W3C Pushing for Better Web on Mobile Devices

Increasingly, people are connecting to the Internet through mobile phones, video-game consoles, or televisions. The problem is that a lot of Internet content isn't available for all of these devices, and many websites crash when loaded on a mobile device. Tim Berners-Lee, director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and father of the Internet, worries that this is effectively cutting some people off from the information that is freely shared on the Internet. Speaking at the Mobile Internet World conference in Boston earlier this week, Berners-Lee said that the W3C is working on defining a set of standards that developers can use to build websites that work with mobile devices, as well as with desktop computers, so that the mobile Web doesn't break apart from the World Wide Web. This week, the W3C also launched a new tool that developers can use to test their websites for compatibility with mobile devices.

Free Document Templates

Useful post on makeuseof.com...

Once in a while we all need some kind of document, it may be a business plan presentation, rental contract, non-disclosure agreement, or even a name change request form. In most cases, Googling the document may ultimately get you what you need, but it’s both time consuming and frustrating. Here are 3 excellent resources that can provide you with any professional document or form template for free.

1. Docstoc
2. Gazhoo
3. Scribd

Current Web Style

Interesting article on current style trends in web design land...

"This is where I try to sum up the current state-of-the-art in graphic design for web pages, and identify the distinctive features that make a web page look fresh, appealing and easy to use. I'm glad to say that web design in 2007 is better than ever. And it's not just because there are more web sites out there, so more good stuff to look at. There's still an awful lot of crud too. I just think that more web designers know more about how to design than ever before"

SkyRocket awarded - Most Creative Favicon

Checking my web stats log and was interested to see that SkyRocket has taken out another interweb gong. This time the good people at Smashing Magazine have voted our Favicon as one of the best they've seen in their article Creative Favicons - When Small is Beautiful. Thanks Smashing people! :)

Web 3.0

Web 3.0 - a rather acidic & cynical article by Sir Jeffrey Zeldman but anything penned by him is well worth reading.

"Web 2.0 is a fresh-faced starlet on the intertwingled longtail to the disruptive experience of tomorrow. Web 3.0 thinks you are so 2005..."

Logopond

Logopond - identity inspiration. Great website + beautiful showcase of logos and branding concepts.

BETSIE Text to Speech Internet Enhancer

If you've ever used a screen reader, you'll know exactly what I mean when I say that the web isn't always all it's cracked up to be. Some sites work when you have the computer reading out loud exactly what's on the screen, from left to right, and top to bottom, but not all of them. Not even many of them. Most sites come out like gibberish.

Betsie stands for BBC Education Text to Speech Internet Enhancer, and is a simple Perl script which is intended to alleviate some of the problems experienced by people using text to speech systems for web browsing.

Betsie has been officially approved by the RNIB, and received the RNIB accessibility award for January 1999.

Tartan - the new black!

Stop using stripes for your site backgrounds and get into something errrrmm... even trendier. That's right. No self-respecting web designer should be without this site which makes custom-made Tartan backgrounds. Didn't you know that Tartan is the new black?

The most effective way of hiding your email address from the spambots

This is the most useful, analytical & informative article on the best way of stopping the evil spammers from getting hold of your email address on web pages. Pay close attention people...

"Publishing an email address on a web page invites more spam. Protect your address by masking it from the email harvesters (spambots) used by spammers. This article tests 50 masking methods against 23 harvesters to see which methods work to stop spammers, and which do not"

Ultimate Web 2.0 Gradients

Don't know why you can't just design your own but, just in case, here's the Ultimate collection of Web 2.0 Gradients...

OECD Privacy Policy Generator

To help implement the Privacy Guidelines in the electronic world, the OECD has developed the OECD Privacy Policy Statement Generator in co-operation with industry, privacy experts and consumer organisations. The Generator, which has been endorsed by the OECD's 30 member countries, aims to offer guidance on compliance with the Privacy Guidelines and to help organisations develop privacy policies and statements for display on their Web sites.The OECD has developed the OECD Generator as a tool to provide users with useful input in the development of a privacy policy and statement. The Generator is freely available to all private and public organisations on the OECD Web site and via links in member and other countries.

IE6 Standalone

Now that Vista is out and everyone is using IE7 (everyone is right?) we'll need to install a standalone version of the IE6 for testing & compatibility checking. Best place to go to is evolt.org which has all the old versions of the web designers bane IE3 to IE6. Warning: this site will give you the creeps as it contains some of the vilest code ever put out for human use. It's a hall of shame but we have to do it so here you are... If you really want to take the express elevator to hell then you can install multiple versions of IE on the same computer. As with everything to do with IE the multiple standalones don't work correctly either so you may need to read this to tame those multiple installs. May the force be with you - you'll need it!

The 50 'Most Beautiful' CSS-based websites of 2006(?)

You decide

A list of the 50 most beautiful CSS-based website designs of 2006. Yes, they are all great & very groovy but there's one problem - they haven't included one of ours ;)

quikmaps

Useful tool to create, edit & customise your own Google map then save or post it on your site.

Footer Stick

Good article from SolarDream Studios: footer stick

"I’m going to show you all how to force the footer of a webpage to stick to the bottom of the viewport. This is a pretty advanced CSS method and requires that you know a bit about how CSS works..."

There's also footerStick ALT from the man in blue

Web 2.0 Stripe Generator

Yes it had to happen - introducing the web 2.0 stripe generator. You know a trend has become mainstream when there's an online generator to do it for you... :/

Designing With Web Standards (second edition)

Best-selling author, designer, and web standards evangelist Jeffrey Zeldman has updated his classic, industry-shaking guidebook Designing With Web Standards 2nd Edition. This new edition, now in full color, covers improvements in best practices and advances in the world of browsers since the first edition introduced the world to standards-based design.

1024 x 768 Most Popular Resolution

Browser size does matter useful article on latest stats & trends on browser window size & screen resolution. Also, in this article from July 2006 Jakob Nielsen recommends that you optimise for 1024×768, which is currently the most widely used screen size.

"Currently, about 60% of all monitors are set at 1024 x 768 pixels. In comparison, only about 17% use 800 x 600 so it's obviously less important to aim at perfection for these small-display users. What's equally obvious, however, is that you can't simply ignore 17% of your customer segment by providing a frozen layout that requires more screen space than they have available"

Bill Gates interview on Web Standards

In December 2006, Molly E. Holzschlag had the opportunity to talk to Bill Gates for a few minutes. She used that time to ask Bill a few questions about Microsoft’s commitment to implementing Web standards in their products... Bill Gates commitment to web standards

He sounds just a bit defensive for some reason...

moo.fx

moo.fx is a superlightweight, ultratiny, megasmall javascript effects library. It's very easy to use, blazing fast, cross-browser, standards-compliant, provides controls to modify any CSS property of any HTML element, including colors, with built-in checks that won't let a user break the effect with multiple, crazy clicks. Optimised to make you write the lesser code possible, the new moo.fx is so modular you can create any kind of effect with it.

The Visual Design of Web 2.0

Good article on the Pixel Acres blog

"The visual elements of Web 2.0. include gradients, colorful icons, reflections, dropshadows, and large text. Bright, cheerful colors dominate Web 2.0 sites. Green is the unofficial color of web 2.0, but saturated blues, oranges and pinks are also favourites. Bold primary colors suggest a playful, fun attitude and also help to draw attention to important page elements..."