Magic Password Revolutionizes WordPress Security

Properly protecting the security of your website has to be number 1 on everybody’s digital checklist. Unfortunately, security is only as strong as the weakest link in the chain, and that weakest link is usually your password.

It’s a fact of digital life, that thanks to the vast number of logins we have to recall, most people use a variation on their “master” password: using “passwordLI” for LinkedIn, “passwordE” for email, “passwordFB” for Facebook. It doesn’t take an AI with advanced machine learning to work out that your WordPress password is “passwordWP”—although worryingly, that AI does exist.

Cue Magic Password…

Magic Password is a revolutionary WordPress plugin that takes a radically different approach to site security by ditching the password altogether!

Password-less authentication has already been pioneered by SaaS like Slack, and Magic Password takes the concept to new heights with its implementation for WordPress. All you need is the smartphone app—which is available for both Android and iOS—and the Magic Password plugin. Both the app, and the plugin are completely free.

Magic Password is one of those rare plugins that’s so useful, you expect WordPress to buy it and build it into the core code.

Once the plugin is installed in your WordPress site, and the app is synced, all you need to do to log into your site is take out your smartphone and scan the Magic code displayed on your login screen. It’s as simple and secure as that; the only person who can access your account is you.

Using Magic Password to login is really easy. Not as easy as typing a password, but easier than trying to remember a different, secure password each week, and certainly easier than two-factor authentication.

If you’re someone who prefers to access WordPress on a mobile device, then Magic Password is even simpler: simply tap the screen and you’re logged in. Super-easy to do and extra secure when you combine it with your phone’s built-in security features like Face ID or fingerprint scanning.

It’s an incredibly convenient process, but Magic Password’s real benefits come from its contribution to your site’s security measures.

The sad reality is that passwords can, and do get hacked. And we make things easier for hackers because human beings are predictable. Hackers know your password is probably 8 characters plus or minus 2, and that it probably ends in a number.

Magic Password completely rewrites the rules by changing the whole login process: The latest end-to-end encryption means login credentials are all but impossible to hack; With no password to type you aren’t vulnerable to a keylogger attack; Brute-force attacks are blocked thanks to limited login attempts; Magic Password doesn’t rely on database or local file storage, your login credentials aren’t stored anywhere, which means there’s simply nothing to steal.

If hackers were taking aim at your site login, they’ll now find themselves looking at a moving target.

One of the most common points of failure in any security plan is a particular user’s lack of caution. It doesn’t matter how diligent you are, if Darren in marketing insists on using “FutureMrBeyonce” as his password on every single site, sooner or later your details will be compromised. Magic Password can be used by anyone on your team, in fact one of the latest features is the ability to require all subusers to login with Magic Password; so you can be confident that Darren’s optimistic password policy won’t wreck your security.

What’s more, the Magic code generated by the plugin and scanned by the phone app is constantly updated on the backend by the app. If hackers were taking aim at your site login, they’ll now find themselves looking at a moving target. As an added bonus, you won’t have to update your login every week “just in case”.

Magic Password is one of those rare plugins that’s so useful, you expect WordPress to buy it and build it into the core code.

You can download the plugin and the app for free.

 

[– This is a sponsored post on behalf of Magic Password –]

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/magic-password-revolutionizes-wordpress-security/

9 Best Online Video Libraries To Teach Yourself Design & Development

With free tutorials you can teach yourself almost anything online. But premium video libraries are often much more detailed with pro-level instructors.

These videos are very helpful when you’re just getting into web design or development. There’s so much to learn in both areas and it can be super confusing if you’re new to frontend code, backend code, or general UI/UX design.

Below are our picks for the best online video libraries for teaching yourself how to make websites. Granted some libraries excel in certain subjects but overall this list should have something for everyone.

1. Code School

Code School has been around for years and it’s one of the few sites devoted to web dev languages.

Many of their videos are accessible free of charge but the larger paths cost money. It’s all rolled into one monthly subscription which makes it great for anyone who wants to progress through these lessons one after another.

If you look at the paths page you’ll find lessons on basically everything.

From basic frontend HTML/CSS/JS code all the way to Python and even Android/iOS programming for mobile apps.

Code School is a solid place to start for any aspiring programmer since their teaching materials are fantastic for learning the ropes (and a bit more!)

2. Codecademy

Another viable online coding library is Codecademy which follows a very similar structure.

With Codecademy you can sign up for free and get access to a few smaller courses on demand. But for their full library they charge based on paths or specific courses.

One thing I like about Codecademy is their attention to detail in their ‘intensive’ program. You can learn about that here but basically the intensive program lets you connect with professional developers who review your code and help guide you along the way.

This is the next best thing to a real mentorship and you can do it all from the comfort of your home office.

Topics range from basic HTML to more advanced JavaScript and TypeScript along with database engines like SQLite. Check out the main catalog page to see everything they’ve got to offer.

3. TutsPlus

The awesome folks at Envato have a massive repository of tutorials in their TutsPlus website.

Most of the written tutorials are totally free and you can view those just by searching the site. However they also have a monthly subscription for pro access to video courses on practically every subject under the sun.

You can learn Illustrator graphics, photo editing, icon design, Android programming and backend development all from the TutsPlus video library.

These videos are listed under courses and the team releases new ones every month. With a subscription you get access to all these courses including the newest ones and oldest ones. That’s what makes TutsPlus one of the better choices for self-learning in the design/dev space.

Recently Envato combined the TutsPlus subscription with their Elements library too. So along with 1000+ HD video courses you also get access to free design assets. Pretty sweet!

4. Lynda

When you think of sites to learn stuff online Lynda has to be one of the first brands to come to mind.

They have video courses on absolutely everything from Microsoft Office to IT/database management and programming. You can learn graphic design, web design, and basically every single program in the Adobe Creative Suite on Lynda.

Their library is a subscription platform so you’d renew monthly for access to all of their content.

Considering how much is here and how much they update I have to say it’s a great choice. However I think their lessons are a bit ‘lighter’ and made to target absolute beginners.

So if you’re starting from scratch learning to build websites Lynda is a wonderful choice. If you already know the basics and want to push a little further I’d say others offer more.

5. Pluralsight

One of the largest competitors to Lynda is Pluralsight. They recently merged with Digital Tutors making this one of the largest digital video learning libraries on the web.

Originally Pluralsight was meant to be a tech/IT library while Digital Tutors covered more creative design courses. Now it’s just one big library and works on the same model as Lynda.

Their courses include beginner-tier stuff but also go far beyond the basics with difficulty labels for each course. So it’s easy to find beginner level courses or intermediate/advanced levels too.

And these courses delve into plenty of topics like OOP JavaScript or building custom WordPress snippets.

To learn more about course quality and how this all works there’s plenty of reviews you can read. But ultimately it comes down to what sort of education you’re looking for.

I mostly recommend Pluralsight for more technical content like IT, database management, programming, and web development. The library does have all of the creative content from Digital Tutors so that’s awesome. But my impression is that Pluralsight really hits it out of the park with technical content.

Also they offer a free trial so there’s no fee to test out the library before subscribing.

6. Treehouse

Treehouse is one of the newest online teaching resources compared to many others in this list. Yet it’s also one of the best and most revered from past students.

The majority of Treehouse content is aimed towards beginners so it’ll really hold your hand through everything. It’s mostly an online video resource for learning development with very few design courses (if any).

But let me say there’s a ton of great dev courses here.

You can learn frontend, backend, database management, and even app development. This means you could even merge different paths and teach yourself fullstack development all from this one library.

These courses are meant to get you ready for a career in the industry which is perfect for someone educating themselves and hoping to land a stable job.

Have a look at their stories page for testimonials to see if this could be the right choice for you.

7. Udemy

With Udemy it’s really a mixed bag of videos.

The Udemy team don’t necessarily record or teach any of their lessons. Instead this is a user-created library with teachers from all over the world recording their own video courses.

They sell at totally different rates and since they’re all taught in different ways the quality fluctuates a lot. However there are tons of gems in here if you know where to look.

Try searching for anything you want to learn like ‘ruby on rails’ or ‘laravel’. You’ll find plenty of courses at varying skill levels all with different user ratings. Check out the reviews and if they seem good you may pick up a course and give it a shot.

Often times Udemy runs monthly sales on courses so you can usually pick these up at 40% off (or more!) if you keep an eye on pricing.

8. Coursera

Coursera is a little different than all the others in this list.

With most video learning sites you subscribe monthly for full access to courses. Or with something like Udemy you get individual courses at a fixed rate.

Coursera sells access to their courses individually but they work almost like online college courses where you learn from a specific teacher and get real feedback on your work.

In fact, many of the teachers at Coursera are real-world college professors. This means you’re learning from some of the best minds across dozens of categories.

It’s still a newer platform but take a quick browse through their lessons and see what you can find.

9. Khan Academy

Last but certainly not least is the incredible Khan Academy. These video lessons are not up to the same quality as many premium libraries and these videos rarely go into as much depth.

However Khan Academy is totally free to join and their videos are free for life. That’s probably the biggest selling point to get in here are start searching.

So it’s free and great quality. What’s the downside?

Khan doesn’t really have the same volume or level of detail compared to big libraries like TutsPlus, Lynda, or Pluralsight. Instead Khan has mostly introductory content which covers the fundamentals only.

You can find a few in-depth courses here but not as much as other sites. And most of Khan Academy is geared towards traditional learning (math, physics, history) rather than web development.

But if you do a search on the site you can find plenty of videos teaching HTML or JavaScript. Not to mention they have an entire computer programming category so that’s probably worth looking into as well.

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/9-best-online-video-libraries-to-teach-yourself-design-development/

5 Subtle Metrics That Could Make or Break Your Website

Not keeping track of your website’s metrics, or doing it but not taking action based on what you find, is more or less equal to walking around in pitch darkness hoping to somehow reach your destination: both are possible but highly unlikely.

But which metrics should you pay special attention to? Some of them you’ve probably heard about hundreds of times as they tend to crop up in every self-respecting webmaster’s watch list. There are, however, many metrics besides bounce rates and Google keyword rankings—perhaps less well-known and less-discussed but still very important.

Today we’ll take a look at some of the less well known metrics that can make all the difference between success and obscurity.

1. Number of Pages Receiving Visitors From Search Engines

When you see significant changes in the quantity of your traffic it doesn’t always comes from the changes in keyword demand or better ranking of your existing pages. One of the less obvious reasons is the changes in the number of pages of your website indexed by Google. You may get a dramatic increase or decrease in traffic without actively doing anything and without experiencing significant changes in search keywords patterns, simply because Google is crawling deeper or shallower on your website.

If you add content and these pages don’t get indexed, then something is wrong.

In what way is this useful? You get an additional insight into the performance of your website. If you add content and these pages don’t get indexed, then something is wrong. If Google crawls deeper on your site, you can connect this to some changes you’ve done recently and make a note for yourself that this particular action had a positive impact. For example, if you alter your navigation structure and soon notice that more pages start getting visits, you can mark it as a useful practice and continue experimenting in this direction.

2. Split Between Branded and Non-Branded Traffic

Branded keywords are the ones that contain direct reference to your company or product name while non-branded are broader terms only tangentially dealing with your business and more related to the industry on the whole.

Seeing the amount of both types of traffic and how they perform against each other helps you balance between them and define your future SEO strategy.

On the one hand, branded traffic usually performs better in terms of pure conversions—but this is mostly because when somebody searches a branded keyword they already know about your business and are probably looking for a particular item. In other words, more branded traffic means higher brand affinity and awareness.

…more branded traffic means higher brand affinity…

On the other hand, it is from non-branded traffic that you get most of your new users, visitors and potential future customers who discover your brand for the first time. If your branded campaigns fare better than non-branded ones, it means that you should concentrate on building more brand affinity.

3. Crawl Errors

Among other things, Google Search Console shows you crawl errors—site-wide by default, but the report can be fine-tuned if you so wish. Needless to say, any crawl error you notice should be acted upon immediately, its existence means that some parts of your website don’t work as they are supposed to and don’t bring you any traffic.

Site errors should be addressed first of all because they affect your entire website. DNS and server are the most important: the former meaning that Googlebot doesn’t connect to your site at all, and the latter that your server takes too long to respond. Using Fetch with Google and then following help instructions is a good starting point to solving these problems.

4. Final Conversions (Goal Achievement)

Only final conversions can show you how well your strategy is working…

Yes, conversion is probably the metric that gets most discussion out there, so how does it fall into a list of lesser-known metrics? It is very simple: we are talking about final conversions, the achievement of the end goal you set in front of your business—for an online retailer it will be making a sale, for a SaaS agency selling a subscription, and so on—in other words, you should measure the factual results, something that puts money in your pocket. Free subscriptions, for example, aren’t conversions; many people subscribe with a vague intention of catching up with this reading later on only to unsubscribe half a year later without ever interacting with your website again. Only final conversions can show you how well your strategy is working and if you should change anything.

5. Backlink Profile

Backlinks still play an important role in SEO, but their quantity doesn’t matter much anymore—quality is much more important. A single backlink from a high-authority website is worth a hundred easy-to-get ones; and these days Google may actually penalize you if you tend to rely on many low-quality backlinks. Therefore, it is the quality of your backlink profile that you should pay attention to, not the sum total of all your backlinks.

…it is the quality of your backlink profile that you should pay attention to, not the sum total of all your backlinks.

How to get more high-quality backlinks? Create valuable content. Seriously get into guest blogging, get in touch with influencers in your industry. Avoid cheap spammy links like the plague.

There is much more to SEO than just measuring the most obvious metrics and taking mechanical actions to improve them when you believe they lag too far behind. SEO strategy is more about seeing the bigger picture, using lesser-known metrics to glean the meaning of the changes that happen with your resource, and taking swift action based on your findings.

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/5-subtle-metrics-that-could-make-or-break-your-website/

Popular Design News of the Week: February 19, 2018 – February 25, 2018

Every week users submit a lot of interesting stuff on our sister site Webdesigner News, highlighting great content from around the web that can be of interest to web designers. 

The best way to keep track of all the great stories and news being posted is simply to check out the Webdesigner News site, however, in case you missed some here’s a quick and useful compilation of the most popular designer news that we curated from the past week.

Note that this is only a very small selection of the links that were posted, so don’t miss out and subscribe to our newsletter and follow the site daily for all the news.

7 Practical Tips for Cheating at Design

 

Stimulus: A JavaScript Framework for People Who Love HTML

 

Handlebars in UI Design

 

Unused CSS Finder – Crawl your Website and Find Unused CSS

 

InVision Studio is Out-but are Designers Migrating to a New Tool Again?

 

The Sudden Death of the Website

 

Are Microframes the Future of Wireframing?

 

Site Design: Oscars Predictions

 

Site Design: Brandacity

 

Just Leave: No Job is Worth Burning Out for

 

The Case Against Google

 

Be Frank – New Platform

 

Branding for Builders

 

Accessible by Design

 

Flat UI Colors – Color Palettes for Use in Projects, Designs, Presentations

 

Top 2018 WordPress Plugins to Extend your WP Site’s Functionality

 

A Better User Experience… Or?

 

Desktop Prototyping by Dropbox (includes Framer Desktop Kit)

 

Tippy.js – A Vanilla JS Tooltip

 

Collection of Great Product Design Case Studies

 

Is Minimalism EVERYTHING?

 

How Twitter Lost the Internet War

 

Why Google AMP is a Threat to the Open Web

 

This Design Generation has Failed

 

The Red Reveal: Illusions on the Web

 

Want more? No problem! Keep track of top design news from around the web with Webdesigner News.

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/popular-design-news-of-the-week-february-19-2018-february-25-2018/

5 Ways to Design Like a Dungeon Master

Storytelling is great for design, so long as you aren’t trying to sell a fairy tale…

Do you tell your users a story about how you’ll save them from their troubles? It’s not very realistic, and users generally know this. You might try a different approach.

Once upon a time in the videogame industry, some game developers got tired of writing stories and quests into their games. So they made a bunch of sandbox-style games where the player could do almost anything they wanted. They just had to want to do it. The “story” would be formed in the player’s own mind, as they took actions and saw consequences in the game.

This was called “emergent storytelling”, and the game developers were very proud of themselves. But they didn’t invent it. Not at all. Emergent narratives have a long history, but were perhaps perfected by the “Game Masters” and “Dungeon Masters” of the tabletop roleplaying games, like Dungeons & Dragons.

There’s a lot we designers can learn from the experiences of Dungeon Masters.

The crash course: Remember when you were a kid playing pretend with others, and then one kid suddenly had a pretend gun, another had a pretend bazooka, and another a nuke? Roleplaying games are basically codified sets of rules that allow people to play pretend without that sort of instant escalation.

The Dungeon Master is a person who referees the game, enforces the rules, tells the story, and doles out consequences for actions. They’ve been telling stories for a long time, often with main characters who are stubborn, ignorant, and determined to break everything the DM might create.

Does that sound familiar to you? There’s a lot we designers can learn from the experiences of Dungeon Masters. They’re experts in both telling pre-planned stories with input from the players, and letting players tell their own stories altogether, and we need to learn both, too.

1. Make Your User the Main Character

Whether a DM has a specific story he wants to tell, or intends to let the player write their own, one thing remains mostly-constant. The player is the protagonist. They are not necessarily the hero, or the “chosen one”, but the protagonist. It is this perspective that allows players to quickly get invested in their character, and the world.

So much of the storytelling I see in web design would have you believe that the product they’re selling is the main character. Worse, sometimes they try to tell you that the website itself is somehow the protagonist of the story. To the Pit with that idea!

Your product is just a tool in their inventory, like a handy rope, or a +4 Vorpal Longsword. They’re the ones making things happen. Remember that, and do your best to play that role. Fight against your role, and they might see you as more of a cursed weapon, to be discarded and dismantled at their earliest convenience.

2. Players May Not Do What You Want

Writers have it easy-ish. They can make their characters do whatever they want, even when it doesn’t make a lot of sense for the character. (Sure, that’s bad writing, but whatever.) Dungeon Masters have to deal with real people playing characters who will do what they want, when they want. Yes, they can punish players for undesired behavior, but that’s a fast way to drive players to another game.

Users are pretty much the same. Learn to adapt to the way your users want to do things. Remember that even if you have a greater narrative going on, it’s still their story in the end. They won’t always be content to go from the Home page, to the Features page, to the Buy Now page every time, in that order. They will find their own path somehow, but it will be easier on both of you if you give them more than one.

3. Players Will Abuse Every System They Can

D&D players and users alike will eventually find the most efficient way to get something done…

A corollary for the point above is that D&D players and users alike will eventually find the most efficient way to get something done, and you may not like it. This is called “meta-gaming” and in D&D, it involves combining classes, special gear, and abilities to create characters that are far more powerful than they should be.

In using web sites or apps, it means that if users find a way to get what they want without jumping through any hoops you have set up, they’ll do it. And they’ll get annoyed if you take their shortcuts away.

4. Have a Big Plan Anyway

Good Dungeon Masters have stuff going on in their world. The players themselves may or may not decide to interact with all of the people and events around them, but “life” will go on. Usually, players will eventually come face to face with the big boss in any case, if only because that boss is bent on dominating the whole world anyway.

Unless your users leave your site altogether, they’re at least going to look at your prices and a big “Buy Me” button eventually. Just because some people won’t follow the plan doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have one. Most users are less obstinate than your average D&D player, and will be glad to have a quick and easy route to their goal.

5. Have Another Plan for When Things Really Break

In D&D, player’s characters can die, and they have to make new ones. In one campaign, a mistake the DM made allowed us to blow up an entire (alternate) plane of existence with most of us in it. Long story. Anyway, he was able to continue the story with new characters, and some fast adjustments to the main story between sessions. Long-time DMs learn to account for catastrophic turns of events like that one.

In web design, we don’t have the option to fix things between sessions, though. The story has to keep going, even if your players are on, say, an error page. If you’re going to use storytelling as a metaphor for your user experience design, then you need to use it everywhere. The story shouldn’t end just because a link went missing.

And with that, have fun. And happy adventuring!

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/5-ways-to-design-like-a-dungeon-master/

Should You Follow Design Trends?

Across all disciplines of design, from fashion to architecture, trends largely define the styles and directions of an industry at a particular time.

Trends are often determined to be a reaction to a previous style. Whether that’s swaying from maximalism to minimalism, or colorful to monochrome, trends by their very nature focus on short termism rather than the larger picture. They also tend to be cyclical, meaning across design industries, a trend is likely to come back around at some point, in some form.

The question therefore presents itself as to why trends exist

In design industries, there is limited scope for constant progression: Architecture is limited by regulation and the development of new materials; Web design is limited by web technologies and the medium by which it is consumed. Over time these develop, presenting opportunities for new design directions and approaches. However, in the medium term, industries such as web design have remained very much the same for the end user. While we can now view websites on our phones and use modern technologies to produce more complex designs, much of the styles we use now could have been achieved decades ago.

The likes of minimalist and brutalist trends do little to push design forward, and tend to do the opposite, pushing design around in a circle. Even more complex visual animations were achieved over a decade ago—albeit using Flash.

The question therefore presents itself as to why trends exist. It’s not to push an industry forward, nor is it to improve the final output for users, whether it be in fashion or web design. Why trends exist is to maintain visual interest, not just for consumers and clients, but for the designers themselves too.

If we take web design as a case study for trends, we can see that we have essentially stripped websites back of their detailing. While currently this is visually appealing, since it’s on-trend, it actually does little to improve the experience for the end user. This is the website design for Abduzeedo in 2010, via the Wayback Machine.

And here is Abduzeedo in 2018. It follows a number of popular trends; from ridding of any design detailing such as gradients, to replacing key elements like search with less-intuitive solutions.

Is it more usable, or simply more on-trend? It’s harder to scan the latest article posts, more difficult to understand the content hierarchy, and lacking the wonderful, contrasting design visuals and details included in the earlier version.

Abduzeedo is not alone in its reductionist techniques, and similar transitions have occurred across the majority of websites over this period. But what if it had simply remained the same? I can’t speak for other Abduzeedo loyalists, but for me a great design is near-timeless, even in such a fast-paced industry.

Some sites have indeed remained the same over long periods. They have found a structure and design language which resonates with users’ needs. Rather than chopping and changing as the trends grow and subside, they stay firm, trusting in their design decisions and reasoning behind them. An excellent example is The Drudge Report.

It’s not following a minimalist or brutalist design trend. It has looked like this for the best part of two decades. Users of the site love the simplicity and consistency of the design. In an industry defined by cluttered news websites with breaking news alerts, The Drudge Report has taken a step back from the race for user’s attention and stayed true to its original purpose.

Much of it can be traced to boredom

Of course there are exceptions over this time, namely with the way trends contribute to design systems like Material Design, which continues to develop a current and user-friendly design language for all to use and benefit from. It’s implemented throughout Google’s products, improving user experience through well-defined user interface assets and consistency. But on the whole, design trends are largely about tweaking styles continuously to provide something new to users, consumers, clients, and designers that is fresh and unique. Much of it can be traced to boredom, not just from consumers, but designers too. Who wants to enter a creative industry and turn out the same style app designs, or websites, time and time again? Cityscapes, computers, the web, mobile apps, clothing, they’d all be samish, and lacking in a great deal of emotion or feeling. Not to mention, a market economy is built upon companies continuing to present new products and new designs, regardless of how good an existing one is.

Designers have to consider whether trends are a primary consideration, or whether the user experience should define the styles and direction. This largely comes down to the sub-industry and whether a design is primarily visual or user-orientated. Aspects such as logo or poster design have much greater scope to follow these trends.

Digital product design should always place the user experience over conforming to trends. In many ways trends should be entirely redundant in these cases and have little-to-no influence on design decisions.

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from Webdesigner Depot https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2018/02/should-you-follow-design-trends/