Published
February 3, 2010
There’s been so much reaction since the release of Apple’s iPad, a lot of it strangely underwhelming. Not that everybody needs to be an “Apple fanboy suckling at the teat of Steve Jobs” (as some people have put it) but the iPad is more than “just a big iPod Touch.” (As an aside, I realize nobody likes the name “iPad” — The Onion’s comment “Awkward name enables Twitter users to make the same joke over and over and over again” points out the obvious jokes — but why don’t IBM ThinkPads get the same treatment?)
On his blog, Mike Monteiro suggested that “The iPad isn’t the future of computing; it’s a replacement for computing.” I think he’s right, which is why so many people who “do computers” (geeks) are underwhelmed — or worse — by the iPad. It’s not going to replace computers for geeks, but it’s going to bring computers to the rest of the world.
So many things that it doesn’t do or have are actually perfect for non-geeks: The iPad has no file system, which is good for people who can’t find files they’ve saved. There’s no multitasking, so people who don’t realize that they left 10 applications open won’t wonder why their computer is running so slowly. And another big improvement is software installation.
Right now it’s pretty simple on a Mac — just copy the application from the disk image to your Applications folder — but even that can be confusing to novices. (How many non-geeks have run their newly downloaded application from the disk image?) iPhone and iPad app installation is easy: find the app you want to install, the icon appears, you move it to the screen you want. This simplicity alone is a huge step in the right direction for the non-geeks.
The iPad isn’t for everyone (I certainly can’t see it replacing my regular Mac) but I believe it is for a lot of people. The geeks may not be impressed (how could a UI designer not be impressed? Simplicity is not simple!) but perhaps the iPad isn’t supposed to impress them. It’s not for them; it’s for the regular folks.
Related reading:
- On iPads, Grandmas and Game-changing
- The iPad Is For Everyone But Us
Published
January 21, 2010
Over at ZDnet Ed Bott says it’s time to stop using Internet Explorer 6. Actually, people should have stopped using IE6 two or three years ago, but there are still people using it today.
Checking my server logs, I see that only 2-3% of people visiting my sites are still using IE6 — small enough that I can probably ignore them — but for some of my clients, that number runs around 5%. For these higher-trafficked sites, I can’t just ignore these users (as much as I’d like to). The sites don’t render perfectly as designed when using IE6, but they do have to work.
So until more of these people upgrade their archaic browser, I as a web developer need to keep testing the sites I build in IE6. But I think 2010 will be the last year I do that.
Are you still using IE6? Upgrade it now — it’s free! Or better yet, avoid security issues and download Firefox or Safari instead.
Related: France Joins Germany Warning Against Internet Explorer
Update: Perhaps the end is beginning? IE6 users to be evicted from Gmail, Google Calendar
Published
January 15, 2010
Web design is not print design. Designers shouldn’t try to force web pages to fit into a screen-sized box. The browser is not a magazine, so let long pages scroll! Even UI curmudgeon Jakob Nielsen said (five years ago) that users expect vertical scrolling on websites.
True, the most important information should still remain above the scroll (that is, be seen without scrolling). But as I tell clients, not everything needs to be above the scroll. The design can encourage users to scroll for the rest of a longer page page, such as with the cut-off technique.
Don’t cram everything into a single screen. Don’t force your users to click though multiple screens to read an article that could simply be an easy-to-read single scrolling page. Remember: on the web there is no page fold.
Published
January 8, 2010
One thing I’m going to try to focus on for the new year is search engine optimization (SEO) tips. Yes, SEO is sometimes looked at as the smarmy, ugly work of spammers, but that’s not what I’ll be talking about. SEO is really just common sense web development with proper page titles and descriptions. The sites I build allow you to keep this information up-to-date, so how your site appears in search results is under your control.
Sample search at search3.com
So, how
does your site appear in the major search engines?
Search3.com is a tool that lets you easily see three sets of search results at the same time. This makes it simple to compare how your site appears on Google, Yahoo and Bing (you can also choose Twitter and eBay) and see where you’re ranked in each.
What if your site isn’t showing up in search results? Or you don’t like the text that Google is displaying to describe your site? I’ll be covering these topics in future blog posts; if your needs are more pressing, please feel free to contact me today.
Published
October 27, 2009
If you’re a web developer who’s had to deal with HTML code from Internet Explorer, FrontPage or Word then you know what a mess it can be. (And just calling it “mess” is being kind…) Next time you’ve got the unlucky task of wading through Microsoft-generated HTML, run it through Microsoft Word 2000 HTML Mess Cleaner first. It won’t make the code perfect, but it will clean things up well enough that you can actually find your way through it.
Published
October 21, 2009
Recently there was a bit of an uproar in the web developer community because of a blog post by Derek Powazek titled Spammers, Evildoers, and Opportunists. In it he tears apart SEO (Search Engine Optimization) by saying, among other things, “Search Engine Optimization is not a legitimate form of marketing.” I mostly agreed with what he wrote, but only because I understood what he meant: good web development includes good SEO practices, plain and simple. A well-developed web site is easily found and read by search engine spiders. Shifty “SEO” companies that say they can guarantee top placement in search engines are probably using unethical linking tactics that aren’t SEO but instead are flat-out spamming — these are the “evildoers” who are ruining the web.
I think part of Derek’s problem was that he assumed everybody knows good common-sense web development practices. But as Danny Sullivan pointed out in An Open Letter To Derek Powazek On The Value Of SEO “the stuff that you think isn’t rocket science — that anyone knows — is indeed a mystery to others.” I’m still surprised when I see sites coded poorly — bad page titles, using images instead of plain text, misuse of (or not using) header tags — but it reminds me that what Derek (and I) consider common sense web development just isn’t to many people. This is where legitimate SEO professionals come in to help clean up a sloppy or unknowing developer’s work.
Sullivan correctly notes that “sometimes [people] can’t find that web developer who also understands SEO issues. In the same way, you sometimes don’t find web developers who are also designers.” Sites I build are SEO-friendly without calling it that, simply because it’s the right way to build websites. Of course, once the site is up it’s up to you to add the most important part of any site: compelling content that brings people back to your site.
Posted in Development, SEO |
Published
October 17, 2009
Here’s a simple tip to use CSS for displaying your website’s logo (and any image in general). The HTML is about as basic as you can get:
<h1><a href=”/”>My Great Website</a<>/h1>
The CSS to “hide” the text and display the logo image instead is pretty simple as well:
h1 {
width: 400px;
height: 100px;
background: url(/images/logo.gif) top left no-repeat;
}
h1 a {
text-indent: -300em;
overflow: hidden;
float: left;
width: 400px;
height: 100px;
}
This styles the text and sets the height and width of the h1 tag to the size of the logo, and displays the logo as a background image. The h1 a style hides the text from the user (but not from search engines) by negative indenting the text and basically hiding it off-screen.
The result:
- very simple HTML code that’s easily read by search engines (better for SEO)
- text that provides a correct representation of the logo (no ALT tag needed)
- design elements are kept separate from the code, making future updates easier (the image can be changed simply by modifying the CSS)
Posted in CSS, Development |
Published
September 28, 2009
This post is more of a note to myself so I don’t forget it (again) when battling IE 6. If you happen to find it useful, then I feel for you for dealing with that browser…
If you have a floated element such as a div and you place margin-right or margin-left on that element, our most beloved Internet Explorer 6.0 will double that margin value, causing havoc in your html layout. To fix this simply add display:inline; to your floating element.
(via Jayme Blackmon)
Published
September 14, 2009
I launched a couple new sites in the past week:
Hofmann Joinery
Where the original Hofmann Joinery site was more focused on their custom furniture, the redesigned Hofmann Joinery site better reflects their current business model, which is high-end custom residential woodworking. I kept the design simple and elegant to put the focus on the photos of their beautiful work.
My Vintage Generation
My Vintage Generation was a very-quick-turnaround Wordpress site. It’s an eBay-powered store and blog, but with little budget it meant no fancy commercial eBay store apps. However, I was able to display products on the site even without a special application or plug-in simply by using eBay’s RSS feeds.
Posted in KCD, Releases |
Published
August 28, 2009
For you Photoshop users out there: Dan Rubin provides two quick tips to make Photoshop faster at makephotoshopfaster.com. Check it.
