I made a weensy little script for the theme I recently made (which I still have not named or prepared for distribution) which will generate single pixel transparent pngs to use as tiled background images in css.

demonstration toy

<?php    
 
	$p = imagecreatetruecolor(1, 1);
	imagesavealpha($p, true);
	$o = (100 - (int) $_GET['o']) * 1.27;
	$c = imagecolorallocatealpha($p, (int) $_GET['r'], (int) $_GET['g'], (int) $_GET['b'], $o);
	imagefill($p, 0, 0, $c);
	header("Content-type: image/png");
	imagepng($p);
 
?>

usage / parameters:

r

how much red to include: r=[0-255]

g

how much green to include: g=[0-255]

b

how much blue to include: b=[0-255]

o

how opaque the pixel should be: o=[0(fully transparent)-100(fully opaque)]

so…

pixler.php?r=255&g=255&b=255&o=50

will make a white pixel that is 50% visible.

pixler.php?r=255&o=100

will make a red pixel that is fully visible.

pixler.php

calling the script with no parameters will create an invisible black pixel (…).

Good:

• The design has been updated and is much less offensive to the eyes.
• The dashboard has better information at first glance.
• Dashboard widgets will probably be pretty cool.
• The new flash uploader is a big improvement.
• The new gallery feature seems pretty cute, although it isn’t the sort of thing I usually go in for.
• Full screen post writing is nice if you have a lot to write.
• Tag management / tag filling is handy.
• The ability to define permalinks on the fly when writing a post is neat.

Bad:

• The admin has a max-width that is very noticeable (annoying) on a widescreen monitor, especially because it is not centered.
• I miss the categories being on the sidebar on the post pages.
• Tags still are not searchable. Why are tags not searchable?
• There is even more Javascript in the admin than before, for an impressive total of 324Kb, ~2 second load.

TBD:

• Whether or not any of the cute little enhancements break the hell out of plugins that I don’t feel like updating.
• Whether or not nightmarish new vulnerabilities have been introduced. With an update this big, it is almost a sure thing.

Watch Matt’s screencast for a quick overview, I have to update the rest of my sites.