iLEMONed

Introduction

Lightview is similar to Lightbox yet superior to Lightbox. Since version 2.0, Lightview has been able to overlay not only images but also videos, iframed webpages, and almost anything! It works with all popular browsers. The original Lightview JS is a project by Nick Stakenburg.

Demonstration

The first photo is an individual one, while the rest four are grouped together.

The above three images are linking to: 1). A Flash color scheme generator 2). A QuickTime movie trailer 3). A webpage.

Installation

1. Download the WordPress plugin, extract the "lightview" folder somewhere.
2. Download the Lightview script from its official website, put the 3 folders "js", "images" and "css" into the "lightview" folder from the WordPress plugin. Choose to replace if asked.
3. Upload the "lightview" folder to /wp-content/plugins/, then activate it.

Why so complicated? Please understand that Lightview is no longer free. Nick Stackenburg was generous enough to approve the redistribution of this WordPress plugin, so please respect his decision and pay for it like I did. Go to the official Lightview project page and you'll find the way to purchase a license and download the script.

How to Use

• For a single image:
  <a href="foobar.jpg" class="lightview">foobar</a>
• For a set of images:
  <a href="foo.jpg" class="lightview" rel="gallery[foobar]">foo</a>
<a href="bar.jpg" class="lightview" rel="gallery[foobar]">bar</a>
• For a QuickTime movie:
  <a href="quicktime.mov" class="lightview" title="">QuickTime</a>
• For a Flash video with title and size limits:
  <a href="flash.swf" class="lightview" title="Title::::width:320,height:240">video</a>
• For a webpage (iframe) with title and description, in fullscreen:
  <a href="http://www.google.com" class="lightview" title="Title::Description::fullscreen:true">Google</a>

Download

Lightview for WordPress (v2.3) 2008-06-18

For the full documentation (more options, custom events, keyboard shortcuts, etc.) as well as the changelogs, please visit the official Lightview project page.

What do you use for enhancing the navigation in your admin center? The ancient thing, Admin Drop Down Menu by Ozh, has always been my choice. This plugin is simple yet very useful, it saves you a lot of clicks! But the plugin was designed for WordPress 1.x, and is too old to get along well with others nowadays.

For instance, if I activate too many plugins that have option pages under the "Options" tab, the "tail" of sub-menu items annoyingly protrudes from the left border (see screenshot). And the CSS style doesn't suit the updated menu in WordPress 2.x (see screenshot). I fixed the errors mentioned above, now it looks beautiful in my admin center (see screenshot). If you also want a copy of my fixed version, you can download it here. But please note this is not an official release.

A couple days ago I discovered Admin Supermenu by Chris Messina, a jQuery version of Admin Drop Down Menu, but it is still buggy. I think until Chris fixes the bug under the post-editing page and implement some more improvements, I will not switch to his jQuery version.

btw I already tried Admin Drop Down Menus, but it wasn't what I expected, though it exactly says the word "drop-down".

The permalink structure of this blog has been updated. I used to include "category" in my permalinks but since tags have been greatly promoted in WordPress 2.3, I believe that categories are going to be disfavored by both users and the development team in the future. Thus I abolished it (so far not completely though). Meanwhile I've activated the plugin Permalink Redirect. This plugin will be serving my blog till Google gets all my permalinks updated.

WordPress 2.3 RC1 is out, the final version will not be far away. I have to catch up, hopefully by the time 2.3 arrives, I can finish my new theme and give this site a slight yet graceful reboot.