Web Design Annoyances

For the past two days, I have been developing and designing a new Wordpress theme for my co-worker and friend Alex. Alex is a frequent blogger. I figured he would be the first to get a new design for his site, since he blogs on a regular basis. Now, creating Wordpress themes isn't something new for me. I've been making them for years now. But I haven't used Widgets myself on my own blogs. Simply because the themes I created and used, are for me only. I used 'old skool' php snippets to put in the sidebar template files in my theme folder. That worked fine for me. Yes, for me. Now, my friend Alex would prefer a theme with widgets. I promised widgets in this new theme, for two reasons. I need to start creating themes that are widget compatible. And Alex is also already using widgets. The problem with widgets is really the heading. There isn't any on default. I can style every widget, the text, its color, links and more. But since there isn't any heading, I can't style the heading :? I find this very odd. How can I use images in stead of text for the heading, if there isn't heading in the first place? After stumbling upon this failure, I decided to go afk for a few hours. I went off and played MySims. I could use the relaxation. After I was done playing (4 hours of MySims), I went back to work on the theme again. In the end, I could only solve the problem by editing the widgets.php file in the wp-includes folder. But every time I upgrade Wordpress, I have to change that file again. What's the harm in putting heading around titles on default? It would help a lot of designers, including myself.

Now, after I had solved this problem, I stumbled upon another issue. I am currently also redesigning my own portfolio. And I tried embedding the flash badge from Last.fm. Turns out you can't make it any wider or smaller. For my own site, I tried making it wider. But the flash content just wouldn't stretch. The badge itself was wide, but the songs stayed 184px. It seems the songs in the flash badge have an absolute width that can't be changed.

The problem doesn't end here. I tried embedding the same flash badge into Alex's new theme. And I am really wondering why Last.fm won't just offer html/javascript badges. You see, Alex's sidebars are a tad too small. And no, that can't be changed. It's perfect for all other widgets. But not for Last.fm. The Last.fm flash badge can be made smaller. But it will just cut off some pixels. Items on the right of the badge disappear.

I really prefer non-flash widgets. But the only other badge Last.fm offers is an image that is generated every x minutes. I'd prefer a Javascript badge. Too bad they don't have one.