Easy Tooltip – jQuery plugin
Posted on April 14, 2009, by Matt, under Uncategorized.
Alen Grakalic at Css Globe has put together a very cool jQuery tooltip plugin. Out of the box, it uses the title tag. It can be highly customized and styled via CSS and simple options. This one is going in my “tool bag” for sure.
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Edit ICO (favicon) in Photoshop
Posted on March 3, 2009, by Matt, under Uncategorized.
Toby Thain at Telegraphics has released a nifty Photoshop plug-in that allows you to edit ICO files. Check it out at
http://wwv.telegraphics.com.au/sw/#icoformat
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A Better Way to {hide} with jQuery
Posted on January 22, 2009, by Matt, under CSS, Web, accessibility, jQuery.
Karl Swedberg has posted (some time ago) a great way to avoid the dreaded flash of “hidden” content when loading lengthy pages.
The typical approach is
<script type="text/javascript">
$(document).ready(function(){
$("#id").hide();
})
</script>
This will work fine on smaller pages, since the time between the document loading and being ready is relatively short. For more sizable pages, Karl proposes the following:
<script type="text/javascript">
$('html').addClass('js');
$(document).ready(function() {
// Stuff to do as soon as the DOM is ready
});
</script>
This simply adds the class of “js” to the entire HTML document. The magic is the addition of the following line to your stylesheet
.js #id {display: none;}
This now sets the “id” element, that now has a class of “js”, to display:none.
This solution supports progressive enhancement in that those who have CSS but no JavaScript will get all of the styled content. Those without both, still get all of the content.
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The State of the Web 2008
Posted on January 15, 2009, by Matt, under Uncategorized.
Web directions recently published its findings from their “State of the Web” survey of professional web designers and developers. Of their conclusions, I found the following one most interesting in support of standards:
“… versions of Internet Explorer still account for over 70% of the browsers used on the web, respondents to the survey indicate that their approach is to develop to standards, and only then ensuring (if at all) their sites work properly in versions of Internet Explorer.”
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Easily Forgotten Disabilities
Posted on January 3, 2009, by Matt, under Web, accessibility.
Karen Nakamura, of the Department of Anthropology at Yale University, has written a nice primer for Creating Accessible HTML.
What struck me were two categories of easily overlooked accessibility groups that need to be considered when developing websites: Economic – those that may not be able afford the latest technology and Educational- those that may not have the “opportunity or ability to reach the same level of schooling” (Educational).
Her article may make you stop and think a bit, check it out.
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Collecting Domain Names
Posted on December 22, 2008, by Matt, under Uncategorized.
Every now and then inspiration strikes, and I am compelled to add a new domain name to my collection.
Here are the highlights:
- entrecerebro.com
- givingforever.com
- poignantsimplicity.com
- buddhaness.com
- organicxhml.com
Got any good ones?
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Global Reset for Consistency
Posted on December 20, 2008, by Matt, under CSS.
Eric Meyer has a great reset stylesheet that can be used to increase consistency between browsers. As Eric describes it, this stylesheet is intentionally generic and requires customization for your use. I highly recommend this stylesheet as a starting point for any project.
Since I have implemented it, the major headaches … err, um… uniqueness of different browsers has greatly diminished, if not completely disappeared.
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Poignant Simplicity: Constant Scrollbars
Posted on December 19, 2008, by Matt, under CSS.
In search of the holly grail of constant scrollbars, I stumbled across this solution that is beautiful in its simplicity and effectiveness:
html {overflow-y: scroll;}
As Media College put it, “That’s all there is to it!”
It tests fine, and produces the same visual result, in Firefox 2 & 3, IE 6 & 7, Chrome & Safari.
It’s so good, I’m updating my reset stylesheet to replace the old solution. The old code was:
html {height: 100.1%;margin-bottom: 1px;}
The old solution made the HTML slightly taller than the browser frame. It unfortunately produced a tiny annoyance of allowing the page to scroll 1px.
Out with the old, in with poignant simplicity.
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jQuery+Lightbox+Cooliris
Posted on December 11, 2008, by Matt, under Web.
Nice combo. Check it out at axia.entrecerebro.com. You need the Cooliris plugin to get the full effect.
If you don’t have Cooliris installed, a Flash powered version is at axia.entrecerebro.com/embeded-wall
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Announcing GoogleIris
Posted on December 8, 2008, by Matt, under Web.
Google has just announced GoogleIris as their latest edition to their Labs technology playground. Well, not really, but I’m making that prediction. I can see it now, 3D cinematic web-surfing. In fact, I don’t think it’s that far. Why couldn’t you cache scalable HTML files and present it with a PicLens / CoolIris presentation?
My apologies to anyone who is disappointed. Don’t fret, it won’t be long before it’s true.
