WPaddict.net tested 8 themes to find the fastest loading theme and confirmed that SWIFT is the fastest loading WordPress theme beating the popular premium themes.

http://wpaddict.net/is-the-swift-theme-really-swift/

An awesome customization of SWIFT I came across recently

http://www.jennyonthespot.com/

Currently, if you want to move your WordPress install to a new host and keep the same domain, you only need to move all the files (WordPress Core, Themes, and Plugins), and then export/import the database. It’s pretty straight forward, but still more complex than many users are capable of.

However, if you want to change the domain (even without moving to a new host) you have to export the database, do some search and replace on the .sql file, and then re-import the updated database. Even then, if the new domain has a different number of characters in it than the old one did, you can run against problems if any of the places you replaced the name happened to be inside a serialized array (almost all the options, including things like widget settings, text widget text, etc).

The goal of this project would be to make a these kinds of transitions simple and smooth. If only the domain is changing, then when the user updates the WordPress URL we would update internal links in their posts, settings, image urls, etc. If they are moving to a new host, allowing them to install WordPress at their new host and enter their credentials for their old host (WordPress admin credentials as well as FTP credentials) and WordPress would simply import everything (posts, settings, uploads, theme, plugins, etc).

There are 3 possible cases

1. Change the domain on the same host.
2. Move to a different host.
3. Change the domain and move to a different host.

Change the domain on the same host

This basically requires finding every occurrence of the old domain name in the database and change it to new one. We may face problems when the data is stored in a serialized array, so I’m first going to unserilaze the data from each row, make the necessary changes and the then put it back in the database.

Move to a different host

I will ask the user to install WordPress on his new host, collect the ftp details from the user. I will then use these ftp details to fetch the details about the database and drop all the tables. I will then dump the database on the old host, transfer it to the new host via ftp and then import it to the new database and then I will copy wp-content directory via ftp.

Change the domain and move to a different host

I will first move the blog to the new host as described in case 2 and then change the domain name as described in case 1

Plugin, theme, or core: I would like to develop it as a plugin, as most of the users might not need this option.

Integrating vBulletin with WordPress

As your blog grows, you might want to build a community around it. If vBulletin is your choice, this guide is for you.

Importing WordPress users to vBulletin 4.0 forum

If there are lot of users already registered on your blog, It’s a good idea to start the forum with those users already registered on the forum. Unfortunately there are no scripts to import WordPress users to vBulletin.

Luckily for us, impex has scripts to import bbPress and the user table structure for WordPress and bbPress are same. So you can import WordPress telling impex that it is bbPress. It will show you a warning that some tables are not found, you can safely ignore them and continue with the import. All the imported users will be placed under a new group named Active Imported Users. Move them to registered users, else they may have problem logging in and posting.

goto admincp-> usergroups-> usergroup manager and drop the newly created group and they will automatically moved to registered users group.

Preparing WordPress for import in disguise.

You can ignore the warnings in red and continue with the import.

Bridging wordpress and vBulletin

There is a mod to bridge wordpress and vBulletin, you can download it here. It has clear documentation on how to use the plugin, read the instructions carefully before you do anything.

If you need help integrating vBulletin with your wordpress installation or convert your bbPress forum to vBulletin you can hire me

WordPress treats two version of the same theme as different themes. That is, if you have SWIFT v5.1 and v5.1.1 in your wp-content/themes folder they are treated as two different themes independent of each other.

That means you can have multiple version of the same theme installed on your blog. So whenever there is a new version of your theme available, instead of replacing or deleting the files of the older version follow this procedure.

1. Download the new version of the theme onto your computer.
2. If the folder name of the new version clashes with the old version, rename the folder of new version.
3. Upload the new version to your wp-content/themes folder via FTP or through the interface provided by your web host or by using the upload feature in WordPress.
4. Activate the new version from your dashboard.

The main advantage of following the above procedure is you can quickly switch back to the old version of the theme if you find any problems with the new version or if it clashes with any plugins you are using.

Awesome content slider in SWIFT wordpress theme

I’m currently working on SWIFT v3.0.0, you can check it in action at GeniusHackers.Com. I would like to have your valuable suggestions and feedback to make it the best. Let us together make premium quality themes available for free.

Whats new in version 3.0.0

Light weight tabbed interface

1. Cleaner code, customization will be more easy now.
2. Featured post slide show.
3. Tabed interface.
4. Better comment styling to match the overall look of the theme (Check the screenshot below)
5. Sexybook marks and related posts are most common plugins on wordpress powered blogs,  so I styled them to match SWIFT. Just install them and you have the fancy styling ready. (Check screenshot below)
6. Swift v.2.1.4 has post content width of 620 pixels, It’s too wide to for easy reading, so reduced it to 580 pixels in v.3.0.0. This also gives more room for sidebar.
7. Switches to minimal mode with a single click.
8. Option to add adsense ad at the end of post.
9. Widgetised banner ads, now you can choose where you want your banners to appear.
10. Option to choose font and other font properties. (3 built in configurations)
11. Integrated  page navigation.
    

    Page navigation integration in SWIFT.

Clean and fancy comment styling to match the overall scheme.

Clean styling of Sexy Bookmarks and YARPP plugins

One of the several BUG fixes in SWIFT

Features still under consideration..

• There is a handy post thumbnail plugin,  I’m trying to integrate it in SWIFT. Not sure if I can make it.

WordPress post thumbnail plugin

• May add tool tips feature.
  

  Tool Tips

Note: GH is not using the default colour scheme.

This theme is mainly aimed at blogs running on low server resources and for those who like clean and simple designs. It’s always good have themes like SWIFT at your disposal so that you can easily switch to it if you are expecting a spike in traffic from social media sites.

Here are some of the best features of SWIFT which makes it stand out from crowd.

1. Loads very fast, minimum number of http requests. Your server will love it
2. Zero images used.
3. Clean typography.
4. SEO friendly, For example,this theme uses h1 tag for post titles, instead of the blog title.
5. Cross browser compatible (Works well on ie6 too , except for the curves )
6. Swift is smart enough to pull out the first image from your post and use it as thumbnail on home page (It even pulls out images that are not part of wordpress gallery).
7. Featured post slider.(Included in v3.0)
8. Tabbed interface.(Included in v3.0)
9. I have bundled lot of features in to the options page to make your SWIFT THEME unique
10. Popular posts are highlighted on the home page to give them more exposure, this will turn the first time visitors to your blog into regular readers.
11. Sidebar and footer with four widgetised sections (8 in total) .
12. Adsense integrated into killer locations .
13. RSS subscribe box in the best possible position to increase your subscribers.
14. Eight different color schemes to choose from(Will Be added very soon, working on them).
15. Ads integrated into theme options page.
16. Option to add thumbnails to home page
17. Easy colour picker to customize your copy of SWIFT (That makes it infinite colours to choose from )

I would like to have your valuable suggestions before I release the next version.Please drop in your suggestions here.

Upcoming Features

1. Better featured post section with slider.(Included in v3.0)
2. Integration with pagenavigation and related posts plugin. (Included in v3.0)
3. Adding some images using CSS sprites.
4. Fancy RSS subscribe box.(Added in v2.0.0)
5. Drop down navigation.
6. rounded corners in all browsers
7. Threaded comments and better comments template. (Included in v3.0)

***** SWIFT Change log *****

04.10.09 – Version 3.1.1
*Removed the unnecessary brace that crept into style.php in 3.0.5.
*Fixed the feed detection bug.
*Added option to pick the popular post title and background colour for author comment.
*Added option to add images through custom fields, check the following url for info on using custom fields
http://swiftthemes.com/2009/09/wordpress-themes/a-complete-guide-to-installing-and-customizing-swift/
*Added default favicon.
*Increased the font size of sidebar title.
*Changed content slider sliding style.
*Fixed the featured posts bug
*Updated the styles
*Comment luv wasnt detecting the rss feed, fixed this problem.
02.10.09 – Version 3.0.5
Forgot to save the changelog in v3.0.4
02.10.09 – Version 3.0.4
*Removed the padding and margin for smileys.
*Added margins to headings.
*Added padding to tags widget.
*Changed blockquote styling.

30.09.09 – Version 3.0.2

*Fixed the sidebar problem in ie6

30.09.09 – Version 3.0.0

*Added featured post slider and tabbed interface.

*Stylish options page.

*More colour options.

*New comment styling.

*Option to disable rounded corners in sidebar.

*Changed the font style of blog title and post title.

*All the paddings and margins are corrected.

*Default HTML elements are styled to match the theme.

02.09.09 – Version 2.1.3

* No serious updates except for few minor changes to meet wordpress theme directory requirements.

31.08.09 – Version 2.1.0

* Fixed the rss feed bug.

30.08.09 – Version 2.0.9

* Jquery file required for options page was deleted by mistake in v.2.08

* Reorganized the options page.

30.08.09 – Version 2.0.8

* Added rounded corner support to safari.

* Fixed all the CSS and HTML errors

29.08.09 – Version 2.0.7

* Fixed the bug in navigation area

* Added some default widgets.

* Some SEO tweaks

28.08.09 – Version 2.0.6

* Made the height of navigation area above and below logo fluid now you can have as many pages and categories as you want.

27.08.09 – Version 2.0.5

* Fixed the 125*125 banner ads bug

27.08.09 – Version 2.0.4

* Options page is more user friendly now.

* Added gravtar next to post title and gave it a whole new styling. You will love it.

* Separate comments and trackback.

* Added an option to add Adsense ad under the navigation area. I have been using Adsense for more than three years, trust me when I say that this position has highest CTR and could double your Adsense revenue when used with proper colour combinations.

* Fixed the email subscription link.

* Fixed some bugs in comments template.

26.08.09 – Version 2.0.3

Changed the post title style

Fixed some bugs with rss

made the search box little wider to accomodate the default text

23.08.09 – Version 2.0.2

Added threaded comments

23.08.09 – Version 2.0.1

*Fixed the links to feeds in footer

23.08.09 – Version 2.0.0

*Changed the layout from 16 grid system to 12 grid system (Swift uses 960.gs css framework)

*Added RSS subscribe box and changed the search box position

20.08.09 – Version 1.0.6

*Fixed some php tags

*Added colour picker to options page and made it more user friendly

19.08.09 – Version 1.0.5

* Added the option to disable popular posts on homepage, disabled by default.

* If no post is specified for the featured section, most recent post is taken as default.

*Fixed the issues with Internet explorer, that crept into version 1.0.4

Download SWIFT

SWIFT The fastest loading wordpress theme

SWIFT | The FlickR style

SWIFT | The WordPress style