

“A busy calendar and a busy mind will destroy your ability to do great things in this world. If you want to be able to do great things, whether you’re a musician, or whether you’re an entrepreneur, or whether you’re an investor, you need free time and you need a free mind.” – Naval Ravikant

“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.” – Dorothy Parker

“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

“So go on, get angry. But keep your mouth shut and go do your work.” – Austin Kleon

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.” – Carl Sagan

A mountain on a starry night.

“The world always seems brighter when you’ve just made something that wasn’t there before.” – Neil Gaiman

“We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents.” – Bob Ross

“Many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are.” – J.K. Rowling

“A new idea is delicate. It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a quip and worried to death by a frown on the right man’s brow.” – Charles Brower

“Remember the two benefits of failure. First, if you do fail, you learn what doesn’t work; and second, the failure gives you the opportunity to try a new approach.” – Roger Von Oech

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.” – Steve Jobs

“Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity.” – T. S. Eliot

Waves crashing on a beach.

“You can’t use up creativity the more you use the more you have.” – Maya Angelou

“There is only one of you in all time. This expression is unique and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost.” – Martha Graham

“Creative people are curious, flexible, persistent, and independent, with a tremendous spirit of adventure and a love of play.” – Henri Matisse

“Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” – Leo Burnett

“You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club.” – Jack London

“To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science.” – Albert Einstein

“The essential part of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” – Edwin H. Land

“Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where teacher and pupil are located in the same individual.” – Arthur Koestler

“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things.” – Ray Bradbury

“Blessed are the curious, for they shall have adventures.” – L. Drachman

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.” – Shunryu Suzuki

A young girl looks off into the distance.

Quotes That Will Make You Think…

For this last section, we’re featuring just a few more quotes for creators that are less motivational and moreso thought-provoking.

“We call ourselves creators and we just copy.” – Lauryn Hill

“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.” – Mary Oliver

“If you’re creating anything at all, it’s really dangerous to care about what people think.” – Kristen Wiig

“Great is the human who has not lost his childlike heart.” – Mencius (Meng-Tse)

“When Alexander the Great visited Diogenes and asked whether he could do anything for the famed teacher, Diogenes replied: “Only stand out of my light.” Perhaps some day we shall know how to heighten creativity. Until then, one of the best things we can do for creative men and women is to stand out of their light.” – John W. Gardner

“Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.” – Howard Aiken

“Some men look at things the way they are and ask why? I dream of things that are not and ask why not?” – Robert Kennedy

Words of Wisdom

Which quote stood out the most to you? We hope you use these motivational and thought-provoking words to boost your creativity and make the world a more beautiful place. You can do it!

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How to Create a Shopping Cart in WordPress with BigCommerce

There are several WordPress eCommerce plugins that allow you to add a shopping cart to your website. However, if you want to keep your eCommerce store separate for better speed and security, then your options are quite limited.

BigCommerce is an all-in-one eCommerce platform that allows you to create a powerful online store without dealing with the technical hassle.

In this article, we will show you how to easily create a shopping cart in WordPress with BigCommerce, step by step.

Adding a shopping cart in WordPress with BigCommerce

Understanding BigCommerce for WordPress

BigCommerce is a highly scalable and fully-hosted eCommerce platform.

It is an all-in-one solution which provides you with everything you will need to create and run an online store, including hosting, design, content, payment solutions, and marketing tools.

WordPress on the other hand is the most popular content management system (CMS) used by over 34% of all websites online. You can use it to create a content-focused blog, a business website, or even an online store.

You can now integrate these two powerful platforms together and enjoy the best of both worlds.

Using BigCommerce as your eCommerce plugin in WordPress gives you the following advantages:

  • Smooth content-and-commerce integration: BigCommerce for WordPress lets you enjoy the industry-leading eCommerce capabilities without compromising the powerful content management features of WordPress.
  • Minimum usage of server resources: You can use BigCommerce as your eCommerce backend for things like catalog management, processing payments, and managing fulfillment logistics, and more. This means that your eCommerce store will have minimal impact on your WordPress hosting server resources.
  • High scalability: BigCommerce lets you scale your online business without losing speed or uptime.
  • Enhanced eCommerce security: BigCommerce takes care of all your eCommerce security needs. It gives you a secure PCI compliant checkout experience.
  • Built-in payment options: You can use popular payment options like PayPal powered by Braintree at the lowest credit-card processing rates.
  • Sell across multiple channels: Each website works as a ‘channel’ in BigCommerce. You can connect a BigCommerce account with multiple WordPress sites (channels), multi-site network, or social accounts and sell your products.

Wondering how BigCommerce stacks up against WooCommerce? Take a look at our article on BigCommerce vs WooCommerce for a side by side comparison.

With that said, let’s go ahead and see how to create a shopping cart in WordPress with BigCommerce.

Getting Started with BigCommerce

First, you need to visit the BigCommerce website and click on the ‘Get Started’ button.

Sign up for BigCommerce

This will bring up a signup form. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the process.

Sign up for BigCommerce account

Once you have signed up, you’ll reach the BigCommerce dashboard where you will be asked to connect your WordPress website.

BigCommerce dashboard

Your BigCommerce store is now ready, let’s connect it to your WordPress website.

Creating a Shopping Cart in WordPress Using BigCommerce

First thing you need to do is install and activate the BigCommerce for WordPress plugin. For detailed instructions, see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Once the plugin is installed and activated, a new navigation menu labeled BigCommerce will be added to your admin panel, and the setup wizard will open. First, it will ask you to connect your account or create a new account.

Connect with BigCommerce Account or Create New Account

Click on the ‘Connect My Account’ button to continue.

This will bring up a popup where you’ll be required to login to your BigCommerce account. After that, you will be asked to confirm that you want the plugin to connect with your BigCommerce account.

Confirm BigCommerce connect

Click on the ‘Confirm’ button to continue.

This will close the popup, and you will see a new BigCommerce screen on your WordPress site. From here you need to set up BigCommerce for WordPress.

Set Up a Channel for WordPress Site in BIgCommerce

Enter a channel name, select an automatic listing option, and click on the Continue button. If you choose ‘Yes, automatically list new BigCommerce products on this channel’, all new products will automatically sync and appear on your WordPress site.

On the next screen, you can choose how you want to use BigCommerce for WordPress. You can select ‘Full Featured Store’ if you’re going to transform your WordPress site into a full-fledged store. Alternatively you can choose ‘Simple Blogging’ if you only want to add a shopping cart page in your blog. The Simple Blogging mode also allows you to add individual products into posts and pages.

Choose How You Want to BigCommerce for WordPress

Next, you will see the BigCommerce Settings page on your screen. It includes all the settings you can configure from your WordPress dashboard.

BIgCommerce for WordPress Settings

First, it will sync your BigCommerce products automatically depending on the option you chose in the earlier step. In the screenshot above, the plugin is syncing all of our sample products.

The first option in your WordPress BigCommerce is Product Sync. You can click on it to choose the sync frequency, automatic listing, and import batch size.

BigCommerce for WordPress Product Sync Options

Next, you can configure Cart and Checkout options. Simply check the Enable Cart option to allow your users to add products to the cart. You can also enable embedded checkout if you want to show checkout form in WordPress.

BIgCommerce for WordPress Cart and Checkout Options

As shown in the screenshot above, the cart page is selected by default. It is because the plugin automatically creates required pages, including the cart page during the setup process.

You can view the default pages by going to Pages » All Pages from your dashboard.

BigCommerce for WordPress Default Pages

Next, you can see Gift Certificate Settings. You can enable gift certificates if you want to let your users purchase gift certificates for store credit.

BigCommerce for WordPress Gift Certificates Settings

The Currency Settings let you see the default currency, and price display option, including or excluding tax.

BigCommerce for WordPress Currency Settings

Next, you will see Account and Registration settings. Login page, account profile page, an order history page, and other important pages are selected by default. You can add a support email as well.

BigCommerce for WordPress Account and Registration Settings

There are more options for Analytics settings, product reviews, API credentials, channel, and diagnostics. You can configure them now or skip them to set up later.

BIgCommerce for WordPress Analytics and Other Settings

After that, don’t forget to click on the ‘Save Changes’ button at the top right corner.

Save Settings BigCommerce for WordPress

Now you can go to BigCommerce » Products to view the sample products added to your website by default.

BigCommerce Sample Products in WordPress dashboard

You can also preview your Products page in the frontend by clicking on the ‘View Products’ link at the top.

View BigCommerce Products in WordPress

Here’s how your BigCommerce shopping cart would look in WordPress with the default Twenty Nineteen theme.

Shopping Cart in WordPress with BigCommerce

Managing Your Products in BigCommerce

The account that we created above is a free trial account with sample products. So the next step is to configure your store settings and add real products in BigCommerce.

1. Adding Products to Your BigCommerce Store

You can add and manage your BigCommerce products from the Products menu. There you will see the sample products added to your store by default.

BigCommerce Products Page

You can delete or replace these products with your actual product details. To add new products, click on the ‘Add’ button at the top.

Add New Products to BigCommerce Store

Add the name of your product, price, tax details, choose product categories, product type, and more information. You can also add the product description, shipping details, and availability options from the sections below.

Once done, save your product. After that, you can add your product images and videos by clicking on the Images & Videos link.

Add Product Images to BigCommerce Store

Similarly, you can review more options like Inventory, Options & SKUs, Custom Fields, etc. from the options on the top. Once done, don’t forget to save your product.

The Products menu also lets you import or export products, manage product categories, product filtering, brands, Product SKUs, etc.

Once you add new products, categories, brands, etc. in your BigCommerce store, they will be automatically synced to your WordPress site.

2. Setting Up Payment Options

BigCommerce has built-in payment options. Visit Store Setup » Payments to configure your payment settings.

BigCommerce Payment Settings

You can quickly set up PayPal, credit cards, offline payment methods like bank deposit, other online payment methods like 2Checkout, Amazon Pay, and also set up digital wallets.

3. Select a Plan and Upgrade Your BigCommerce Account

BigCommerce is primarily a paid platform for building online stores. The free trial version expires in 15 days, so you should upgrade your account before it expires.

Go to the ‘Select a Plan’ button at the top right corner and click on that.

Select a BigCommerce Plan

After that, you will see the available pricing options.

BigCommerce Pricing

The BigCommerce Standard plan is available for $29.95 per month.

Displaying Your BigCommerce Products in Your WordPress Site

Now that you have added products and set up the store options in BigCommerce, you can display products in your WordPress site and start selling.

There are multiple ways you can add your BigCommerce products to your WordPress site. We will show you two of the easiest methods below.

1. Add Your Products Page to Menu

The easiest way to show your BigCommerce products page in WordPress is by adding the page to your WordPress menu. Visit Appearance » Menus and create a new menu.

Create a New Menu in WordPress

For detailed instructions, see our beginner’s guide on how to add a navigation menu to WordPress.

After that, you can click on the Custom Links option and enter your Products listing page URL.

You can find this page by going to BigCommerce » Products » View Products from your dashboard. The page URL usually is your domain name with /products/ at the end. For example, http://example.com/products/.

Add a Custom Link to WordPress Menu

Next, enter a link text, and click ‘Add to Menu’ button. You can also add the Cart page to the menu.

After that, select Display location for your menu and save the menu.

Save Your WordPress Menu

Once done, visit your website to see new menu items in action.

WordPress Primary Menu Demo

2. Embed Your Products to Your Posts in WordPress

Another simple way to add your BigCommerce products to your WordPress blog is to embed individual products in posts and pages.

This approach is more suitable when you only have a couple of products, and you want to add them to your landing pages or blog posts.

Open your WordPress post editor and click on the Add New Block icon. After that, you can select the BigCommerce Products block.

Add BIgCommerce Products Block to Your Post

Once done, your BigCommerce store products will appear in your post editing area.

BigCommerce Products List in WordPress Post

You can customize your block, add content, and publish your post.

Final Thoughts

BigCommerce is an excellent eCommerce platform for WordPress, and a powerful alternative for WooCommerce.

Often users ask us to compare BigCommerce with Shopify, and in our eyes BigCommerce is a better platform because it provides a robust integration with WordPress whereas Shopify does not.

However for full WordPress integration, WooCommerce is our go-to pick. You can see our step by step tutorial on how to start an online store in WordPress for more details.

We hope this article helped you learn how to create a shopping cart in WordPress with BigCommerce. You may also want to see our guide on the best email marketing services and the best WordPress plugins for business websites.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Create a Shopping Cart in WordPress with BigCommerce appeared first on WPBeginner.

Posted on

NLog with Docker Compose

Hi All,

Any suggestions on how could we attach the NLog.config to a docker-compose.yml file so that it generates an NLog_Internal.txt on the host machine and we can see all the application logs in that file?
In other words, is there a way we could extract the logs of an application running inside a Docker container using NLog on a specified location (local disk or cloud)?

I have tried creating an ASP.NET Core application with the following NLog.config file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<nlog xmlns="http://www.nlog-project.org/schemas/NLog.xsd"
      xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
      autoReload="true"
      throwConfigExceptions="true"
      internalLogLevel="Trace"
      internalLogToConsole="true">

  <variable name="dockerlogDirectory" value="/data/logs/app"/>

  <targets>
    <target xsi:type="File" name="ownFile" fileName="${dockerlogDirectory}/MyCustomLog-${shortdate}.log"
            layout="${longdate}|${logger}|${uppercase:${level}}|${threadid}:${threadname}|${message} ${exception}" />
    <target xsi:type="Console" name="console" />
    <target xsi:type="Null" name="blackhole" />
  </targets>

  <rules>
    <logger name="*" minlevel="Trace" writeTo="console" />
    <logger name="Microsoft.*" minlevel="Trace" writeTo="blackhole" final="true" />
    <logger name="*" minlevel="Info" writeTo="ownFile" />
  </rules>

</nlog>

Thanks.