Category: Technology

9 Steps to Ensure High Speed of WordPress Website

Posted on by galaxy-admin

WordPress powers more than 40% of the web today. WordPress is powered by thousands of different plugins, themes, and technologies and all of these have to coexist. Things can quickly turn into a nightmare for regular WordPress developers here when the website gives them trouble and they can’t identify the problem area. 

The speed of the website is of the utmost importance and remains a top priority regardless of the nature, size, and function of the website. In every technical audit, an improvement in website speed is given weightage. Poor page loading is a big turn-off for users, as well as a factor that drives them away. 

User experience, content, SEO, mobile-responsiveness, etc are a few of the elements that make a successful website. However, website speed has become more and more important over time. The 4gs and 5gs have made consumers impatient. Even if a website is fractionally slow, they would move on to something else. 

A study from Microsoft Corp. says people are generally losing concentration after eight seconds. It is an effect of an increasingly digitalized lifestyle on the brain.

The fact that visitors are mostly using mobile devices, often having a slower data connection than computers exacerbates the problem further. 

As a result, WordPress website owners are hard-pressed to make their websites fast. But, this demands a lot of technical knowledge.

Here we attempt to guide you in speeding up your website step by step. 

First Up – Backup

The process of speeding up a WordPress website may cause you to lose data and other important components of the website. To that end, always make a backup to restore in case of a mishap. A fresh backup can go back to how things were before. The first step will always be downloading both website files and the database. Do it manually or via a plugin, whatever is convenient to you.

Let’s get to the steps… 

Step One – Damage Assessment 

Post backup, it is time to see how the site’s current performance is in terms of page speed. Then follows the before/after comparison. If you have before/after data, you can draw the comparison and check if your actions made any difference. Some of the commonly used tools are – Pingdom, GTmetrix, Google PageSpeed Insights.

Plugging the URL into these sites to see the site’s performance. These testing tools will provide inputs on how the speed of the page can be improved. The recommendations will look like this:

  • Enable compression
  • Leverage browser caching
  • Reduce HTTP requests
  • Eliminate JavaScript and CSS above the fold
  • Optimize images
  • Minify CSS and JavaScript
  • Reduce server response time

Step Two – Eliminating Unnecessary Plugins and Themes

There are always some plugins on the site that are not useful or have outlived the initial purpose. These plugins put an extra, unnecessary burden on the site, increasing the loading time. HTTP requests can slow a site down, so log in and sort through the plugin list. Disable plugins that are not in use and also stop by the theme menu to see if there is anything that isn’t needed.

Step Three – Run Plugin Performance Profiler

With Performance Profiler, plugin performance can be scanned, pinpointing the ones slowing down the WordPress website.

Step Four – Update!

Upgrading WordPress, themes, and plugins gives you access to the latest features and also lets you take advantage of speed improvements. Proper up-gradation of each element constructing the website is necessary.

Step Five – Optimization of the Database

Data optimization can be done using plugins like WP-Optimize. It helps you remove the data overhead from database tables and unnecessary entries such as old post revisions and more.

Step Six – Image Optimization

Images often make up the bulk of any webpage, especially if they are completely composed of visuals. For that reason, we optimize images as much as possible. 

Step Seven – Enable Compression

Next, zip up the files to make them smaller so that browsers need less time to download and present them on the screen.

Step Eight – Turn on Browser Caching

Enabling browser caching basically means telling the browsers of visitors to store parts of the site on their hard drive for a quick future load. This way, resources that aren’t likely to change, can be reused next time.

Step Nine – Minify and Concatenate

Using plugins like Autoptimize to reduce the number of HTTP requests made by the browser by minifying and concatenating the CSS and JavaScript files.

About Galaxy Weblinks 

Galaxy Weblinks is your one-stop solution for WordPress solutions, We offer a complete range of IT services including WordPress development and WordPress optimization. Contact us now for the complete WordPress solutions.

Apple Urgently Patches Actively Exploited Vulnerabilities

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The timing of this Apple’s urgent security update is sure to raise some questions as it’s happening in the same time frame as the Pegasus hacks. According to the reports, the spyware tool turned mobile phones of journalists, activists, and others into portable surveillance devices, granting complete access to sensitive information stored in them. 

The most recent 0-day bug patch that was released this Monday was in the line of 13 releases that Apple has made since the start of this year. Apple has fixed these vulnerabilities for all of their offerings including iOS, iPadOS, and macOS for which Apple claims that the flaw was actively being exploited, until after Apple released the patch. 

The update fixes a memory corruption issue (CVE-2021-30807) in the IOMobileframeBuffer component, which is a kernel extension for managing the screen framebuffer. In essence, the flaw could be abused to execute arbitrary code with kernel privileges. 

Apple claims that in addition to addressing the issue, they have also improved memory handling. Further details about the exploit have not been disclosed to prevent ill-usage of the information for more severe attacks. An anonymous researcher has been credited by Apple for discovering and reporting the vulnerability. 

Here are the other 0-day vulnerabilities that Apple has patched in this year alone including CVE-2021-30807 update —

  • CVE-2021-1782 (Kernel) – A malicious application may be able to elevate privileges
  • CVE-2021-1870 (WebKit) – A remote attacker may be able to cause arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-1871 (WebKit) – A remote attacker may be able to cause arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-1879 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to universal cross-site scripting
  • CVE-2021-30657 (System Preferences) – A malicious application may bypass Gatekeeper checks
  • CVE-2021-30661 (WebKit Storage) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-30663 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-30665 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-30666 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-30713 (TCC framework) – A malicious application may be able to bypass Privacy preferences
  • CVE-2021-30761 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution
  • CVE-2021-30762 (WebKit) – Processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution

Like any security vulnerability this one is not to be taken lightly considering the threats Apple devices have been exposed to lately. We highly recommend that you move quickly to update your devices to the latest version to avoid exposing your device to attacks associated with the flaw.

About Galaxy

We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services. Our mobile team and UI/UX designers are creative problem-solvers with a decade of experience in all facets of digital and interactive design. We create compelling and human-focused experiences delivered through clean, and minimalist UI. Click here for a free consultation!

NET MAUI: Evolution of Xamarin by Microsoft

Posted on by galaxy-admin

Microsoft has announced to replace its Xamarin Toolkits with .NET MAUI a few weeks ago. Microsoft unveiled this new approach at Build 2020, calling it the .NET MultiPlatform App UI (MAUI).

.NET MAUI is the next generation of Xamarin Forms. It is designed to allow developers to create an app in a single Visual Studio project, with a single codebase that can target any supported device. Microsoft described it as the evolution of Xamarin.

The goal is to deliver a project structure that is simplified. Instead of a single solution with separate projects for each platform you want to target, MAUI has a single project that contains all of the resources you need to target specific platforms. If you need access to device-specific services, you can bundle them in a platforms view and use them at compile time when targeting builds for each platform.

Bringing Mono and .NET together in .NET 6

With.NET 6, which will be released in November, the company is unifying the entire.NET ecosystem into a single offering. In preparation for this, it is providing.NET MAUI toolkit replacements for traditional Xamarin toolkits. Among the latter is Xamarin.Essentials, which provides cross-platform APIs for mobile apps, and Xamarin Community Toolkit, which includes commonly used behaviors, converters, effects, MVVM utilities, and controls such as the CameraView, AvatarView, and TabView.

The goal isn’t to completely replace Mono, but to have a single set of class libraries and a single toolchain for.NET Core and Mono, building on the work already being done in platform-level features like the.NET Standard libraries.

For cross-platform development, Xamarin is an alternative to WinUI. Its cross-platform strategy is based on a combination of XAML support for native iOS and Android controls and its own cross-platform Xamarin Forms. Xamarin Forms is an MVVM (model-view-viewmodel) development platform in and of itself, with its open-sourcingcontrol look and feel based on the Material Design language used by Android. Xamarin Forms provides a consistent look and feel to iOS and Android apps while still allowing them access to native features and services.

What difference does .NET MAUI make?

.NET MAUI is designed with developer productivity in mind, including a project system and cross-platform tooling. .NET MAUI consolidates project structures into a single project that can target multiple platforms. This means that you can easily deploy to any target, such as your desktop, emulators, simulators, or physical devices, with a single click. With built-in cross-platform resources, you can incorporate any images, fonts, or translation files into a single project, and.NET MAUI will automatically configure native hooks so you can focus on coding. Finally, you will always have access to the native underlying operating system APIs, which will be easier than ever thanks to new platform-specific integrations. You can add source code files for a specific operating system and access native APIs under platforms. Everything you need to stay productive is in one place with.NET MAUI.

This provides:

  • One project with multiple platforms and devices in mind.
  • Fonts and images can be managed in a single location.
  • To organize your platform-specific code, use multi-targeting.

Source: Microsoft

.NET MAUI is the future

The foundation of this update can be traced back six years with the open sourcing of.NET and the formation of the.NET Foundation. The platform required an independent organization to guide it through the transition from the old .NET Framework to the new, legacy-free, modular .NET Core. This transition had to include more than just Windows; it had to include Xamarin’s mobile clients and Unity’s 3-D gaming platforms, as well as the goal of expanding the reach of .NET’s to macOS and Linux.

Source: Microsoft

That brings us to 2021, and with the recent release of.NET MAUI Preview 6 (as part of.NET 6 Preview 6), the essentials bits have been directly integrated into.NET MAUI as well.

We know that some developers are updating their existing Xamarin applications today. Xamarin and iOS Android apps to.NET 6 without.NET MAUI and still want to use all of Xamarin’s APIs Essentials. We also have you covered, as you can add this:

<UsingMauiEssentials>true</UsingMauiEssentials>

to your.NET 6 iOS and Android apps to include all of the most recent APIs.

Summing Up

Perhaps a more optimistic way of looking at it is that, with the shift to a cross-platform.NET Core as the foundation of all things.NET, Microsoft is absorbing Xamarin rather than Xamarin becoming the heart of open .NET’s source future. That is an excellent legacy for the Mono project.

One of the goals of one .NET is to give developers more options in terms of personal preferences, so they can be more productive when using .NET. This manifests itself regardless of whether you use Visual Studio 2019, Visual Studio for Mac, or even Visual Studio Code. .NET MAUI will be available in all of them, and it will support both the existing MVVM and XAML patterns, as well as future capabilities such as Model-View-Update (MVU) with C# or even Blazor.

Have any cross-platform development needs? Contact our experts today.

About Galaxy Weblinks

We specialize in delivering end-to-end mobile design & development services and have hands-on experience with the latest technologies like .NET and Xamarin. Our developers help deliver well-performing cross-platform mobile applications. Investing in such app development technologies saves money and ensures a faster go-to-market. 

Flutter Global Summit ’21 – Highlights and Takeaways

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Flutter Global Summit 21 introduced several new and improved features, as well as some new tools. Flutter, originally introduced as a cross-platform mobile development tool, is now covering a broader range of development areas, particularly when combined with its native development language, Dart. Take a look at our top takeaways from this summit!

1. State Management- Riverpod

Riverpod allows you to manage the state of your application in a compile-safe manner while sharing many of the benefits of Provider (which instead of manually writing InheritedWidget, acts as a wrapper and common way to consume those InheritedWidgets).

Reverpod also provides numerous additional benefits, making it an excellent choice for Flutter state management.

This was a topic that sparked a lot of debate and a variety of solutions. There is even a league table of popular Flutter state management solutions. The provider is one of the most popular solutions, and Riverpod is marketed as a Provider without limitations.

2. Debugging – Dart DevTools

Flutter includes a set of performance and debugging tools, and the summit highlighted some of the advantages of learning them, such as the ability to monitor and filter network calls. Common development issues were also highlighted and how Flutter has a DevTool to solve each one.

3. Game Engine for Animation

Flame has given Flutter developers a path to include game-like features in their apps by providing an animation game engine. Flame is a modular Flutter game engine that provides a comprehensive set of out-of-the-box game solutions. It makes use of Flutter’s powerful infrastructure while simplifying the code required to build your projects.

Forge2D includes a physics engine similar to Box2D — it is a fork of Box2D, which has been used in many popular games. Forge2D is one of several tools that work with Flame.

4. Localization and Internationalization

The range of complexity presented by internationalization, which is far more complex than translating the text, was highlighted. Texts, plurals, dates, numbers, currencies, legal jargon, and other topics were all covered, demonstrating that there is a lot to think about when you understand the need to localize as well as translate.

The process of designing a software application so that it can be adapted to different languages and regions without requiring engineering changes is known as internationalization. The process of adapting internationalized software for a specific region or language by translating text and adding locale-specific components is known as localization.

5. Dart on the server- Serverpod

Serverpod is a next-generation app and web server that is designed specifically for the Flutter and Dart ecosystems. Serverpod solves the problem that developers face when creating a full-stack application that includes a mobile or web frontend and a back-end server with a database.

Instead of learning server-side programming languages and tools, Serverpod, an open-source product in development, aims to keep the developer working with Dart while also generating much of the required code to create your server API. It also produces Flutter client code.

Final Thoughts

Given that Flutter is now widely used on the web, it was interesting to hear panelists state that Flutter is not the best tool for general web application development. Waft is best suited for progressive web applications and single-page apps. Flutter’s strength is in its interactivity.

You may also like: Our Top 5 Picks for Mobile App Development in 2021

On the other hand, if you want to take your company’s mobile presence to the next level with your mobile application idea, then talk to us and we can help you decide which technology is opt for your mobile application.

About Galaxy Weblinks

We specialize in delivering end-to-end mobile design & development services and have hands-on experience with the latest technologies like Flutter. Flutter is the quickest way to deliver well-performing cross-platform mobile applications. Investing in Flutter app development saves money and ensures a faster go-to-market. 

How Gatsby is so blazing fast? A Guide to GatsbyJS

Posted on by galaxy-admin

Gatsby is an extremely powerful tool for quickly creating complex websites. It allows us to pull data from any source, provides access to a rich ecosystem (both of Gatsby-specific plugins and the broader React ecosystem), and even does things that feel magical, like auto-optimizing images.

In this article we’ll cover different attributes of Gatsby and how those features help in speeding up the application. And before that let’s take a closer look at GatsbyJS, a framework that has captured the hearts of many React developers worldwide!

Blending Static Websites with Dynamic Apps

In addition to using React, Gatsby is also a static site generator. If your website has multiple pages, it creates HTML files for each page.

Node.js will mount the React application to create HTML files with the rendered content for each route. Gatsby’s core is this.

“Gatsby pre-builds pages instead of waiting for them to be requested.“

-Gatsbyjs.com

In order to understand why this is important for performance, let’s go back to the basics.

An HTML file is accessed by an HTML browser, which renders its contents. Using an anchor tag, without any cache or JavaScript, will load another HTML file when clicked, even without any cache or JavaScript.Consequently, the user may have to wait or, in the worst case scenario, see a blank page while the page is being rendered.

Until Single Page Applications (SPAs) came along, this was the most common way to design a website.

JavaScript is used to render the page. This allows you to update much more quickly than if you had to download static files. As the user interacts, they update a single HTML file.

As the view layer of an SPA, React is used. JavaScript code is required for such frameworks and libraries as React. This means that the Critical Rendering Path is significantly affected when these are built as SPAs.

Critical Rendering Path stalls the render while loading and executing JavaScript.

Source: Guillermo.at

What about API calls to fetch data from external servers or databases, such as blog posts or product lists for your eCommerce shop? After the build process is complete, GatsbyJS creates the corresponding site content. Every time you update your database, you have to run the build process again. A continuous deployment tool would be useful in this scenario.

You can see how Gatsby deploy and build website in the diagram below:

Below are the ways how Gatsby JS speeds up your web application.

Image Optimization

Image optimization can be one of the most effective ways to improve a website’s performance.

Less bytes to download means less bandwidth required, allowing the browser to download and render content more quickly. Some of the optimizations we can make are as follows:

  • Resize it to take up the same amount of space.
  • Create responsive images with varying resolutions for desktop and mobile devices.
  • Compression and metadata removal.
  • Lazy loading can be used to speed up the initial page load.
  • While the image is loading, show a placeholder.

This can take a lot of effort and Gatsby has a solution: this whole process can be automated.

Gatsbyjs-image, like many other Gatsby tools, is powered by GraphQL. This plugin prepares images in various resolutions for download. It generates thumbnails and compresses them. This is all on the construction step.

You will receive all of the following benefits by using this component:

  • Images that are responsive and optimized for your screen size,
  • By default, an image blurred by base64 encoding (low resolution) is loaded.
  • When the image is visible, an integrated IntersectionObserver swaps the base image for the proper image.

When the image loads, a “blur-up” technique shows a preview in a very low-quality image that is already in the HTML file (or just the background). To create the automated optimization, all of the work in coding GraphQL queries is reduced. Check out this example:

So, what does this mean for app performance? In summary:

  • Using media queries, a user will receive the smallest image that is compatible with his device,
  • Heavier images are requested only when they are visible,
  • A blurred image retains the required size,
  • Jumping content or shifting elements are avoided.

Prefetch on scroll and hover

The majority of people dislike apps that take too long to load or are unresponsive while in use. That is why Gatsby expends so much effort in resolving the issue. During the build process, your code and data are divided into smaller chunks. Users load only the most important elements on the first visit to ensure that your site is rendered correctly. Once everything is visible and the user begins interacting with the page, Gatsby by default prefetches data for other pages on the site, making clicking around and navigating between pages incredibly smooth.

Remember that the Gatsby application is still a single page application (SPA). It means that after a routing event on your site (for example, after clicking on a link), there is no need to retrieve the entire site from the server again, which saves a significant amount of transferred data.

Best of Both Worlds

Gatsby gives us the best of both worlds by generating HTML statically and letting React do whatever it needs to do on the client side.

Statically rendered pages improve SEO, TTI, and overall web performance, among other benefits. Static sites are easier to deploy and have a wider global distribution.

Conclusion

This does not mean that there will be no issues with the build version if the code runs successfully in development mode (Gatsby develop). Build the code regularly and fix issues. Builds are generated after every change, and the build time is only a few minutes. A build might be more difficult to create if there are frequent changes and multiple issues need to be resolved at the time of the build.

Sites with many styled components and libraries take longer to build. As a result, it is no longer feasible to run the build after every change, making it difficult to track down build problems.

About Galaxy Weblinks

We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services and have hands-on experience with popular front-end and back-end frameworks. Our back-end and front-end engineers also help in improving security, reliability, and features to make sure your business application scales and remains secure.

Choosing Django as Your Backend Framework in 2021

Posted on by galaxy-admin

Building a scalable product is a best practice and necessity, even if you’re starting out. Because once you get that user validation, scaling becomes difficult and not so cost-efficient. So you outsource backend in order to move things around to accommodate more users and tackle heavier loads. 

Now think about when you’re building an application, you need to get two major things right i.e. Frontend (what users see and interact with) and the backend (what happens in the background, invisible to users). For this blog we’re focusing on the backend side of things. Django backend framework to be precise. 

The Backend runs on a server, that’s why it’s called server-side of the application. Although invisible, this server-side of the application holds great importance in terms of performance. Hence, choosing the right backend framework becomes critical, if you want to avoid slow, buggy, and overall bad user experience. For this blog we’re taking a look at Django and its relevance in 2021 as a backend framework. 

Relevance of Django in 2021

Django provides generic functionalities to build a web app without many hassles, as it comes equipped with solutions that eliminate the need of writing everything from scratch. Django code is reusable, which subsequently helps in cost and time reductions in development.

Django is a batteries-included framework. And, for the Frontend part, depending on your goals, you can select and combine different complementary frontend elements with Django. 

Benefits of Choosing Django as Your Backend Development Framework

As mentioned earlier Django is batteries included so it comes with everything you need to build an MVP right out of the box. Provided you have user flow, information architecture and UX of the product planned to a T. Some other benefits are as follows:

  • Out of the box Django comes equipped with Content administration, site maps, RSS, user authentication, etc.
  • Django provides you with a production ready admin interface, you just have to define your models. It also lets you add and authenticate users with different levels of permissions. 
  • Django likes to keep URLs clean and elegant, so it avoids putting any cruft in URLs, like .php or .asp. 
  • Django is equipped with templates to help avoid security attacks like cross-site scripting, cross-site request forgery, clickjacking and SQL injection.
  • Scalability is one of the strong suits of Django and some of the famously large organizations across the globe use Django to build scalable web applications.
  • If we talk about versatility, Django is used to build robust backends for CMSs to Social Networks.

Why Do You Need Django in 2021?

If you were to do backend development from scratch, you will realize that raw SQL queries will be needed to manipulate the database and soon enough it will stop scaling. Subsequently you might end up writing your own wrapper on top of the raw SQL queries, to keep the code DRY. 

Now your users are interacting with the interface with raw queries. Which in turn makes your app vulnerable to SQL injection. Security vulnerabilities don’t just stop there, the app will be exposed to cross site scripting and clickjacking. 

Even if you even managed to tackle these security vulnerabilities, which is tedious to say the least, exposing the backend to the frontend of a web/mobile app in 2021 is even more difficult. 

Django Usage Across Industries and Countries

Here are the industry-wise and country-wise stats of Django usage. About 30,699 live websites run on Django.

django
django-country
Source: SimilarTech

Reasons to Choose or Not to Choose Django

If you need Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence based core features and functionalities then Django is highly recommended. All you need is a strong Python team. 

  • Django is great for growing projects, as they’ll need features like database, migrations, cache, etc right from the start. 
  • Django is great for use-cases like a CMS-style CRUD application or when you’re writing in the framework while it can be a real pain to work around when you need to do something it doesn’t easily support.
  • Django or even Python in general is not good at some async and CPU-intensive tasks. 
  • Django scales gracefully, has a great security track record, and sane deprecation schedules.
  • Choose Django when you require both API backend & web app within the same codebase.
  • Django supports ORM.
  • Don’t go for Django if your application is huge and you don’t intend to break your app into micro services.
  • Choose Django if you’re building something bespoke and from scratch. 
  • Django is not recommended for basic apps that do not require a database. 

Wrap Up

There are an impressive number of web/mobile apps that utilize Django as the backend framework because it’s fast, reliable, and easily scalable. These traits are enough to make it relevant in 2021.

If you’re still not sure if Django is the right framework for your project or not, then get in touch with us here and we’ll try to help you make the right decision.

About Galaxy
We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services. Our analytics team and UI/UX designers are creative problem-solvers with a decade of experience in all facets of digital and interactive design. We create compelling and human-focused experiences delivered through clean, and minimalist UI.

What Makes a Great WordPress Plugin?

Posted on by galaxy-admin

There are thousands and thousands of listings in the WordPress Plugin repository, 58,600, to be precise. These plugins offer numerous different functionalities and use cases. But just like any other thing in the world, not all of these plugins are great at what they do. The ratings tell a different story altogether, even some great plugins get some flak every once in a while for doing something differently or worse, badly. Those 5 stars don’t last a lifetime. 

So how does this happen and what are the aspects that determine success or failure of a WordPress Plugin? Here is a dive into what makes a great WordPress Plugin.

Users judge apps, utilities, and other pieces of software based on their usage, needs, and previous exposure to other alternatives. How do we go on about this defining business of something subjective such as a WordPress Plugin being good or not? Each person will judge a plugin based on their own needs and experiences. It might be difficult but not impossible, here are some aspects to help you start:  

Get your Goal

According to the ‘Golden Circle’ rule, “people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” A plugin developer should also start with a why and then move into other important questions like – 

  • Why is this plugin being developed?
  • What purpose does it serve?

Let the answers to these questions be the mission statement. Most of all the plugins should be solving a problem. The purpose can be something as simple as adding new functionality to an existing plugin, WooCommerce extension for example. Or something complex and comprehensive. 

The goal and the purpose is not just something to get the development started and getting the solution in the users hands. As the user base grows, it becomes vital for the developer to stick to that mission statement. The plugin might improve with regular updates but completely changing tracks is unadvisable. For example, it wouldn’t make sense if all of a sudden an SEO plugin starts adding irrelevant features like a shopping cart. Users might get frustrated and abandon the plugin altogether. 

Great plugins tend to stick to their initial goals and mission statement. 

Mind the Users

Be mindful of the users and respect their preferences. Users like to have control of the tools and what they do. Implementing policies that are not transparent is a bad practice. Don’t upsell unnecessarily and clutter the dashboard. Also don’t spam users with stuff they didn’t sign up for or enroll users for auto-update without telling them. Even if some of the actions might be good for the users but make it clear to let them know and let them make the choice. 

Users hate it when their personal space is being breached and when crucial functionality is turned on/off without their consent. 

Mind the Coding and Accessibility Standards

Not just for WordPress plugins but coding and accessibility standards should be followed in general. Sticking with the standards makes the plugin code efficient, secure, and stable, and UI accessible to everyone. 

WordPress being an Open-source platform, adhering to these standards is easier said than done. Literally anyone who wants to write code and build a plugin can do so. But not everyone sticks to the rules, especially when dealing with bigger, harder-to-manage plugins. A little piece of rogue code can create a big mess in an instant. A great WordPress plugin sticks to the standards for the very same reason.  

Support it and Maintain it

Developing a WordPress plugin is difficult and maintaining it is a major undertaking on its own. But it’s worth it because it’s one of the major factors that determines long-term success of a WordPress Plugin. 

Bugs are a part of the system, they appear even in the popular enterprise applications that have large and vigilant teams dedicated to hunt and rectify them. They will appear regularly and it can be frustrating but the key here is to deal with them in a timely and regular manner. Firefighting won’t take you far.  

Providing support reinforces user trust in the developer. When things go wrong, provide support, at least to the extent you can. Type and cost of the plugin also plays an important role here in determining what kind of support users are going to expect from you. A free product can survive with a basic knowledge base while a commercial product is expected to have a good support. 

Final Thoughts

WordPress Plugins are meant to solve problems and as long as your plugin does that, keeping the users needs in mind, it’s going to score good. Utilize the key aspects mentioned in this blog to make things easier while you try to achieve WordPress greatness. 

And if plugin development is something that you need WordPress experts to handle for you, then drop by here and tell us your needs.

About Galaxy

We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services. Our analytics team and UI/UX designers are creative problem-solvers with a decade of experience in all facets of digital and interactive design. We create compelling and human-focused experiences delivered through clean, and minimalist UI. Click here for a free consultation!

Product Analytics – Why They Matter and How to Get Started?

Posted on by galaxy-admin

Product analytics have helped companies – big and small to better target and understand their customers. Analytics helps them determine product health, improve their customer experience, test product fitness and ensure they invest correctly, with limited time and resources. In essence, you can accelerate the growth of your business by analyzing products.

In the end-user era, when you purchase customers through product-led growth, it is essential to know what specific actions people take to guide your strategy through product, sales, marketing and client success.

Your first thought could be: ‘My product has so many features. How do I know what I’m supposed to measure?’

Here is the first scary answer: all your events and commitments must be measured. The secret is placing them in a setting that helps you to understand them. That is because not all user actions have the same value even for the user, and certainly not for the company you run.

Why should companies care about product analytics?

Historically, implementing product analytics has been difficult. It takes time and requires the collaboration of multiple stakeholders to develop a working product analytics engine that can be used to propel your business forward.

However, the effort is well worth it because some of the fastest-growing companies use product analytics to expand their operations. So, let’s take a look at the top reasons why businesses use product analytics.

  • You will require data to validate your decisions. Product analytics ensures that you are investing your time and effort in the right areas. By connecting with what your customers are doing, you can create better customer experiences and, as a result, improve your core growth metrics.
  • Product analytics allows you to examine the growth of your company. Trend analysis can be used to see what happened in the past, how the business is performing today, and make predictions for the future. This is extremely useful when attempting to forecast a course for your business.
  • If you want to measure product-market fit, you need to include product analytics in the mix. You can use retention analysis to see if the same group of users returns week after week and derives value from your product.
  • Product analytics can help you understand how customers use your product and which features resulted in retention.

Product analytics with Pirate metrics

It is easier to keep track of all your product metrics if you have a framework to contextualize them. McClure’s pirate metrics for startup growth is one framework:

  • Acquisition 
  • Activation 
  • Retention
  • Referral 
  • Revenue

If you look at the initials of this list, you’ll notice a very nice AARRR, and if you read it with a pirate accent, you’ll know where the name comes from.

Delve into the specific metrics for each step of this framework by knowing about the key mobile metrics to make your app profitable. This framework helps to overlay it with the long-term customer experience of an ideal user who chooses to stick with you. Consider a user persona when making UX decisions and changes, and consider a user persona when determining how their behavior may be reflected in the numbers you’re tracking. 

How to get started with product analytics?

Begin with the North Star metric, a guiding output metric that can help drive business and product success. Its goal is to provide clear evidence that your product solves the problem for which it was designed and adds value to your target market.

If your product has a vision statement, the north star metric is how many users you’ve reached that vision with. For instance:

  • If you’re building Quora intending to become a source of knowledge on the internet, the number of questions answered is your North Star metric.
  • If you are Spotify and want to entertain people by providing the best music, your North Star metric is time spent listening to music.
  • If you’re Uber, Lime, or any other ride-sharing app to get people from one place to another, your North Star metric is the number of rides taken in a week in a reasonable amount of time (e.g. between 5 to 10 minutes). In most two-sided markets, the North Star metric is a result of both demand and supply, rather than just user demand. Monitoring the supply side ensures the overall success of the market.

It reflects the results of the entire AARRR framework.

When it comes to the future business outcomes that your team cares about, a good North Star metric is a leading metric. Furthermore, it is supported by all of the metrics (and thus actions) that a user triggers as they gain value from the app, use it, and make it a habit to use the app.

Is this to say that the North Star metric is a single metric on which you should concentrate your efforts? It’s simpler to think of it as an output metric. You can’t zero in on it because it’s too broad, too big, and not actionable enough for your team to take action on.

However, it is a scoreboard that tells you how you are doing in terms of the product vision you have set for yourself. To change the score, look for specific input metrics that will also move the needle on your North Star metric.

As an example, consider Spotify (remember, their North Star metric is time spent listening to music):

The tech stack for product analytics

There are loads of different tools available serving both particular niches and the sector as a whole. Here, we’ll look at a few platforms that serve a variety of different needs.

1. Mixpanel – as the data visualization analytics

Mixpanel is a self-service reporting tool for product analytics. It serves as the data visualization analytics tool in our data scheme, assisting us in making sense of all the data gathered in the product and acquisition campaigns.

It is more specifically:

  • Data from Segment and other platforms is interpreted (Branch).
  • With the help of Segment, aggregates ALL data received from various sources.
  • Allows the Product Strategist or Product Owner to see a complete picture of the results of product tactics, current user engagement, and user cohort behavior, as well as track any other experiments.

2. Segment – as a data warehouse

Segment is a customer data platform that assists you in gathering, cleaning, and controlling your customer data. Singular is an alternative.

Because Segment organizes all data around the user, it acts as a data warehouse, telling you what the user does within the product as well as on the path to purchasing your product.

Segment is used to collect the following information:

  • Events and properties resulting from product interaction.
  • User traits are used to associate specific characteristics with a user (i.e. product preferences, device properties, personal data).
  • Events that are automatically tracked – App Installed or partner-specific events (i.e. Deep Links opened, through other Partners integration).

3. Branch.io – as the marketing attribution tool

Branch offers the leading mobile linking platform, as well as solutions that unify user experience and measurement across various devices, platforms, and channels. Its primary functions are to provide reliable linking and to attribute those links.

The tool is used to do the following:

  • Installs, campaigns, and attribution can all be tracked.
  • Make trackable links (deep links).
  • Determine whether the product already exists or whether it is not installed on the user’s device.
  • Attribute and track app installs across multiple channels, then aggregate them in a unified fashion.
  • Integrate with Major Advertising Partners (Google Adwords, Facebook Ads, and Apple Search Ads) and Customer Data Platforms.
  • DeepViews of the product – provides a preview of the product.

Conclusion

Product analytics is the process of collecting, inspecting, and analyzing data about your product’s interactions with users.

By tracking, recording, and attributing each user’s action, you can create an extremely detailed picture of:

  • Who are your customers?
  • How they are interacting with your product
  • What tasks do they find difficult?
  • Points where they come into contact with each other
  • Which features are the most popular and which are underutilized?
  • How different user groups behave and achieve value, and so on.

Product analytics, in its broadest sense, allows you to assess the impact of the digital experiences you’ve built into your product. At the end of the day, you have no reason not to get product analytics right. It is critical to the long-term success of your product. Need analytics expertise for your application? Reach out to our experts

About Galaxy
We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services. Our analytics team and UI/UX designers are creative problem-solvers with a decade of experience in all facets of digital and interactive design. We create compelling and human-focused experiences delivered through clean, and minimalist UI. Click here for a free consultation!

Our Top 5 Picks for Mobile App Development in 2021

Posted on by galaxy-admin

Mobile apps are expected to generate over $935 billion in revenue by 2023. Take a moment and let that sink in! The projected numbers are baffling and they will continue to grow as the market’s demand for digital experiences rises. 

Getting a mobile app developed is a decision that needs its share of due diligence. For starters, you have to choose what platform or demographic you are going to target? Are you developing for Android, iOS, or both? If you’re choosing only one, then native development is the way to go. However, if you’re targeting both these platforms, you may opt for cross-platform development.  

Here are our top picks for cross-platform Mobile app development in 2021: 

1. React Native

React Native is an open-source mobile app development framework for Android and iOS. It’s created and maintained by Facebook. React Native utilizes React’s native development library for building UIs. 

The developers that know and love JavaScript will feel at home while writing mobile applications in React Native for its native look and feel. Additionally, most of the code can be shared between platforms, which makes it easier to simultaneously develop for both Android and iOS.

One of its greatest benefits over other cross-platform frameworks like Cordova and Ionic is that React Native renders using the host platform’s standard rendering APIs. It translates your markup to real, native UI elements, leveraging existing means of rendering views on whatever platform you are working with.

Why React Native?

  • Reusable code & cost-efficient – One codebase and you can deploy apps for iOS and Android. Not developing separate native apps saves big in development time and cost.
  • Live reload – React features a convenient live reload that enables developers to see the changes in real-time. 
  • Performant mobile development – In contrast to other tools, React Native makes use of GPU on mobile devices, taking the unnecessary load away from the CPU and subsequently making the experience faster.

2. Xamarin

Created by the developers behind Mono, Xamarin is a .Net-based open-source mobile development platform. The tool is primarily used to develop cross-platform mobile applications that share 90 percent of their Code-DNA. This makes development more streamlined and oftentimes quicker in general.

The thing that works in its favor is that it’s based on the Microsoft technology stack which already has a community of over 1.4 million developers.

Why Xamarin?

  • API Compatibility – Creating separate APIs for different platforms is a chore. Xamarin lets you utilize the same APIs to build apps for iOS, Android, and Windows. 
  • Technology Stack – Xamarin is based on C#, which makes it easier to build multiple solutions without having to switch environments. 
  • Ease of Testing – Xamarin test clouds are the reason that developers can churn flawless code through continuous testing. Testing clouds also provide access to numerous mobile devices to test, thereby eliminating the need to buy every other device for individual testing. 

3. Ionic

Also an open-source, Ionic is a UI toolkit for cross-platform native and web-app development. It’s built on the foundation of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript combined. Ionic is very flexible as it comes with Adaptive Styling, Ionic apps look and feel at home on every device.

Ionic features universal web components that work with any JavaScript framework including Angular, React, and Vue. Another benefit of choosing Ionic is that it doesn’t force the developer to choose a particular technology in the backend as well, one can go with AWS, Azure, and Firebase. 

Why Ionic?

  • Fully equipped – Ionic comes with a library of components and plugins like frontend building blocks, UI components, common app icons, etc. Plugins also connect to mobile’s native APIs like Bluetooth, GPS, and camera.
  • Front-end agnostic – Post the Ionic 4 update, developers can pair Ionic with any JS framework of their choice. 

If you’re digging our top picks series, here’s an another listicle of our top picks for backend frameworks for 2021. Check it out.

4. Flutter 

Flutter is the framework of choice for faster and dynamic mobile app development. Like other cross-platform mobile app development tools Flutter also utilizes a single codebase for Android and iOS apps. It also features hot reload which works via DVM(Dart Virtual Machine). Which in turn makes it easier to see the changes as they are being made. 

It’s safe to say that Flutter is almost like a react framework with ready-made 2D rendering, widgets, and tools. These elements make things easier when you’re designing, building, testing, and debugging apps. 

Why Flutter?

  • Reactive Dart – Flutter is built on Dart programming language. Which comes equipped with a rich standard library, garbage collection, strong typing, generics, and async-awaits. 
  • Custom Widgets – Flutter provides numerous widgets to help developers in their builds. It makes building a basic UI easier than anything, as it automatically adapts to different resolutions, screens, and platforms.
  • Hot Reload and Development – This is similar to what we see on React Native with the ‘Live reload’ feature. It reflects the changes made to the code quite instantly.

5. Apache Cordova

Cordova a.k.a PhoneGap is one of the most well-known and developer-friendly cross-platform mobile application development frameworks. It’s based on CSS3, HTML 5, and JavaScript. This framework with the use of Cordova plugins makes it easier to access device hardware such as GPS, Camera, and accelerometer to deliver a Native app experience. 

Why Apache Cordova?

  • Easier to maintain – Apache Cordova is easy to maintain as it bypasses the version, making it simple to update. 
  • Cost-effective – Cordova is cost-effective as you don’t have to spend resources on different platforms. 
  • Great plugins – When developing applications, Cordova plugins help to expand native functionalities. StatusBar, Social Sharing, Barcode Scanner, GAPlugin, Pushwoosh, PushPlugin, and Facebook Connect are some of the plugins in the repositories.

Conclusion

Mobile app development is no longer a choice, it has become an integral part of the business plans of new-age businesses. Making the right choice on the development platform hence becomes crucial. This is our list of technologies that we love to work with, let us know what you think and if you’re looking to get that cross-platform development ball rolling in any of the mentioned technologies, drop in and say hi here.

About Galaxy Weblinks

We specialize in delivering end-to-end software design & development services and have hands-on experience with popular front-end and back-end frameworks. Our back-end and front-end engineers also help in improving security, reliability, and features to make sure your business application scales and remain secure.

The Good and the Bad of Dark UI Designs

Posted on by galaxy-admin

From mobile screens to TV sets, dark UI designs are seen far and wide and appreciated for the visual appeal that they offer. A dark theme depicts sophistication and elegance. However, dark UI designing comes with multiple challenges. If the implementation is poor, things can very well go south.

Digital products having dark UIs are perceived as powerful, elegant, and mysterious. They are a formidable trend across the digital spectrum. It’s said that dark mode can reduce eye strain, save battery life and increase accessibility. But, most of the time, dark themes are an aesthetic choice.

Over the past few years, dark themes are amongst the most requested features. Both Apple and Google have a dark theme as an essential part of their UI. Be it browsers, mobile applications of social media platforms, or VR/AI games, dark themes are everywhere as an option, if not a default feature. 

Source: Apple

Dark User Interface – The Good and the Bad

Choosing one of the two is a tricky balancing act. The dark theme is not suitable for all interfaces and neither is the light theme. Selecting the right options depends on brand fit, cultural suitability, and color psychology. Also, consider the emotional impact before asking your developer to go for either one. 

For instance – a financial app designed for millennials to take care of their credit card bill payments may look cool with a dark theme, but the same won’t work for a big bank’s website, serving the general, larger population. Too rich, too dark, and too stylish may frustrate people who just want to check their balances and transfer money.

Source: Cred

Dark UIs for B2B SaaS applications are notoriously difficult to design. Web UI components like widgets, forms, data tables, and dropdowns can look odd on a dark theme. Owing to the type, context, and environmental factors, certain brands and products are not an ideal fit and may prove an insurmountable challenge.

If your designers have not worked with dark UI design before, they might find themselves in rough, uncharted waters. In the world of dark UIs, norms are bent, pitfalls aplenty, and trends change quite often. 

Having said that, using dark UIs is a good call for a number of reasons:

  • With the minimalist design having only a few content types.
  • When there is appropriate context and use; like a nighttime entertainment app.
  • When a striking and dramatic look is needed.
  • To make a statement for the brand.

Not to forget, there are scenarios when dark UI is a bad call. When there is too much text (dark background makes reading difficult), a lot of mixed content types, or the design calls for a wide range of colors, the dark theme should be avoided. 

Impact of dark theme on UI design

As developers, we are always considerate of UI design trends and user preferences while making the best use of our time and resources. So, is adding a dark mode design a worthwhile use of the client’s budget?

We would say, this totally depends on the use case. As established earlier, the dark mode can sometimes be a hindrance to comprehension. We won’t recommend it for digital products where it could lead to big consequences. For instance, online banking services or regulatory platforms.

In other instances, we can turn to dark UI design to influence user behavior. If user engagement is an important metric for your product like Twitter, Reddit, etc, then the case for the dark theme will be stronger.

7 dark theme design tips from Galaxy

Dark theme design captivates the audience when done right. That’s what we aim for with all products that we develop. Here are seven design tips that we also practice:

  • Considering brand (identity, image, etc) 
  • Avoiding pure black
  • Avoiding heavily saturated colors
  • Ensuring enough contrast in colors
  • Softening white backgrounds
  • Matching color to the brand message
  • Communicating depth

Summing up 

It boils down to personal preference…

For most users, it all comes down to personal preference. Most of them don’t care about their eyesight or battery life, or have an aesthetic preference – they just like the way it looks and that is it. With iOS 14, Apple, who controlled their product’s design with an iron fist, allowed users to add custom icons and home screen widgets. Maybe this is not about choosing between light or dark mode, but about allowing users to configure what they like.

About Galaxy Weblinks 

Galaxy delivers end-to-end software design & development services. With a decade of experience in digital and interactive design, we create compelling and human-focused experiences. Our UI/UX designers are creative problem-solvers, delivering clean, and minimalist UI.