My writing, editing, digital publishing, and software development skills come together for WordPress projects.
Client Websites
Linda-Marie Miller: Professional speaker website for woman who placed second in the 2020 Toastmasters World Championship.
Swank Specialty Produce: For celebrity chef events, used RSVPMaker with customized page layout design featuring large photos at the top of each page, standardized presentation of chefs listing, and integrated with another platform for reservations and payment.
SuperStar Beauty: Ported site to WordPress, using a standard theme and my own customizations for a more modern and mobile-friendly look. Updated elements such as photo gallery that client was unhappy with. See superstarbeauty.com
Stockdale Industries: Created from scratch for a veteran-owned business. Standard theme with modifications for placement of logo and other elements. Included logo design by my wife and business partner, Beth Anne Carr. See stockdaleindustries.com
Technical Skills
WordPress provides a solid base set of web publishing features, but what I love is all the ways it can be customized with the strategic use of PHP, MySQL, CSS, and JavaScript. My projects (both professional and volunteer) have given me an in depth understanding of the WordPress APIs and core objects like $wpdb for custom database programming.
Most recently, I’ve learned enough ReactJS programming to create custom components for the new Gutenberg editor introduced with WordPress 5.0.
Projects:
- RSVPMaker, a WordPress plugin for event scheduling and registration. Since its first public release in 2010, RSVPMaker has evolved to take advantage of the Gutenberg block editor, asynchronous JavaScript techniques, and API integration with Mailchimp, PayPal, Stripe. Fans of the plugin like that I provide hooks for further customization by developers and designers.
- The WordPress for Toastmasters project, a bundle of free open source software, plus a hosting service based on WordPress multisite (Toastmost.org), for chapters of Toastmasters International. Includes an RSVPMaker extension to manage signups for specific meeting roles, as well as a number of other utilities for tracking member progress through the public speaking and leadership educational program. Also: a theme to simplify compliance with Toastmasters branding rules.
- Maintenance of client websites, including optimization for SEO and mobile access.