Binary by Accident Archives

I've temporarily abondoned my thought for a graphic title - when I finally figure out Paint Shop Pro, I'll give it another whack. 10:50:44 PM

I learned today that there is some confusion as to how the Fresh Favorites work. I will think of a way to make it more obvious. Thanks to Burningbird for pointing this out. 4:07:38 PM

Yes, I am a Jew, from Meryl Yourish, is well worth a read and consideration. I don't feel capable of making the editorial decision of including a quote - better just to read the whole thing.

11:05:21 PM

Huh, I would've guessed the U.S. Congress instead. (Courtesy: Jordan Cooper) 6:39:34 PM

"So what exactly are the synergies that are supposed to justify the joining of equity research and investment banks?" (Courtesy: Megan McArdle) Damn good question. 6:22:42 PM

"I've said it before, and will say it again: Google Loves Weblogs!" (Courtesy: Dane Carlson) 6:14:55 PM

John Lilly. "In the province of the mind, what one believes to be true either is true or becomes true." (Courtesy: Motivational Quotes of the Day) 6:40:58 AM

Unknown. "All general statements are false." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:40:41 AM

Mark Twain. "Truth is more of a stranger than fiction." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) Boy - does this one get misquoted a lot! 6:40:18 AM

So much for simple rules of etiquette. I've already violated what I thought was the way to work. This morning I felt it much more appropriate to post a new entry here and place a comment on Burningbird's site. The email just went out the window. It just didn't seem right. Groan. How's a guy supposed to think clearly at 6:30 in the morning? 6:37:52 AM

Burningbird stopped by last night and joined the discussion Dane and I have been having about grammar and style in blogging.

I don't disagree that the thought is more important than the medium (which, to me, also means the mechanism of communication).

But, the impact of the thought can definitely be harmed by poor presentation. Great grammar doesn't save a piece of drivel. An excellent piece will not be ruined by the occasional mistake.

I'm not a "real" writer. I won't be published in the traditional media. So, I have to treat my blog with the same degree of care that authors, like Burningbird, need to have in their professional work.

6:34:48 AM

Dear Miss Manners, Is there a blogging etiquette? Sincerely, BS

I only wish it were that easy. Now, with comments being part of Radio, there are even more questions about proper etiquette. (Is there any such thing as improper etiquette?)

When you add a comment to my post, how should I respond? Do I add a new entry to the blog, add a follow-up comment, or privately email you? A combination? Something else?

My initial reaction is to both email the response and also add the message as a comment. That does three things:

1. It lets you know that I value and appreciate your participation.
2. We can continue the discussion.
3. I'm not forced to assume that you'll a)come back and b)search to see my response.

10:11:40 PM

I'll admit I didn't quite understand why Radio users wanted some notification (be it in your News Aggregator, via email, or otherwise) when a comment was added to a post. Now I do. I find myself calling up my own blog just to see if a comment has been added. No wonder my page-reads have been so high... 6:28:57 PM

Lester J. Pourciau. "There is no monument dedicated to the memory of a committee." Courtesy: (Quotes of the Day) 6:27:45 AM

From the "Do As I Say, Not As I Do Department:"

Yesterday's bit about spelling and grammar contained two errors, which I have subsequently fixed. One word didn't mean what I thought it did (doh!). I also smushed (technical term) two words together, giving what I wrote a completely different meaning.

I find things like that all the time in what I write. Blogging does encourage a shortening of the edit process and errors like that creep through. I will fix them as I find them. I like the idea of <edit></edit>, but will only use that if I substantially change or add to a post.

6:25:07 AM

"People expect email to be prompt, funny and not spellchecked. They expect the same from your weblog." (Courtesy: Dane Carlson)

I'm not so sure. If an email has a typo, fine - that happens. But, when something is being posted for all to see, I want it to be "right". When sharing your thoughts, ideas, and opinions, your spelling and grammar are the only things that can be "right". The rest is subjective.

Personally, I don't want people to see my careless mistakes. Every day at work, I see professionals with good educations misusing here, hear, their, they're, too, to, and two. Subject-verb agreement is often optional (We was...). To me, it's like fingernails on a chalkboard.

I don't actually use a spellchecker on these posts. I often regret it. I make frequent revisions of posts just to fix spelling errors. It's important to me. Many of you reading this will never have other contact with me other than through writing. The impression you get of me (and, honestly, my impression of you) will be formed by my ability to communicate through this medium - spelling and grammar are a large part of that. If we interacted in other settings, your impression of me would be influenced by many other factors. But we don't and likely won't.

You can be darn sure I ran this particular post through a checker. The spelling is "right" - your mileage may vary on the opinion.

11:20:56 PM

So much for validating...while at work today, I tried validating this page, just to check on it. Unfortunately, one of my concerns was realized. In order to get it to validate, I had to make a change in radio.root - it was overwritten at some point after I made my changes. So, as a stopgap measure I've changed it again. I've also sent an email explaining the problem. I'm not smart enough to know all the issues - but I think it's an easy and innocuous change/fix. 4:33:05 PM

Thomas Jefferson. "Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances." (Courtesy: Motivational Quotes of the Day) 6:18:09 AM

Meryl Yourish finds a new friend. This is exactly how I felt when people started responding to my humble posts. 7:36:41 PM

John Andrew Holmes. "It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 7:37:06 AM

I am no longer frustrated, thanks to Jeff Cheney. After reading my previous post, he posted a reply that led me to getting this page to validate as HTML 4.01 transitional. I hope to get it up to Strict. 12:12:51 AM

Well, I finally have valid CSS.

Unfortunately, I cannot get the HTML to validate. Part of the validator results make no sense to me. It says some tags aren't closed, which I don't see when I look through the source. Other errors are caused by the comments feature - but those concern me much less.

I am, once again, frustrated.

9:38:35 PM

I've been playing around trying to create the graphic I want for my title. I am not a graphic artist. I am not having any success. I do not want my title to be just text rendered as a graphic, as it is right now. I am giving up (for now) and moving along to something else. I am frustrated! 8:21:05 PM

Ambrose Bierce. "Politics, n. Strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 10:25:01 AM

Somebody remind me why "Poker Night" is supposed to be fun. Let's see - have a bunch of friends over to the house to eat, drink, spill the drink, knock another one over while they're cleaning the first spill, whining over their luck, while proceeding to take you for more than you expected to drop. Especially since the last hand was a "sure thing". There was no way I could lose - except there was and I found it. Then comes cleaning up after said friends.

Can't wait until next month! My luck's gotta change, right?

11:33:39 PM

"Nothing says 'Unrepentant Bachelor' like peanut butter and a steak" (Courtesy: Phil Ackley) 6:19:12 AM

Thomas A. Edison. "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:14:29 AM

George Carlin. "I'm not concerned about all hell breaking loose, but that a PART of hell will break loose... it'll be much harder to detect." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:14:12 AM

I'll take my ball and go home

Alright, I've officially become disgusted by the Olympics - the Russians are upset and threatening to pull out, and the South Koreans have hired lawyers and are threatening to sue the short-track race official for disqualifying their athlete (Disqualifications for on-ice events are quite common in short-track). This is not what the Olympics are supposed to be.

Unfortunately, all of this started with the pairs figure skating controversy. Now, athletes that don't take home a gold medal feel the need to have the decision overturned administratively.

Bah - let the Russians and Koreans go home. The Olympics should be a competition with honor, humility, and pride in your accomplishments (no matter whether or not they garner you a medal).

While we're at it, send the professional athletes home as well.

10:03:58 PM

Radio UserLand released the comment feature today. I'm now testing it out. Thanks! I'm sure the #1 request is for an indicator of how many comments each item has. 4:15:27 PM

"It's true: we're just Canadians that don't say 'aboot'." (Courtesy: Phil Ackley) 6:21:56 AM

Anatole France. "When a thing has been said and well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:18:44 AM

The accessibility statement at diveintomark. Wow! 6:15:21 AM

If you've been by lately, you know that I'm somewhat of a curling nut. One of the main arguments I've heard is that the rules and strategy are unfathomable. Well, Curling Basics has you covered from the rules angle. I'm still searching for a good strategy guide. 9:59:52 PM

 "When I visit Jonathon Delacour's site, for a few seconds, this is what I see." (Courtesy: Dave) This topic is covered by BlueRobot and is called The Flash of Unstyled Content. The jury is still out about whether or not this is an IE bug. 4:20:08 PM

John Walkenbach's The Spreadsheet Page quietly celebrated its 6th birthday a few days ago. John provides an excellent resource for intermediate and advanced usage of Excel. He also is the top author of Excel-related books, covering everything from the Dummies series to Power Programming.

Happy Birthday!

6:35:09 AM

Sinclair Lewis. "Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, particularly if the goods are worthless." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:26:19 AM

Boy, my school had nothing like this. We did other things with our free time. 11:16:36 PM

News.Com: Has Microsoft gotten ahead of itself? Must-read. (Courtesy: Scripting News) 8:11:21 PM

The world through a 3.0 browser. Egads. 5:29:57 PM

I'm finally getting my arms around how upstreaming works. For some reason, my mind couldn't grasp that the files are static and are only rendered when they change on my computer. I was pulling my hair out trying to figure out why the archive links to the right were only updating my entries when I published. Duh - simple when the light finally switches on. That also explains the static nature of the Updated Favorites. 6:32:40 AM

Albert Einstein. "The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:20:32 AM

Gore Vidal. "Any American who is prepared to run for president should automatically, by definition, be disqualified from ever doing so." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) I always wondered who said this. It's a shame that many times it rings true. 6:20:04 AM

Just realized how much harder changing the look of the site is going to be. There are a lot of templates to change. So, the changes to some pages will happen over time. Please excuse the dust, since I don't really have all that much extra time on my hands. 9:43:35 PM

Checking out my referers is interesting - I have a lot of hits from Google looking for Steven Bradbury and Apolo Ohno, the Canadian Bud Light commercials, and NBC's fake fireplace (which is a gas - pun intended - since I merely was linking to Dane Carlson with that story). 9:35:41 PM

George Carlin. "Well, if crime fighters fight crime and fire fighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight? They never mention that part to us, do they?" (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:17:57 AM

If you've been here before you'll notice things look a little different. Binary by Accident is now CSS-based. I don't quite have the HTML and CSS validating yet, but I've got the look. It should look passable in CSS-capable modern browser (Mozilla, Opera, N6, and IE), while it degrades gracefully for the NN4 users out there. I don't have testing capabilities for Mac browsers, so if something is horribly broken, let me know via .

Be forewarned - lots of tweaking shall be going on.

8:19:07 PM

Jean-Luc Picard. "Things are only impossible until they're not." (Courtesy: Motivational Quotes of the Day) 7:25:53 AM

Australia's Steven Bradbury just became the first Australian to ever win a gold medal in the Winter Olympics. He won the 1,000 meter short-track speed skating finals by positioning himself perfectly. On the last turn, the other 4 competitors, including alleged US Olympic Trial race-fixer Apolo Anton Ohno, jostled each other and fell. Bradbury, who trailed the pack, by a good 30 feet, skated unopposed across the finish line.

All through the aftermath of the race and the medal ceremony, Bradbury was beaming. It was a great sight. It turns out he is also recovering from a life-threatening training injury. Things like this are what make me watch and enjoy the Olympics - not watching a bunch of pros play hockey.

Note: CBC Sports Online has better coverage of this than ESPN.

11:30:44 PM

Earlier tonight, I stumbled across Jeff Cheney's web service for Fresh Favorites. I've made a couple minor edits and have added it in the right column. Great stuff! 11:10:50 PM

I've added archive links underneath the calendar. It uses the macro from Going Crazy With Macros. Currently, both the link and file are hard-coded with the dates. 9:56:02 PM

"Dvorakitty" (Courtesy: Chris Pirillo) In response to a recent Dvorak article. 6:57:37 PM

"I come not to bury HTML, but to praise it appeared in the winter 1995 edition of, the now defunct, X-RAY magazine. I think it has held up fairly well. And it's interesting to look at what the web was like back then. At least how I saw it..." (Courtesy: Jeff Cheney) 5:07:13 PM

Charles M. Schulz. "My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right?" (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 4:44:45 PM

Watching the Olympics on CBC has exposed me to another gem of Canadian culture: a romantic comedy with a backdrop of curling. I think the trailer looks great - I wonder if Maureen will tolerate a 2 hour drive across the border just to see a movie once it opens. Oh yeah, Leslie Nielsen is in it! I had no idea he was Canadian. 5:16:23 PM

Let's forget about CSS  - it's time to create Better Living with XHTML. 4:26:17 PM

Radio Bump: "I guess I'm not getting what the fuss is all about with this CSS versus tables thing. I have three or four tables at my house that work fine. In fact, I'm typing on one of those tables now. Why would I replace them with some CSS thing? Can I put my coffee on it?" 4:18:18 PM

Steven Wright. "Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:11:51 AM

How to have fun as a software developer - code error messages such as "Thanks for the ping. But the name of your weblog looks (to us only, no criticism intended) like a URL. However foolishly, we think of this as an error." (Laughs courtesy: Dave) 11:14:13 PM

philter. (Dictionary.com Word of the Day) A great word for Valentine's Day, no? 10:16:55 PM

CSS: Moral arguments aside. (Courtesy: diveintomark) 5:12:26 PM

Elias Schwartz. "Anything not worth doing is worth not doing well. Think about it." (Courtesy: Quotes of the Day) 6:20:15 AM

NBC lies their way through the Olympic coverage. Even the fireplace is fake. (Courtesy: Dane Carlson) 9:53:03 PM

Dave asked: Are Tables Really Evil?

I'll bite - caveat: I'm not a web designer or a professional programmer. I play here as a hobby. I enjoy trying to make things work, although I often lack the knowledge to do so.

<rant>

Tables vs. CSS is a highly religious subject. As a lay person, here is my summary and thoughts. Per the W3C spec, tables are meant to hold tabular information.  Using them for layout was originally a hack, because there was no other mechanism to do so. With CSS, a "proper" (per spec) mechanism for layout was introduced.

What is the use if tables work well? Older browsers (v4 and earlier) often have trouble rendering the complex nestings common in layouts. Lynx has problems with tables. Surfers that use a screen reader are stymied by layout tables. Individually, any of these groups make up quite a minority of web surfers, but this may be important for commercial websites.

As designers learn their craft, they should learn to code to spec. Then, once they have mastered that, they learn when breaking it is the right thing to do. Until this sort of training becomes commonplace, we are going to see lots of sites relying on tables for layout that don't need to.

Now - for the amateur website creator (this is where I put Dave - he doesn't create webpages for a living) this debate is less significant. If Dave doesn't want to learn CSS layout - fine. He does make the distinction that "The way I choose to render SN and the wants of Radio 8 and Manila users are totally separate things." I hope this means that he would consider implementing out-of-the-box CSS layout. Although, I'd want to make sure the flexibility is still there for the developer who wants to tweak things. I doubt that any default CSS template for a Radio weblog would satisfy a majority of users.
</rant>

6:25:32 PM

Some more CSS-design links for those inclined: 3-column layout by Al Sparber (with a header added by Scott Andrew LePera) 4:33:55 PM

No magic answers, yet.  I'll just start hacking around and see what I can come up with. 4:28:07 PM

3 questions (this morning):

1. If I find and change the code that renders the <%code%> bit, will I be setting myself up to be broken in a Radio update? Goal: Render a border around each day's posts.
2. Can I find a way to call the thisMonth macro in a link with parameters? I want to have a link that says "January archives" and have it point to a dynamically generated page (rather than have a page hard-coded).
3. I like the idea of reading an external file to render the navlinks on the left. How can I modify how this works to have more control in giving them categories? My hack doesn't allow separate formatting for each category - in fact, they aren't categories, just cleverly (to me at least) lacking a URL to point to, thus not being formatted as links. I've lost a link to a page that talked about doing it with an outline, but even so, I didn't understand it.

6:39:09 AM

A tableless, CSS-based, liquid, three-column layout that works in Netscape 4.x. (Courtesy: Zeldman) I may ditch my test design and move to this. I doubt I'll have more time to play until the weekend, though. 8:46:15 PM

Dane Carlson explains how to use Google to find RSS feeds. 6:30:58 AM

After abandoning my original quest for CSS layout (due to extreme dullness and lack of creativity), I've decided to give it another whirl, what with the successes of Jonathan Delacour, Joe Gregorio, and Sylvain Carle.  However, here's an example of what not to do! <edit>Sample removed as it evolved to a workable design</edit> I whipped that up to handle the layout (the colors are to make sure I understand the padding and margins).  Now comes the hard(er) part - creating a look that is somewhat unique, but also appealing. If I wanted to have a clone of someone else's site, I'd leave the themes alone. 6:28:09 AM

Jonathan, your blog's new look is great!  Good luck getting the CSS to work cross-browser. 9:33:57 PM

Jeff, that is how I finally picked the name for my weblog! 10:45:10 PM

Alright, watching CBC Olympic coverage has the side-effect of exposing me to Canadian commercials. A recurring spot for Bud Light features a series of love songs for the poor girlfriends/wives of good beer-drinking Canucks.  Titles include "I Love You Dearly Because You Let Me Go Out With My Friends On A Weekly Basis" and "Our Relationship Is Getting Stronger With Every Golf Game That I Play". Funny stuff. Then the kicker - it's a real, free CD! Unfortunately, they won't ship it to the US.

This also begs the question - Do any self-respecting Canadians actually drink Bud products? 10:36:17 PM

Thanks for the well-wishes Dane! I'm slowly recovering from this cold and getting back to my normal self. 6:10:46 PM

It's great to see the Scobleizer posting again! 6:08:12 PM

Speaking of the CBC, I'm greatly enjoying their coverage of the Olympics.  I'm glad I'm not restricted to watching NBC, like most Americans.  I've been watching events *live* since 11am EST this morning and all day yesterday.  They actually tell you when something is taped, and don't insult their audience by pretending it is live.  They showed the first 35 competitors in the men's downhill skiing.  I'm going to turn to NBC later to see what they show - my guess is 6 skiiers tops. 2:04:16 PM

Earlier, Phil Ackley was asking about curling - well, let's go to a great source, none other that the CBC (Canada's network channel).  Even though I live on the States, my cable system picks up the CBC and I've become hooked on curling!  The demo page I've linked to contains definitions, rules, and a Flash demo of how the game works.

On second thought, he could have been asking "Why?" The answer to that is tougher. I find it highly addictive. There is a combination of strategy and execution that intrigues me. Watch it if you get a chance - you may get hooked. 6:03:43 PM

Finally getting a chance to test the Dave's second web service example.  Here goes:

1. From the Desktop of Dane Carlson
2. Scripting News

5:52:35 PM

Still ridiculously sick -- and bogged down at work.  Ugh. I hope to get my mind blown by Web Services this weekend...I just need to get a mind back first!

In the meantime, I'm reading the A List Apart, A Season on the Brink,  the last few days of css-discuss, and my Form 1040 instructions. 7:43:42 PM

...or not. I am sick as a dog today and am going to sleep after way too long of a day at work from where my attempts to post here via email failed dismally and I'm too braindead to figure out why. 6:32:48 PM

Hello Dave!

<edit>Cool! - Tommorrow comes test web service #2</edit> 4:32:36 PM

Interesting...Greta Van Susteren, a news anchor, now on the Fox News Channel, just announced on the air the reason that she underwent cosmetic surgery was to impress the boys who wouldn't date her 30 years ago in high school. Before. After. (Links courtesy: Todd Dominey) Hmm...I would have thought hosting a one-hour news program each weeknight would have been impressive enough. I guess it's part and parcel of the trade.  But, come up with a better excuse! 11:06:48 PM

Each day in the month of February ...[Chris Casciano]... will be posting a redesign of this page using only CSS. The underlying HTML code wont change a bit. Past style sheets can be viewed using the form controls found somewhere on this page. (Courtesy: Zeldman) 10:37:47 PM

Oh yeah - the jambalaya was kicking and the chili was sweet.  3 kids under the age of 3 makes for instant exhaustion. I think parents love getting together like this so they can let other people entertain their kids and give them a break for a while.  Gotta find that pillow...ugh...it's 2 floors above me. 11:11:12 PM

Wow! What a Super Bowl.  An absolutely intense, incredible game. I gotta disagree with the choice in MVP though - Adam Vinatieri becomes the first kicker to win a Super Bowl, as time expires - that is an MVP performance. Only 1 thing could've been better - the Steelers doing it instead of the Pats.

2 of the last 3 Super Bowls have been great - let the Rams come every year if this is the game we'll get from it. 11:07:49 PM

Getting ready to have family and friends over for the Super Bowl.  I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm glad the Steelers did lose last week - I would have been an awful host.  Now, I'll just have a few snippy things to say and can get on with the process of entertaining.

On the menu: a jambalaya recipe I picked up last year from Emeril, some chili, cornbread, caesar salad, spinach dip, and oatmeal cookies.  Maureen is probably going to enjoy watching me slave over the two main courses today - she gets to do the sides, but is such a seasoned cooking pro, so never gets fazed, no matter how many things she's cooking at once. 9:59:51 AM

Need proof that CSS design doesn't have to be boring?  You'll find it at Eric Meyer's css / edge.  Way cool. 7:53:54 AM

Do as I say, not as I do - Section 508, the U.S. Government site dedicated to “Section 508 compliance and accessibility of websites,” is neither Section 508 compliant nor accessible. (Courtesy: Zeldman) 10:59:55 PM

Gotta love the game of Life...leave your spinner, car, and blue and pink pegs at the door. 11:47:40 PM

Earth at night. Notice the difference between US and Europe and the rest of the world? (Courtesy: Mike Cohen)  It's one of those things that make you go hmm... 7:39:55 PM

CSS-Discuss - I've used it to help me on my company's Intranet site already (and I subscribed today!) 4:40:09 PM