2010 — Even Danbo couldn’t believe it.

Anyway, first post of 2010!

Five years and five days ago, like a boy who had discovered how awesome cotton candy can be (for the record though, cotton candy was never my thing), I stumbled upon WordPress —  which was, at the time, a shiny new blogging engine still in its infancy. But that didn’t matter, for I deleted my HTML-hardcoded blog whose code I shamelessly copied and modified from some random blog — and never looked back.

My host then, Stafa, graciously installed my first copy of WordPress (version 1.2.1) via Fantastico — magically sprouting a Hello World entry telling me it’s my first post and that I could edit it and start blogging. My website just talked to me, I marveled.

Back then, WordPress’s default theme was bland, full-width’ed and a dull-green that shouted for a change. Then I found Kubrick. Yes — if Kubrick looks familiar to you, that’s because it is the very look you see every time you install a fresh copy of WordPress. From version 1.5 on, Kubrick became bundled along with WordPress as the default theme we all know now — in 2010, that might also shout at you - change me!

But five years ago, Kubrick was a game-changer.

One of my first mods of the Kubrick theme circa 2005

Rounded corners, appealing minimalism, subtle footer gradients, and with an easily customisable header image to boot, it wasn’t hard to see why Kubrick took the blogging world by storm then. Once I got Kubrick running on my shiny new WordPress installation, I started, with however limited knowledge I had of CSS, modifying it so that I had the most unique Kubrick theme on the net.

Fast-forward five years later, I’m on my own domain sporting a self-made theme I designed and coded from scratch — what you’re looking at right now. Thus it goes without saying that Kubrick was largely instrumental in sparking my personal endeavor in web-design. Even the tehCpeng.net version two theme I’m running now is based on the Kubrick framework — a last-minute design decision as I wanted the new theme to differ as much as possible from my previous works off the Hemingway framework.

Later on this year, WordPress will be retiring Kubrick as its default theme — the first time in five years. Needless to say, Kubrick is now relatively dated among a largely design-centric blogosphere it helped stir about in the first place.  Tina Daunt of The Huffington Post has a great piece on how Kubrick, a single blog theme revolutionised the blog design arena. I couldn’t agree more on Kubrick’s contribution on changing the face of the blogosphere into one that not only focuses on content, but also on design and aesthetics.

Reaching my fifth year in blogging on WordPress, I can’t help but to look back on the humble beginnings. As Kubrick retires as the default theme for WordPress, it will most likely be forgotten among the new generation of WordPress users with access to sleek and shiny modern themes widely available today. But blog designers around the world would never forget Kubrick’s former glory and how we were once inspired by this humble theme to make the web a much more beautiful place as it is today.

Work in Progress.

It was then when I realised I needed a single-columned theme. My blog posts needed space.

During the last exam season,  the ‘design ideas’ part of my brain started kicking into high gear. Something that never fails to happen every time I’m in the midst of exam stress. All sorts of ideas started flowing in and thus, resulted in Version Two today, a mishmash of most, if not all of the ideas that reached me in my routine morning shower.

And I fear, though I’d rather not acknowledge, that once I release this theme, something is gonna seem wrong about it and I’ll be brainstorming for new ideas to replace it before I even know it. But oh well. =)

So despite being just two months shy of tehCpeng.net Version One’s first birthday, I decided to rush Version Two out. I started working on the mockup on 30th December, 2008 — the day before I got my dSLR. The 500 pixel wide photos on my old theme didn’t do any justice to the photos I wanted to potray. So I took 6 days to complete the mockup before I started gobbling up another week for the coding.

While two weeks might sound like an eternity to design and code a website, the time I spent on Version Two was easily half of that I spent on Version One a year ago. =P

What’s New?

Everything.

Okay seriously, there a few changes you might want to know. I’ve:

1. Increased the width for the photos to 600 pixels and also made use of WordPress’s new image caption stylings.
2. Removed the sidebar and ditched most of its elements, retaining some at the footer.
3. Hidden some content at the footer for the sake of simplicity. These are accessible via the ‘more?’ link at the bottom. Try it!
4. Added gravatar support within the comments.

There also bits and pieces of shiny new stuff here and there that I’ll be leaving it to you to find out.

Notes.

As you might have noticed, my portfolio isn’t quite ready yet. I’m gonna postpone work on that while I iron out a few more quirks and bugs in the theme, which, if you look closely are still present as of now.

I’ve also haven’t really iron out browser compatitbility issues with the theme. As of now, I am fairly certain that everything should appear fine in at least Firefox 3, IE 8, Safari 3, Chrome 1.0 and Opera 9.6.

Enjoy!

Now I emphasise that wannabe because in no way am I a full-fledged web designer/developer/coder. I may know a wee bit of Illustrator and Photoshop and bits of HTML/CSS stuff here and there but that’s nothing. Seriously, who doesn’t know how to use Photoshop these days?

That said, go easy on me okay?

Anyway, yes I’m bloody delighted cos for the past two weeks, my blog’s new design had been featured on not one, but eight bloody design showcase sites (and counting!). That might not seem like a lot to you, cos there are hundreds of these sites out there. But it sure as hell seems a lot to me.

CSSclip was the first CSS gallery to feature my design on it on the 31st of March.

It means a lot too, when you see something you work so hard for gain recognition among the web design community.

On that same day, Sharebrain showcased my blog on their web developers resource site, under a header which I still think my blog is unworthy to be placed on.

A ton of these websites exist out there to offer inspiration to web designers looking for well, inspiration, for their next project.

CSSelite, the more popular of the lot of CSS galleries, featured my blog’s new design on the 3rd of March.

Its that proud feeling that when you get featured on these very galleries that you used once upon a time for inspiration yourself. Seriously, I was once a frequent lurker of CSS galleries eyeing for inspiration when designing tehCpeng.net.

Having the chance to actually inspire others and give back to the community feels really great. =)

On 11th of April, a screenshot of my blog appeared on the front page of the CSS based gallery.

Daily slurp give me a slot on their daily ‘slurp’ galleries on the same day.

So did WP Cube, a WordPress powered design showcase gallery.

Remember those days when you race to get your artwork/essay/calligraphy/photo featured on your school’s yearbook? And the joy when they actually make it into the pages? You get the picture. =D

As seen on WP Zoom, a WordPress theme resource community.

W3C Sites, who brings web developers that follow W3C standards together, had my blog featured under their editor’s picks.

Edit (19/4/08): Been also featured on CMSShowcase, and We Love WP!

Being featured on so many sites at once only means one thing, there’ll be scores of web designers and developers dropping by!

..and if any you decide to take a peek at my messy and noobish code,
don’t laugh okay? =\

Thank god for the enrolment day, which means Semester two is commencing! =D Funny how you always long for holidays when studying and long for classes while holidaying. And this is when I know perfectly well that i’ll be longing for the holidays as soon as I start the semester. The Irony.

Thankfully though, this holidays I had something to keep myself busy on (though not enough to keep the mushroom spores away). The result of which is what you’re looking at now. =)

Weee! Welcome to my blog’s spanking new home! xD

Finally, I have my very own domain! About damn time right? Oh, in case you haven’t yet know, this blog is named after my all-time favourite drink. XD And yeap, thats the answer for that mind-boggler I posted as a teaser on ember.stafa.us.

Camellia sinensis is the scientific name for that plant from which we get its leaves to make tea, that said, it’s extract essentially means simply, tea. H2O at minus 15 degrees is well, ice. Lactose, I admit it sucks but it symbolises milk. Anddd, sucrose is table sugar! I hear you shout ‘English!’ It’s pretty obvious now that you’re here and all but I’d still put it out for ya: mix tea, ice, milk, and sugar you’ll get ..drumroll please.. teh-C peng.

Wahaha, I hear you crying foul again. I know teh-C peng doesn’t use milk and sugar. Rather, it uses evaporated milk and gula melaka. But bear with me can? The latter are really processed products of the former. So technically, no harm substituting milk and sugar for the sake of this trivia. =P

I admit this is no teh-C peng, but rather coffee. Read why here. I’d say its teh-C panas. =P

Today is day my blog stood on its own legs, its own domain, its own hosting and its own spanking new look!

Of course, not forgetting its roots, I would like to thank my buddy back in Kuwait, Stafa, who kindly hosted my blog all these years without asking anything in return. Without your generosity I wouldn’t be blogging at all today. =D So here’s a big heartfelt thank you to you man!

I love these earphones, they effectively separate you from the bustling reality of life to savour humanity’s best creation — music.

So what’s exactly new on tehCpeng.net?

• We’ll begin with the most obvious — the new table-top themed look!
• Ajax commenting and comment editing capability
• Now comments you submit will appear instantly without the need to reload the page.
  And best of all, you’ll get to edit not only your comments, but also your ‘name’ and ‘URL’ field for errors. (try it out below!) =P
• New 500px wide pictures. Used to be sized at 450px. They’re now enlarged for your viewing pleasure. =)
• (hopefully) faster loading times with my blog now hosted locally (Malaysia)

What is old, then?

• The author. — No I don’t mean old old, but it’s still the same old me behind the keyboard, whether you like it or not. xD
• Its contents — Apart from the revamped About page (you should check it out sometime), every single bloody post, page and comment was transferred over from ember.stafa.us. So yes, this is essentially a blog shift. =D

Oh, and if anything looks broken or weird, I’ll be glad if you’d notify me. I haven’t been able to test the new layout on every single platform, only those that I have access to.

And while I’m at it, a huge shoutout to all of you out there still using IE6. If you can find the words ‘Internet Explorer 6′ north of this page, that’s you: Maybe its time for you to consider changing your browser to better ones (seriously) or even upgrading your browser to IE7 to fully experience tehCpeng.net.

Um okay, I could go on and on but check out these new pages that will hopefully complete an introduction to my new blog. =D
– About the site.
– In more detail.

That said, welcome!

Watch this space! =D

Speakers up, please. Hear anything? =D

————-

I’ll be off to Kota Kinabalu for a week tonight. Gonna attend some kind of self-improvement course at the Nexus Karambunai Resort. Gotta love parents. =P

Ah soon, you guys save all the moviegoing till I come back okay?

Something’s brewing.

And it’s got a lot to do with coffee.

Smell anything?

Welp, let’s put aside all not-so-pleasant thoughts, shall we? =D

I’ll be heading back home in about two hours. These few days have been pretty fun and you bet, I’ll posting all about ‘em when I get back to Kuching. In the meantime, here’s a teaser: (a pretty big one at it =P)

See that huge burst of traffic to my blog? That’s what I call the Catscity Clique Effect. =D

I know, it’s already a week since the bloggers’ meet, but seriously, life’s been so busy ever since. Of course, it hadn’t got anything to do with the meet; it’s only that the college term is reaching its exam season.

And when I mean busy, I mean busy.

Next monday would be our 3rd and final Oral Comm. assessment. This time it’ll be a three member team presentation with power point slides, 15 minutes, free topic, and lots of nerves. And that, currently, is our top priority, for there will be scripts to draft, witty phrases to brainstorm, slides to design, portfolio to be typed and lots and lots of brainjuice to be consumed.

Not to mention the tests heading our way these few weeks, they’re so many of them I won’t even bother to list them out here but it’s crazy. Sometimes you’d just wonder when will the brakes apply.

But for now, and for the following weeks to come, it will be full-force ahead.

Anyway, September, for me and for perhaps a lot of you too, is the birthday season. We just celebrated Dad’s last Friday.

Taka as usual. XD

Then it was Jeffrey’s the next day, held at his house.

He invited so many people, a good half of the guests that night were strangers. Now that’s rare for a popular guy like me. XD

Oh well, life goes on.

So does the Swinburne campus expansion construction going on next door.. Despite being rumoured to be 2 months behind schedule.

Tonight is the night most of us would celebrate the mooncake festival. Kids are running around the neighbourhood with their lanterns as I type this, really makes me recall the times when I was one of them. Times have changed, my parents are out, sister’s having tuition and I’m here, bloody blogging.

Gosh, I feel so old. Now where did I keep those bloody lanterns..