This was a great week for development. I don’t know that I’m at where I want to be at this point, but hopefully by end of month we’ll be ready for the final touch ups for the first version of Aquila to be launched.

Progress

• Week 1 Much improved functionality of the Theme Settings dashboard
• Week 1 Support for Custom defined CSS
• Week 1 Support for user defined “Fav Icons” (partially complete)
• Week 2 Support for Multi-Column Widget Regions
• Week 2/4 Support for Dynamically defined Widget Rows
• Week 3 Graphical eye candy for Widget Interface
• Week 4 Support for Analytics Code Region
• Week 4 Support for custom CSS
• Week 4 Support for Copyright/Powered By Settings
• Week 5 Support for custom Typography Settings
• Pre-Defined Template Layouts
  • Week 2/3/4 Standard Page
  • Week 5 (next) Business
  • Blog
  • Magazine
  • Contact Page
  • Under Construction
  • 404 Page
  • Timeline
  • Image Gallery
  • Archives
  • Portfolio
• Support for Retina displays
• Support for Lightbox Image Viewer
• Special Custom Post Types
  • Week 4 Testimonials
  • Week 4/5 (partially complete) Portfolio
  • Week 4/5 (partially complete) Team Members
  • Week 4/5 (partially complete) FAQs
• Special Advanced Widgets
  • Reservations
  • Contact Forms
    • Support for CAPTCHA
    • Support for Skill Testing Question
• General Purpose Widgets
  • Week 2 Phone Number
  • Week 2 HTML Box
  • Week 2 Image
  • Week 2 SEO Tags (H1,H2,H3,H4)
  • Week 2 Logo (Text with Graphic or Vector Icon)
  • Week 2 Column Break
  • Week 3 Custom Menu
  • Week 3 Content Region
  • Week 3 Info Box/Feature Page Widget
  • Week 3 Twitter Feed Widget
  • Week 3 Social Media Icons Widget
  • Week 4 Testimonial Viewer
  • Week 4 Footer Contact Region
  • Week 5 (next) Back To Top
  • Week 5 (next) Contact Form
  • Week 5 (next) Font Sizer
  • Week 5 (next) Google Map
• Support for third party Newsletter services (MailChimp)
• Multiple Slider Types
  • Week 4 Nivo Slider
  • Week 4 Fullscreen Carousel
  • Week 4 Jumbotron Carousel
  • Week 4 Parallax Slider
  • Week 5 (next) Video Slider
  • Week 5 (next) Blur Slider
  • Week 5 (next) Amazing Slider
  • Revolution Slider (Available in Pro Package only)
• Increased customizability of blog display

So the breakdown of what I hope to get done this next week (Week 5) is as follows:

• Support for custom Typography Settings
• Pre-Defined Template Layouts
  • Business
  • Blog
• Special Custom Post Types
  • Portfolio
  • Team Members
  • FAQs
• General Purpose Widgets
  • Back To Top
  • Contact Form
  • Font Sizer
  • Google Map
• Multiple Slider Types
  • Video Slider
  • Blur Slider
  • Amazing Slider

And in Week 6 I’ll be cleaning up all of those items that are partially complete, and then complete the mission critical items that are needed for the first release. As I’ve said previously, we’ll be doing continual updates of this framework adding additional features in. The reason we opted to create this new framework, rather than updating the Orion framework, is that the new designs that Colin are working on are so drastically different in their HTML architecture (they are using Bootstrap) that we needed a new way of handling the information. A lot of the code that I use in Aquila is leveraged from the Orion code-set though.

Development went on hold for a week while I took off a week to enjoy with the family at our summer vacation spot.  Had great weather, good times, lots of laughs, but by the end I was itching to get back to work on the Aquila framework.

And unbelievably, I actually made progress this week.

• Week 1 Much improved functionality of the Theme Settings dashboard
• Week 1 Support for Custom defined CSS
• Week 1 Support for user defined “Fav Icons” (partially complete)
• Week 2 Support for Multi-Column Widget Regions
• Week 2 Support for Dynamically defined Widget Rows
• Pre-Defined Template Layouts
  • Week 2 Standard Page (partially complete)
  • Week 3 (next) Business
  • Blog
  • Magazine
  • Contact Page
  • Under Construction
  • 404 Page
  • Timeline
  • Image Gallery
  • Archives
  • Portfolio
• Support for Retina displays
• Support for Lightbox Image Viewer
• Special Custom Post Types
  • Portfolio
  • Team Members
  • Testimonials
  • FAQs
• Special Advanced Widgets
  • Reservations
  • Contact Forms
    • Support for CAPTCHA
    • Support for Skill Testing Question
• General Purpose Widgets
  • Week 2 Phone Number
  • Week 2 HTML Box
  • Week 2 Image
  • Week 2 SEO Tags (H1,H2,H3,H4)
  • Week 2 Logo (Text with Graphic or Vector Icon)
  • Week 2 Column Break
  • Week 3 (next) Custom Menu
  • Week 3 (next) Content Region
  • Week 3 (next) Featured Page Widget
  • Week 3 (next) Info Box Widget
  • Week 3 (next) Testimonial Viewer
  • Adsense Regions
  • Banner Ad Space
  • Social Media Buttons
  • Back To Top
  • Contact Form
  • Font Sizer
  • Google Map
• Support for third party Newsletter services (MailChimp)
• Multiple Slider Types
  • Nivo Slider
  • Bootstrap Carousel
  • Amazing Slider (Available in Pro Package only)
  • Revolution Slider (Available in Pro Package only)
  • Fullscreen Carousel
  • Jumbotron Carousel
• Increased customizability of blog display

Admittedly, looking back at the progress on the checklist, it doesn’t look like much.  But the “Multi-Column Widget Regions” was a big one.  That took me three days alone to complete.

Next week I’ll be focusing on completing the “Standard Page” template, a much more definable and customizable (than WordPress provides) “Customized Menu” widget, a content region widget, and a couple more display widgets. I’m hoping to tackle the FAQs and Testimonials custom post types as well. Hopefully by week’s end (it’s a short week, as Monday is a holiday here), I’ll have the Business Page and FAQs templates complete as well. A bit ambitious!

Earlier this year, we retooled the WordPress Theme framework codenamed Phoenix (WPFW2), with an iterative release called “Orion” (WPFW3). Orion featured some huge improvements over the previous frameworks, most notably the “Theme Updater”, “Unlimited Sidebars”, “Custom Component Regions” and “Multi-Page Image Sliders”.

Well, I’m excited to announce that I’ve begun work on WPFW4, code named “Aquila”.

For those of you keeping an eye on our latest website template releases, you’ll notice a number of major changes to our web template architecture.  We’re now employing the use of the Twitter Bootstrap framework as well as the FontAwesome vector icon set.  Along with a number of exciting new image sliders, and much improved typography, our newest templates are red hot and flying off the shelves.

But in order to accommodate all of the new updates in the website templates, I have to completely re-engineer the WordPress Theme framework that we have developed.

I’m hoping that the re-tooling will see that we’ll have a bunch of Twitter Bootstrap enabled WordPress Themes available as of September 1st.

Just a taste of some of of the newest planned features:

• Much improved functionality of the Theme Settings dashboard
• Support for Custom defined CSS
• Pre-Defined Template Layouts
  • Blog
  • Magazine
  • Business
  • Contact Page
  • Under Construction
  • 404 Page
  • Timeline
  • Image Gallery
  • Archives
  • Portfolio
• Support for Retina displays
• Support for Lightbox Image Viewer
• Special Custom Post Types
  • Portfolio
  • Team Members
  • Testimonials
  • FAQs
• Special Advanced Widgets
  • Reservations
  • Contact Forms
    • Support for CAPTCHA
    • Support for Skill Testing Question
• General Purpose Widgets
  • Adsense Regions
  • Banner Ad Space
  • Testimonial Viewer
  • Social Media Buttons
  • Phone Number
  • Back To Top
  • Contact Form
  • Font Sizer
  • Google Map
• Support for third party Newsletter services (MailChimp)
• Multiple Slider Types
  • Nivo Slider
  • Bootstrap Carousel
  • Amazing Slider (Available in Pro Package only)
  • Revolution Slider (Available in Pro Package only)
  • Fullscreen Carousel
  • Jumbotron Carousel
• Support for multi-column Widget Regions
• Support for dynamically defined Widget Rows
• Support for user defined “Fav Icons”
• Increased customizability of blog display

And that’s just to start.  Whether I get all of that done by September, I can’t say.  But we’ll be releasing September 1st with what we have done, and continue to develop as the year goes on.

We’ve made a commitment to make WordPress Theme development our top priority now.

If you have any suggestions for what you would like to see in our new WordPress Theme framework, let me know.

“Fortis” is our first of many to come in our Bootstrap framework series of website templates.

Design Types

Our templates now come in three design “flavors”:

• HD — High Impact Design
• FD — Flat Design
• SL — StreamLine

High Impact Design

This is our signature look.  Full featured, full of depth and color and gradients, this the power look that we’ve become known for.

Flat Design

A step down in the “depth” department, this level of design is “flatter” but still with a tonne of impact.

Stream Lined

This is really, truly, the most clean and streamlined that the particular design can look.  With just a few graphic highlights, this particular design targets professional business class websites.

Package Types

We are also releasing each product in three package types, just as we did with our Generation 10 products: Basic, Standard, and Pro

Basic Package

This is the home page, with a one column, two column, three column and four column layout pages.

Standard Package

This particular package includes all of the pages for the given theme-set, how we envisioned the site should look.  It includes a full “standard” web, complete with “home”, “contact”, “about”, “privacy”, and “faqs” page, plus more.

Pro Package

This is really where it’s at.  You get so much bang for you buck with this package.  You get the “Standard” web as you would in the Standard Package, plus a full screen photo-slider page, and all of the alternate home page layouts:

• Default Home Page
• Parallax Slider Home Page
• Fullscreen Carousel Home Page
• Jumbotron Carousel Home Page
• Nivo Slider Home Page
• Video Slider Home Page

We’re finally there.  In the coming days you’ll start to see our first batch of our new framework of web templates hit the store — bootstrap templates.

I think we all forgot, that when you go to launch an entirely different framework of product, there’s quite a bit to the development process.  When we decided to take our innovation to the next level, and bring a fresh look to our new releases, we thought it would be a three or four month hiccup in our release schedule to get the new framework out.  It took twice that.

What took so long?  Understanding the framework (each and every single component), making it work for a template product, writing and recording new tutorials, re-writing sales material, re-writing a packaging system, re-writing a help system to accomodate the new help material, re-writing the demonstration websites system… and on, and on… and on.

But now that we’re here, we couldn’t be more excited.

Packed with all the features of the Twitter Bootstrap framework, as well as all of the icons of the FontAwesome scalable vector icon set, our new generation of website templates are going to make your websites look cleaner, load faster, and be more responsive.

So what is the big deal about Twitter Bootstrap anyway?  Let me just detail some of the great features.

1. Inherently set up for “responsive” or “adaptive” display
2. An easy to understand “grid layout” — in standard or fluid flavours
3. A base CSS system that makes styling your website easy
4. Countless number of pre-designed components
5. Extended functionality via jQuery enabled components
6. Customizable
7. Constantly updated
8. It’s open source

And FontAwesome… well, it’s just… awesome.  After including the CSS link in your page, all you have to do add to your code is something as simple as <i class=’icon-calendar’></i> to have your page render a calendar icon (there are over 360 icons currently).  And it too is open source.

So why did we decide to switch from our Generation 10 framework to Twitter Bootstrap?  Quite simply, the development that was ongoing with the Bootstrap system was happening at such a rapid pace, we (as a three person team) couldn’t develop anything quite as robust quite as fast.

We decided to leverage the underlying framework, take advantage of the great typography settings and components, and boost our unique style of templates with an even more solid framework.