Sunday, August 31, 2003Some new CSS resources and examples: MiniTab Shapes are a new variant of CSS mini tabs, using small GIFs instead...
[hebig.org/blog]
5:43:20 AM
comment [] trackback [] CSS, Web Standards and Accessibility
There have been some good articles and posts on various blogs of late about CSS, Web Standards and Accessibility. Here's a selection of some of the best ones. Standards: Designing For the FutureOld Coding Habits Die HardIn Defense of the BoxOver-Accessible?...
[Andy Budd::Blogography]
5:30:52 AM
comment [] trackback [] RSS 2.0 Best Practice Tip: Entity-encoded HTML in Descriptions
Technical Recommendations for Avoiding Interoperability Issues Related to the Use of Non-ASCII Characters within
[Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
5:14:41 AM
comment [] trackback [] Appease your inner geek
Any geek worth mentioning has been to SourceForge.net at least once in their life. As a matter of fact, I found an open source program there called POPFile that I simply cannot live without. Now as we all know; "Time is like money because everybody wants some from ya." We don't always have the opportunity to check out the latest software releases from SourceForge.net. Perhaps the thought never even entered our minds. Then a rival geek brags about their latest "open source find" all over the message boards. Don't you hate that? It sure drives me nuts, that's for sure. Fortunately for me I have my buddy RSS to appease my inner geek. The result; enter SourceForge.net's new software release RSS feed. (The feed does come up blank, but it works.) I can save a trip to their website everyday and remain informed of the latest developments in open source software. Mmm, now every time I open my aggregator I can actually feel the open source goodness tingling my nostrils. ;-)...
[Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
5:09:58 AM
comment [] trackback [] Tagging conventions for microcontent
Jon Udell has put up his structured blog search which allows you to write XPaths over an XML representation of his blog and get some useful information out of it. In the accompanying blog post he makes the plea for well formedness, since that makes things easier. No argument from me. What I'm more interested in is a description of his tagging conventions.
[Ted Leung on the air]
5:06:19 AM
comment [] trackback [] W3C Markup Validator 0.6.5 Beta #1
The new "Zeldman Made Us Do It!" edition of the W3C's free online markup validation service includes human-friendly error messages that you can customize, and a "fussy parsing" mode that catches technically kosher but problematic patches in your markup.
[Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report]
4:58:05 AM
comment [] trackback [] Two RFCs: Comment notification in Radio and Manila
"Manila-Dev: RFC: Comment notification via email[Jake's Radio 'Blog]Radio-Dev: RFC: comment notification for Radio via email
If you're a Manila or Radio developer, please have a look, and post any comments or questions you have on the corresponding mail list.
Thanks!"
4:57:02 AM
comment [] trackback [] Categorical indirection
Don Park's post on how to link blogs and wikis is actually an instance of the following. Take a category, or view (if you prefer database terminology) and send it off to somewhere else. This is cool, and another reason why multiple categorization would be useful. Each category can do its own rendering, transmission, etc.
[Ted Leung on the air]
4:35:21 AM
comment [] trackback [] Friday, August 29, 2003This page collects my own experiments with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). Normal usage of styles is omnipresent throughout my site, as it is positioned and styled exclusively with CSS. Nevertheless, I felt the need to express my moosely ideas further, beyond what is considered normal. Therefore, whatever follows, should by construction be considered abnormal. I do not intend to save the world, or present ideas with Edisonous utilitarian properties; all experiments of mine are useless from the socially optimal point of view, they serve no purpose other than maximize the objective function of at least one individual, whilst leaving all others unharmed. Accordingly, if ideas explored here strike your fancy, by all means use them to destroy your otherwise perfect and visually attractive CSS design.
[CSS-Technik-News]
3:17:19 PM
comment [] trackback [] Thursday, August 28, 2003...At evectors we are working on a reputation-based filtering system, where users of k-collector will be able to have their news filtered according to who is writing about some specific topic. It's still at a very early stage, but it sounds promising.
Whew... it looks like there's still a lot of stuff to invent and code to write, uh? 
[w4feed:RSS 2.0]
6:43:04 PM comment [] trackback []
Introducing O'Reilly's Developer News Site
I'd like to introduce you to O'Reilly's Developer News site. I think it is the cumulative work of the best parts of news sites today.
[Meerkat: An Open Wire Service: O'Reilly Network Weblogs]
5:20:21 PM comment [] trackback []
Blogware developed in Ruby!?!
"Congrats on the first publicly deployed blog hosting system in Ruby!
Cool! Could we have some more technical details please, Joey? Like why
Ruby and why not Perl, PHP, ASP, etc? The things you mention are nice
computer science arguments, but some juicy ammunition for PHB's :-)
would be awesome!"
"Boss Ross has declared that we are far enough out of stealth mode for me to use my powers as Tucows' TC/DC (Technical Community Development Coordinator) and actually say what language the developers are using to write this pretty cool blogging tool called Blogware...(via The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
Ruby!
Some of you might right now be cocking your head to one side. Ru-what? If you're one of these people, Ruby is:
* A complete, full, pure object oriented language. Even the number 1 is an instance of class Fixnum.
* Flexible and dynamic. It's both dynamic (no need to declare variables) and strongly typed (types are checked at runtime). What to add methods to a class at runtime? No prob. Want to add methods to an instance at runtime? Once again, No prob.
* A language with a nice clean, consistent syntax
* Open source
4:56:26 PM
comment [] trackback [] Closing the loop on XHTML blog content
James Farmer asks about the difference between WYSIWYG XML and HTML editing:
[Jon's Radio]
1:08:45 AM
comment [] trackback [] Wednesday, August 27, 2003"This is no "for money" product. We have developed that for our own needs and because we are educators and will use this code base in excercises with our students and therefore will give it away for them to play with, anyways, we can just as well share it with the rest of the folks out there, too.
This is "free software" without the politics. The software license we chose for DasBlog is plain and simple: BSD. You may use, modidy and redistribute our stuff as long as you keep us out of trouble and leave our and all of the other contibutor's copyright notices in. If you want to derive a closed-source, proprietary product from it ... just go right ahead. We don't like the GPL and the whole "must disclose source of derivative works" interpretation of "free"."
(via dasBlog.net) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
6:34:07 PM
comment [] trackback [] SimpleBits | CSS Photo Zoom
After reading Pixy's clever Fast rollovers, no preload needed method for using a single background image for multiple hover states, it got me thinking. What if the concept was used to offer a zoomed view of a thumbnail image, right inline on the page, again using a single image?
(via MovableBlog) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
6:30:13 PM
comment [] trackback [] The Design Council
The UK's Design Council aims to help people and organisations understand and use design more effectively. As part of this strategy they have an excellent About Design section on their site which focuses on design issues such as user centered design, information design, interaction design and inclusive (or accessible) design. They also run a number of sister sites...
[Andy Budd::Blogography]
6:05:53 PM
comment [] trackback [] The value of design
In my expirience most people view design as a superficial thing. It's about making something look nice, be that a business card, a brochure or a website. This is why many web designers jump straight into Photoshop when they get a new commission, and why clients expect to see designs before any requirements have been set. People just don't get...
[Andy Budd::Blogography]
6:03:13 PM
comment [] trackback [] All Things Distributed: Web Services are NOT Distributed Objects
...Popular (misconceptions) are: "Web services is just RPC for the Internet", or "You need HTTP to make web services work". Below I will try to address a number of the more popular misconceptions.... [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
5:54:51 PM
comment [] trackback [] Standards don't necessarily have anything to do with being semantically correct
Since the push toward good HTML/CSS/XHTML standards started a few years ago, browsers have gotten better at rendering standards-compliant code correctly and web designers have gotten better at writing standards-compliant code. Safari and Mozilla in particular have made great gains in rendering code correctly and folks like Todd Dominey, Dave Shea, Dan Cederholm, and Doug Bowman (the four Ds?) have built great-looking and usable sites with standards-compliant code and then......
[kottke.org]
4:23:23 PM
comment [] trackback [] Exploration and discovery
This week's column on dynamic languages, and its associated blog entry, provoked some interesting reactions. From Don Box:
[Jon's Radio]
4:51:55 AM
comment [] trackback [] Tuesday, August 26, 2003"The message we should all have tatooed on our forheads should read: Integration, aggregation and customization. Everything we need has been invented. Now it's just time to get it all to work together."
[Marc's Voice]10:23:58 PM
comment [] trackback [] New Flavour Model for Blosxom
Rael Dornfest, (who I assume is the creator of Blosxom) incorporated a few suggestion I had for improving Blosxom 'Flavours' (themes). Instead of 4-5 text files spread around in the root folder, he has boiled a template down to 1 file stored in its own folder, inside a themes folder. This is going to be a much cleaner system, and now Blosxom has a standard model for themes with component parts, like images and css files. Simply store your images in the same folder as the theme file, and they will be automatically detected and used. In addition to this innovation, Rael will incorporate a standard way to designate different themes/flavours for subfolders in your directory.
[BryanBell.com]
7:32:37 PM
comment [] trackback [] XML-to-string converter (in XSLT) [0xDECAFBAD Quick link]
7:23:26 PM
comment [] trackback [] RSSlets Are Just the Beginning
Phil had a nice post tonight about RSSlets from Eightlinks. I remember the Amazon RSS feeds hitting the ether about a month ago. RSSlets by themselves provide point functionality. I disagree with the location of the intelligence -- on a server. RSSlets in a MoveableType world can only be server based. In a Radio world, RSSlets are desktop based. Once you move this type of functionality to the desktop, a whole new world opens up. What is needed is a supervisory engine in Radio that provides a plug-in architecture for RSSlets. The rough structure is there with Tools, but this structure needs to be extended to provide management for RSSlets, a simple interface for creating RSSlets, interfaces that feed the news aggregator, and an engine capable of learning your preferences based on RSS subscriptions, RSSlet return data, and specific user input.
[Dann Sheridan's Weblog]
7:14:14 PM
comment [] trackback [] MetaWeblog API
"It is now safe to deploy applications based on this spec."
[Scripting News]
7:09:24 PM
comment [] trackback [] Embedding RDF in HTML
Radio embeds RDF data in the HTML output of my blog. I recall reading about this in the past. What is the commonly accepted view on this (from the RDF folks)? Good or Bad?
Update: I found this article by Sean Palmer. The answer: It depends. But basically, OK.
[Blogdigger Development Blog]
2:03:31 AM comment [] trackback []
Monday, August 25, 2003More insights and tips from TweezerMan!
...Since I worked out the programming for my monthly archive links macro, I keep seeing little things everywhere that I used to think would never be fixed but now are "not too difficult" or even "easy". In my news aggregator, I am subscribed to my own XML feed so I can see what is going out on...
[The Tweezer's Edge 2]
Good value again!
3:26:54 AM comment [] trackback []
Tracking down Radio problems
Well documented Radio debugging help:
Good value!
3:19:28 AM comment [] trackback []
Sunday, August 24, 2003[Scripting News]
10:36:50 PM
comment [] trackback [] Cute CSS-based Rollover Trick
Typical rollover uses multiple images, one for each state. Petr Stanicek shows how CSS2's background-position attribute can be used to do rollover with just one image containing subimages for multiple states. Cute. Via Paschal L.
For the impatient, here is the meat:
[Don Park's Daily Habit]#menu a { ...
background: url("button.gif") top left no-repeat;
... }
#menu a:hover { ...
background-position: 0 -39px;
... }
#menu a:active { ...
background-position: 0 -78px;
... }
2:36:58 AM
comment [] trackback [] Flash Head
I'm not sure how to describe this Flash app. Maybe something like this: It's a partial head that moves in response to your mouse. The author calls it "Looking," and says: "This is one of the hardest things I have ever managed to code. The engine is based on a single image and multiple clips sandwiched together. The math involved in the movement is still really buggy.... but hey! it's gettin there." The site is called ARSEIam, and it has lots of other cool stuff.
[The J-Walk Blog]
1:39:50 AM
comment [] trackback [] Saturday, August 23, 2003Continuing with making it easier for "Big Pubs" to create RSS feeds. I'm assuming that they have a publishing system, but it wasn't built with RSS in mind, but they want on the bandwagon.
Using curl, tidy, and XSL to scrape content from HTML pages into an RSS feed. This is basically what I do now with a half-baked Java app using JTidy, XPath, and BeanShell. I keep meaning to release it, but it’s too embarassing to share so far. Yet, it’s been working well enough to scrape what sites I’m interested in such that I haven’t been too motivated to tidy it up and tarball it. One thing I like better about Bill Humphries’ approach, though, is that it doesn’t use Java :)
[0xDECAFBAD]
2:14:32 PM comment [] trackback []
Bindows
Erik Arvidsson, the DHTML guru behind WebBoard and WebFX, revealed what he had been working on since last year: Bindows. Bindows is a DHTML framework that emulates Swing/WinForms UI, similar to what Convea and Oddpost. I am not sure yet, but Bindows seems to use XML to define its GUI. It seems pretty slow though. I suspect that most, but not all, of the slow speed is due to the server-side misdesigns.
[Don Park's Daily Habit]
1:35:17 AM comment [] trackback []
Practical mod_perl: Chapter 6: Coding with mod_perl in Mind. Pt. 4
The following is the conclusion of our series of excerpts from Chapter 6 of the O'Reilly title, Practical mod_perl. (O'Reilly)
[WebReference News]
12:41:21 AM comment [] trackback []
Object Sniffing New Browsers, Part 3: Opera
In this series we've looked at how you can use object detection to distinguish between various browsers and tailor your Web code to take advantage of their individual features (or lack thereof). In this last article, we look at the other major browser out there, namely Opera. (By Keith Schengili-Roberts)
[WebReference News]
12:40:29 AM comment [] trackback []
XML machine the successor to von Neumann
Really bring data and programs together.
(The Register) [via Der Schockwellenreiter]
12:31:05 AM comment [] trackback []
Understanding Web Services [via Der Schockwellenreiter]
12:04:56 AM comment [] trackback []
Animated Population Pyramid for England and Germany
SVG, JavaScript and SMIL [via Der Schockwellenreiter]
When the inimitable Schockwellenreiter raves about a cool implementation of anything, it pays to take look...
Now
if only it wouldn't crash Safari, Firebird, Camino, Mozilla, IE,
iCab... (only OmniWeb doesn't barf - but it doesn't work with it
either) :-(
12:00:17 AM comment [] trackback []
Friday, August 22, 2003I chose a pared-down RSS file to provide the sample XML for this article. I could have chosen any arbitrary XML document, but RSS serves a particular purpose of syndicating content, often news and weblog items, and is ideal for demonstrating basic transformations with CSS and DOM. Throughout this article, I'll show how to use CSS to apply formatting style to the RSS elements, and how to use the DOM Level 2 interface to traverse and transform the output. By the end of this article, I'll have created a (admittedly crude) browser-based RSS reader application using the RSS feed itself.
(via CSS-Technik-News) [PlasticThinking: Moe's Link Dump.]
2:05:05 AM
comment [] trackback [] Thursday, August 21, 2003Low Bandwidth SOAP: Using web services on low resource J2ME devices is possible through Enhydra.org's KSOAP classes. This article shows you how to create lightweight web service clients and servers.
[Der Schockwellenreiter]
12:28:13 PM
comment [] trackback [] Wednesday, August 20, 2003Very cool. In Perl
"Description: Intelli-Aggie is a proof-of-concept RSS feed aggregator and sorter that does the following:
* Fetches user defined RSS feeds.
* Categorises news items in the feeds into user defined categories
based on user defined keywords.
* Generates list of these news items grouped in various views. For an example output, check this earlier post of mine.
* The most novel thing about Intelli-Aggie is that the system tries to adapt according to the reader's reading preference, trying to show him/her more interesting and relevant news items first."
(via Coding Projects of Srijith) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
11:54:06 PM comment [] trackback []
Russell Beattie on .Text
Yes, it looks like Microsoft's XML APIs are a lot saner than the PHP APIs too.
"I just spent a while trying to grok what was going on inside Scott Water's .Text, a new server-side blogging app for the .Net crowd. I don't have much of a clue what's going on, but it's amazing how close C# looks like Java, though it seems that Microsoft has done a saner job with the XML stuff than Java's current offerings (though this might be a wrong first impression. It's not like I'm ever going to use it to know for sure ;-) ).
Anyways, it's *a lot* of code including a giant-a*s SQL Server script with a zillion stored procedures (god, I hope all that .SQL was autogenerated), but it does seem to be complete - even down to XML-RPC support and Atom feeds."
(via Russell Beattie Notebook) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
6:57:08 PM comment [] trackback []
No messing with JavaScript
For anyone doing Javascript work I can highly recommend both David Flanagan's JavaScript: The Definitive Guide and Danny Goodman's JavaScript & DHTML Cookbook. The guide is a pretty comprehensive reference that I turn to a lot. The cookbook is a very interesting mix of practical JavaScript and DHTML techniques. I'm particularly interested in the possibilities for drag & drop in web interfaces. Marc Barrot uses this to good effect in WebOutliner.
[Curiouser and curiouser!]
3:24:40 PM comment [] trackback []
RSSlet - generate RSS feeds from dynamic pages generated via an HTTP POST or GET
Cool hack in progress.
"My ultimate vision for RSSlet is a service that allows users to generate dynamic RSS feeds that actually do something functional from any web page. I'm a big believer in iterative and interactive design and development. So in line with this, rather than developing the service in its entirety and then releasing it to the world, I'm starting with making some of my prototype explorations available for use and feedback. Since this is a work in progress everything here is labeled as use at your own risk. As I add more functionality and polish everything up into a useable standalone service, I'll post updates here.Other Alternatives
The ability to scrape web pages and make RSS feeds is not unique, NewsIsFree and MyRSS both currently offer the ability to do this in some fashion, but as far as I can tell, neither handle any of the following gracefully:
* pages generated dynamically from the contents of a form (or other source of parameters passed into a page via GET or POST) * password protected data sources
* keyword based filtering"
(via Eightlinks - Features: RSSlets - Functional RSS Feeds) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
2:17:55 PM comment [] trackback []
Clearing Floats
As most of you probably know, when you float an element it no longer takes up any space in the document flow, causing borders and background colours to behave strangely. To get round this you need to add some content to the container element and set that content to have a clear: both; style... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
1:54:34 PM comment [] trackback []
Creating form layouts using CSS
A while ago I read an article at A List Apart about creating form layouts using CSS that you would normally use tables for. It was a great little article, but I could never quite get it to work. I was trying to lay out a form today using this method, but it kept breaking in IE 5.x on Mac.... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
1:53:33 PM comment [] trackback []
Flash Satay Experiment
Should you or shouldn't you use the Flash Satay method of embedding flash content? What browsers does it work on and how many people will actually be serverd the flash movie correctly? Fill in this poll and help answer that question.... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
1:52:54 PM comment [] trackback []
Headers and soul
HTML 4.01: The HEAD element contains information about the current
document, such as its title, keywords that may be useful to search
engines, and other data that is not considered document content. User
agents do not generally render elements that appear in the HEAD as
content. They may, however, make information in the HEAD available to
users through other mechanisms. Of course, there always is another point
of view. [Sam Ruby]
1:36:12 PM comment [] trackback []
Understanding RSS
You wanna know all about RSS? Fine. We're gonna help you figure out what's what! Scott Johnson (of Feedster fame) is officially under agreement to produce a tutorial on news aggregators and RSS. It'll be sold direct by Lockergnome and via Amazon. He recently came to me with the suggestion that there needed to be a good, comprehensive resource to help get people started. He suggested a "Mom's First Aggregator" sort of thing. I agreed, and let him have at it. He hopes to be finished with it before Halloween, covering: The Basics, How an Aggregator Can Change Your Life, Versions and Basic Terminology, RSS For Content Publishers, Developers, Users, & Marketers, Choosing an Aggregator, The World's Simplest Aggregator, etc. If you would like your tips, thoughts, or experiences added to the tome, please let us know immediately.
1:13:52 PM
comment [] trackback [] Roll your own Google feeds
Today I want to introduce you to three Google query solutions that are accomplishing incredible feats with RSS and Google search technology.
1) Google Alert - Track any search query from your favorite news aggregator. A variety of cool settings are available once you are signed up. My only gripe is that it is primarily focused on email alerts and I had to dig around before I found the RSS settings in the "toolkit".
2) "It's Google.rss" - I like this tool for query tracking better than Google Alert because I can get to making my RSS feed right away without the login interface and other annoyances. It is a great example of "no frills" ingenuity at work.
3) Gnews2RSS - The holy grail of RSS news feeds, in my opinion. You can finally get Google news without being bound to using MyRSS.com or any other ad supported RSS generator. The webmaster of Gnews2RSS encourages users to host their own version of this tool with his script. A link back to the script's author would be appropriate if used for personal use.
By matt@ctsdownloads.com. [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:12:40 PM comment [] trackback []
Tuesday, August 19, 2003Screen shots can only "say" so much, so if you're still unsure about how a news aggregator works, I'd recommend you take a look at this particular Flash application. Drop to the Tech Category and you'll quickly see how sites from all across the Internet can be scanned in seconds. This is a very powerful system that's sitting at your fingertips. With more programmers beginning to harness RSS and continuing to enhance the user experience, these types of utilities are becoming a commodity. Give this Monkey a banana!
By chris@pirillo.com. [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:13:07 PM
comment [] trackback [] Macromedia Central
»You can develop Macromedia Flash applications people can use both online and offline, right from their desktops. Macromedia Central will help users more easily interact with information on the Internet, and help Macromedia Flash MX developers and designers create, distribute, and sell Macromedia Flash applications.«
(Oliver Wrede) [WebDEV]
1:00:23 PM
comment [] trackback [] Atom API
A working implementation of the Atom API. It is entirely self-contained within a single CGI script and runs on a default Apache install with no .htaccess tricks. [Der Schockwellenreiter]
12:53:49 PM
comment [] trackback [] AppleScript and mySQL
"mySQL4AppleScript is a library of AppleScript handlers for accessing mySQL databases. mySQL4AppleScript requires mySQL to be installed on Mac OS X." [Der Schockwellenreiter]
12:50:20 PM
comment [] trackback [] Working AtomAPI Implemenation
A real live working implementation of the AtomAPI has been posted. Mark has all the details.
This is an implementation in two parts. The first is a server-side CGI script that Mark wrote in Python that hooks into a MoveableType installation. Yes, it's true, this is an AtomAPI implementation for MoveableType.
The second part of the implementation is a client side GUI written in Python that allows you to create, modify and delete entries. If you download the client implementation and run it, it will automatically connect to Marks implementation and let you add, remove and modify entries.
Things to note:
As always, you can give feedback on RestEchoApiDiscuss, or atom-syntax. [BitWorking]
3:28:56 AM comment [] trackback []
3 column CSS layouts: Easier than you might think
In a recent issue of the Sitepoint Tech Times newsletter, Kevin Yank explains (in detail, with pictures) the recurring problem in CSS of trying to create a three column layout with columns of equal height and a footer spanning all three. If you don't yet understand the problem, you will once you've read his article. Kevin suggests a javascript fix... [Artima Web Buzz]
3:06:40 AM comment [] trackback []
Intro to Flash SkillSwap
I've just come back from the latest SkillSwap event, and I have to say it went very well. Pete Barr-Watson of pixelfury gave an excellent "Introduction to Flash" talk and even I learnt a couple of new tricks. For instance, when using the rectangle tool, If you click and drag to create a new shape, using the arrow keys before... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
2:59:31 AM comment [] trackback []
Monday, August 18, 2003If you thought you could just throw in an off-the-shelf XSLT engine into your software to enhance your output capabilites, you need a security wake up call. XML has its own set of potential security issues that must not be overlooked and XSLT is no exception.
Prajakta Joshi shows how to perform XSL transformations securely in Secure XSL Transformations in Microsoft .NET. If you are not a .NET programmer, ignore the .NET bits and concentrate of the issues. [Don Park's Daily Habit]
2:22:09 AM comment [] trackback []
Sunday, August 17, 2003So, I wrote my first plugin! I will be updating it shortly, but wanted to go ahead and get it out there for comments (if anyone really wants to look at my bad perl code). Instructions Download b1, the sample alias file and sample entry. No config necessary If you want to use review, create an entry.alias file (this will probably change) [Artima MacOS Buzz]
1:20:26 PM
comment [] trackback [] Faceted Movable Type
Tanya Rabourn has written a blog entry about combining Movable Type and faceted navigation
(via Column Two) [Channel 'blog_network']
1:10:03 PM
comment [] trackback [] Guido van Rossum Interviewed
Qa1 writes "Guido von Rossum, creator of Python, was recently interviewed by the folks at O'Reilly Network. In this interview he discusses his view of the future of Python and the Open Source community and programming languages in general. Some more personal stuff is also mentioned, like his recent job change (including the Slashdot story about it) and a little about how he manages to fit developing Python into his busy schedule."
[Slashdot]
12:39:38 AM
comment [] trackback [] Friday, August 15, 2003The painting in the age of the internet? The idea for E.G. is simple: the machine is the new painter and its languages are the new painting techniques. The brush stroke is now replaced by a portion of HTML code, the painter is your own computer, each painting is generated each time and everytime is brand new. References to the past abstract masterpieces are evident, but today a work of art like a Rothko's painting is reduced to a mathematical formula that ...[The J-Walk Blog]
6:56:32 PM
comment [] trackback [] Web-safe color-palette officially declared over
(via NewsisFree) [Robot Wisdom]
6:49:32 PM
comment [] trackback [] Thursday, August 14, 2003meet Mitch, Shelley, AKMA, JD.... Pixelview is an ongoing series of interviews with independent Web designers and developers. And Christopher Lydon has been conducting fascinating audio interviews with a slightly different bunch of people who have also been soaking in the Internet for a while. [Seb's Open Research]
12:51:43 PM
comment [] trackback [] Afterstep 2.0 Beta Includes XML Graphics System
vaevictus writes "Afterstep just released its 2.0 Beta 1, after a long merge from its development branch. One of the most interesting new features is an ... [Slashdot]
12:36:21 PM
comment [] trackback [] How I Organize my Stylesheets
. A couple of weeks ago there was a big discussion on css-discuss about how people structure their CSS files. Here is what I do. First off I try to break my styles down into logical chunks. I'll have a basic stylesheet that I'll serve up to Netscape 4 and within this I'll import the more advanced style sheets. [Andy Budd::Blogography]
12:11:50 PM
comment [] trackback [] Illustrated MT templates
Nice dissection of how templates in MT work. Need this for every blog system including Manila and Radio.
"Tackling Movable Type templates and CSS for the first time can be daunting. The MT default templates contain four kinds of code: CSS, HTML, MT tags, and Javascript.
I'm working on a little project to break it apart in an illustrated way. It's not exactly a Movable Type tutorial, but it does point out where divs are and what the tags look like in code and rendered in the browser.
If you click the images above, the first image shows where the div sections of the MT index template begin and end. The second one breaks apart the code for the blog entry and points to each section in a sample entry. The smaller images below show details for calendar, search and side menus"
(via mediatinker.com) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
12:07:13 PM comment [] trackback []
Web Design Postcards
This is one of the best ideas I've seen in a long time: Postcards that contain web design tips. Look through these postcards for coding, design and content tips for your own sites, and if one of the sites you visit regularly doesn't measure up, why not show them you care by emailing them the URL of an applicable card?
[The J-Walk Blog]
1:59:58 AM comment [] trackback []
Avoiding Tanek's "Box Model Hack"
If you're a CSS developer you'll know that IE5.x gets the box model wrong. Padding and margin should actually be added to the width of a box. However IE5.x includes padding and margin within the width of the box... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
12:35:12 AM comment [] trackback []
Wednesday, August 13, 2003In the first article we looked at how you could use object detection to distinguish between Konqueror, Safari and OmniWeb. Here, we go further, using JavaScript object detection to distinguish between recent versions of the Netscape browsers.
By Keith Schengili-Roberts. [WebReference News]
3:28:59 PM
comment [] trackback [] The Colours of Numbers
For the math geeks out there (which I'm not - maybe his theories will be shot down in flames), Karl Palmen has discovered that numbers can be assigned one of eight "colours", related to their prime factors. He goes on to show the interesting mathematical properties of these colours. A novel way of playing with numbers. Software is on offer. [MetaFilter]
2:30:41 PM
comment [] trackback [] OOP Using Flash and Actionscript
An interesting article can be found at O'Reilly, by Joey Lott, the author of ActionScript Cookbook arrived on-line today. The book published last month provides Flash user's their own cookbook. Will it generate the sales numbers that The Perl and Python Cookbooks did for O'Reilly? Mr. Lott says, "Just what is an object, after all? Again, Flash and... [Artima Web Buzz]
6:19:01 AM
comment [] trackback [] Monday, August 11, 2003When building the new message website I decided to use the Fahrner Image Replacement technique in combination with a list of links and the use of pure CSS rollovers to handle the site nav. For those not familiar with the... [Andy Budd::Blogography]
10:08:28 PM
comment [] trackback [] Centralized CSS in Radio
"If you would like to centralize your Radio CSS you can simple save your Style sheet as "#cascadingStyleSheet.txt" then place it in your "www" folder. Then simply add the <%cascadingStyleSheet%> macro to your template. Your CSS will be included where you included your macro."
This method will work even if you create a theme out of your design.
(via Bryanbell.com) [Dewayne Mikkelson and his Radio WebDog, Shadow]
2:28:48 PM
comment [] trackback [] Jeffrey Zeldmann: Designing With Web Standards
"There was a time not that long ago when many drivers thought nothing of tossing empty bottles out the windows of their cars. Years later, these same citizens came to realize that littering was not an acceptable way to dispose of their trash. The web design community is now undergoing a similar shift in attitude. Web standards are key to this transformation.«
"very cool" [Der Schockwellenreiter]
1:59:07 PM
comment [] trackback [] Dan Shafer: HTML Utopia: Designing Without Tables Using CSS
[Der Schockwellenreiter]
1:56:32 PM
comment [] trackback [] Comments in RSS
We've added a separate Comments feed in our sidebar, but this is merely a workaround. Steven Garrity sends word that there's an includedComments RSS Module Proposed Specification online. "With a simple namespace extension, we can enable inline comment syndication for aggregators who wish to use them. Users may then bring comments into their microconent aggregation as a valuable source of information and community interaction." UPDATE: The Comment API was last revised on March 20th this year. By chris@pirillo.com. [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:43:05 PM
comment [] trackback [] Password Protected RSS Feeds
Both Erik Porter and Jason Nadal would be wise to read up on support for security in aggregators. Depending on the interpreter, HTTPS (SSL) and authentification over HTTP are possible. If you intend on making your OPML file public, you'd be wise to stick with safer URLs - leaving account information transmissions to the client. By chris@pirillo.com. [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:41:23 PM
comment [] trackback [] Sunday, August 10, 2003Shelley Powers: I just published the final three parts of the Weblog Link Series, on permalinking and archives: A four part series. If have (voluntarily or involuntarily) been relocated and are busy, part II contains a lot of useful nuggets. Once things settle down, do yourself a favor, and go back and read the rest. [Sam Ruby]
6:55:02 PM
comment [] trackback [] Blog maintenance
3:47:21 PM
comment [] trackback [] Radio, Trackback and Technorati
Steve Kirks was wondering "...if, with the new implementation of Trackback in Radio, the code exists to ping Technorati, too. I started perusing Radio.root and I think I found the right place:
system.verbs.apps.weblogsCom
As for now, people who use the web interface of Radio, just add this:
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
to the "URLs to Ping:" box on the Radio home page..."
Over at the Technorati Developer Wiki there's a HowTo page for most blogging tools, albeit with no method for Radio yet.
But then there's also the problem to consider (as David Sifry sees it) of Radio's"... obnoxious habit of sending pings to www.weblogs.com for each weblog "category" if you use multiple categories on your blog. Same information, same author, just link spam, basically"
3:31:08 PM comment [] trackback []
Transforming XML Into RSS
For .NET developers: "My previous article, 'Translating RSS With XSLT,' went over the steps of changing RSS into HTML. In this article I will discuss the ability to convert XML into RSS using XSLT. You may be thinking, 'Why would I want to do that?.' With the example in this article, I hope to answer that question." By chris@pirillo.com. [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:57:57 PM comment [] trackback []
Interview with RSSJobs Creator
Phil Wolff interviews Steve Rose: “I started playing with the RSS format, creating some feeds for my own personal use, and I thought this would be useful for checking a local University’s job board. I wrote a quick java servlet to parse the new job listing and return the results as RSS. It was so cool! [ranchero.com]
1:13:10 PM comment [] trackback []
Saturday, August 09, 2003Edd Dumbill: If you don't care about decentralized interoperability, it's hard to see how you can ever agree with web technology. [Sam Ruby]
6:03:55 PM
comment [] trackback [] Namespace training wheels
In general, we don't have much experience creating and using simple XML vocabularies, never mind mixed ones. InfoPath, the first application making a serious bid to enable mainstream folks to routinely gather and use XML data, hasn't even shipped. I think the creators of InfoPath and similar tools -- who hope that use of modular XML vocabularies will turn out to be like riding a bicycle -- ought to provide some training wheels. [Full story at InfoWorld.com] ... [Jon's Radio]
6:02:02 PM
comment [] trackback [] Flash Aggregator
Oliver Steele has created an RSS reader in Flash
"The aggregator was based on a suggestion by Marc Cantor. It's a widget intended for the gutter of a blog. Like a blogroll, it displays a list of blog titles. Like a full-page aggregator, it displays the last few items within each blog. And since it's a Laszlo application, it can be driven by an XML feed, and animates smoothly between visual states." [Lockergnome's RSS Resource]
1:28:00 PM comment [] trackback []
Technorati Tutorial, Part 1
Lilia Efimova at Mathemagenic asked an interesting question about Technorati on her weblog today, and I popped by (thanks to my watchlist) and answered her questions. Given the interest, I thought I'd republish my response here, along with a few elaborations. Lilia asked, Does anyone knows how Technorati works? Do they process blog homepages only? Or only items in RSS feeds? Or only things "not older than ..."? I wonder because I usually observe some fluctuations in numbers of inbound blogs and inbould links. E.g. yesterday I had 100+ inbound blogs and today it's 80+. It would be interesting to know why these things change. I tried Technorati site and weblog of David Sifry with no luck. I guess this is a quite typical question that user has about systems that digest information: what are the criteria that are used? Some basics about Technorati 1) We spider weblogs, and correlate each weblog's outbound links to any page on your blog/site 2) Technorati works on any URL - not just URLs for weblogs. For example, you can see what people are saying about an interesting article or favorite company, and get an instant read on the conversations going on around that article or site. 3) The simplest way get your weblog included in the Technorati index is to ping us whenever you update your weblog. That puts you in the high-priority queue for indexing. You can save the page as a bookmark, or you can program your weblog software to do... [Sifry's Alerts]
1:08:55 PM comment [] trackback []
RSS resource
If you want to learn how RSS can help you or keep track of new RSS tools and services head over to Lockergnome's RSS Resource.
[Kalsey Consulting Group :: Measure Twice]
12:57:07 PM comment [] trackback []
System Administration Quick Links
If you are a Java weblogger chances are good that you are running your weblog on your own site or are contemplating the possibility. If so, bookmark this O'Reilly page. This resource provides some great helps that will make system administration a whole lot easier. The page provides articles that covers backup options, implementing DNS, setting up... [Artima Web Buzz]
12:31:48 PM comment [] trackback []
An RSS/RDF epiphany
Some fascinating conversations have been weaving their way through blogspace and email in the last few days. As a result, I think I've reached a new understanding of the seemingly endless debate about whether and how to use RDF (Resource Description Framework) and RSS together. I mentioned Dan Brickley's comments the other day. He expands on his remarks over on Shelley Powers' blog: [Jon's Radio]
2:46:41 AM comment [] trackback []
Rendering PHP Files with Radio UserLand
A Workbench visitor asks: How can I use Radio to render .php files instead of .html files when upstreaming?
The file extension is determined by the #renderedFileExtension directive. By default, files are rendered with the .html extension. To set the extension to .php for an entire folder and its subfolders, edit the #prefs.txt file in that folder and add this line:
#renderedFileExtension "php"
Here's an example: the xmas.txt file and the xmas.php page it produces.
To set the extension only for a specific file, add the same line at the top of the file along with any other directives. Leave a blank line after the directives and before the content of the page, but don't put blank lines between each directive. [Workbench]2:32:40 AM
comment [] trackback [] Outline numbering
Outline numbering can be accomplished on the Web by using nested ordered lists and a bit of CSS. [Kalsey Consulting Group :: Measure Twice]
2:28:45 AM
comment [] trackback [] Dirk Hesse | Freier Webdesigner aus Dortmund
Nice clean standards based look and feel. Danke!
(via Jeffrey Zeldman) [Roland Tanglao's Weblog]
2:08:46 AM
comment [] trackback [] Thursday, August 07, 2003ecotonoha [medium high bandwidth flash link] [via Abstract Dynamics]... [Ross Mayfield's Weblog]
12:37:29 PM
comment [] trackback [] More standards sites
Zeldman lists some larger commercial sites that were designed with Web standards. [Kalsey Consulting Group :: Measure Twice]
12:27:48 PM
comment [] trackback [] Wednesday, August 06, 2003A year ago it was notable when a company redesigned with Web standards. Now it is less so.
There are a variety of companies that are using CSS instead of tables for page layout. AIn October, I mentioned Mercedes-Benz and Wired. Since then Cingular and ESPN have both redesigned with CSS layouts and been mentioned here.
It is interesting that CSS is becoming the norm instead of an exception. I'm even doing the site for a California state agency with pure CSS layout. As far as I know, it's one the first state government sites to be done this way. (The state of Montana site uses a bunch of absolutely positioned layers instead of tables, but this technique isn't much better than using tables.)
Is anyone else finding less resistance to the concept of CSS layout from clients and bosses? [Kalsey Consulting Group :: Measure Twice]
11:18:52 PM comment [] trackback []
Tuesday, August 05, 2003In Issue No. 159 of A List Apart, for people who make websites: Search engine optimization (SEO) can generate more traffic than banner ads or pay-per-click methods. It's not voodoo or rocket science. The techniques many of us already use to lower bandwidth, comply with standards, and follow accessibility guidelines turn out to be some of the best things we can do to enhance our search engine rankings. New contributing writer Brandon Olejniczak tells how in "Using XHTML/CSS For an Effective SEO Campaign." [Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report]
10:12:10 PM
comment [] trackback [] Using RSS 2.0 and RDF together
I've been working on a series of issue analyses for the RSS 2.0 site. One of the questions I've been wanting to explore is whether RDF might be used in conjunction with RSS 2.0, and if so how. Today, in the comments section of the site, Dan Brickley pointed me to the example I've been looking for. He writes:
This week, a new 'RSS and jobs' site is getting some interest. http://www.rssjobs.com/rssjobs/index.jsp There is a similiar effort at http://jobs.perl.org/rss/ (eg. see http://jobs.perl.org/rss/telecommute.rss) and an old example scenario that Libby and I worked on at http://ilrt.org/discovery/2000/11/rss-query/.Suppose you wanted to do an RSS 2.0 feed that would expose those job fields as first-class XML. And suppose further that you wanted to express the job data in terms of RDF. What might that look like? ... [Jon's Radio]
I hope we all agree that such applications are an exciting part of the future of RSS and RSS-like technology. To my mind, the big question is, how can we partition the work so that we have a Web of complementary namespaces which fit together to give us better descriptions in our XML feeds.
Looking at the feeds currently served by rssjobs.com, all the structure is hidden, entity escaped, inside the 'description' tag. Date, job title, employer, location, blurb... all crushed into a single field.
8:13:25 PM
comment [] trackback [] MySQL Studio 4.2.4 released
MySQL Studio 4.2.4 is released. MySQL Studio is a MySQL Database GUI Admin Tool for administrating and monitoring MySQL server on Mac OS X platform. The new version improves support for MySQL 4.x, enhances MySQL Connection settings and backup, and fix the evaluation expiry problem.
Like Pixels? Check out MacDesign [MacMerc.com]
8:10:57 PM
comment [] trackback [] Trillian 2.0, webEdit & Jabber
I'm using the new Trillian 2.0 beta. So far it seems stable (just like 1.0), not too different - although I love the new tonal sound scheme. What I was really waiting for was the Jabber support. This works seamlessly (even though it's implemented as a plug-in) and has allowed me to develop a new application.
Frontier has a webservice based code editing environment. You can check objects out of the server, edit, then check them back in. Although there is no version control it is a convenient way to edit server code. However one of the issues is working out who is doing what. I thought about a web page, or an RSS feed, but it actually seemed like a nice IM application.
Since Dave, Jake, Lawrence, and Jeremy had already done the work this was as easy as adding a call-back to the Frontier webEdit code that said tcp.im.send( message ) and Voila! Instant notifications about who is working on what code.
[Curiouser and curiouser!]8:10:11 PM
comment [] trackback [] Lecture notes online
The slides for our Web Design World presentations - and what to make of them. [Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report]
8:05:58 PM
comment [] trackback [] Testing trackback again 123
6:17:58 PM
comment [] trackback [] Add a 'Blogs I Read' Search to Your Site
as seen on McGee's Musings
Another feature to look into.
5:02:41 AM
comment [] trackback [] Matt Round's weblog:
another adjectiveanimal weblog....has got to be one of the most superlativedang blog designs out there.
Well, it gets my vote - right down to the blog ...er, bogroll!
Good value!2:10:56 AM
comment [] trackback [] Sunday, August 03, 2003To be fair, you should also strace a dynamically-linked hello world app under Linux some time. [Hack the Planet]
11:01:33 PM
comment [] trackback [] SOAP Digest Auth
Sam is looking to do SOAP based digest authentication. I'd suggest you start with the "Basic and Digest Authentication" spec that Rich Salz & Bob Cunnings put together, I did some implementations of this a while back, pretty straight forward. [Simon Fell]
10:52:04 PM
comment [] trackback [] Six Plus One
Previously I talked about the six different places there are to store information in an HTTP transaction. This is slightly misleading. To review, the six places are:
- Request URI
- Request Headers
- Request Content
- Response Status Code
- Response Headers
- Response Content
This is slightly misleading because the URI is listed as a single storage location. This isn't the best characterization, as it really contains two different sets of information: the path, and the query parameters.
Now the path part of a URI usually corresponds to the directory structure on the server. But remember that the path structure of a server is completely controlled by that server and it need not corresponse to any file or directory strucure. While it is at times convenient to map it to a directory structure, this isn't required, and it is possible to pass path information to a CGI program. For example, if you do a GET on the following URL:
http://example.org/cgi-bin/test.py/fred/12
and there exists a program named test.py in the cgi-bin directory
then that program will be executed. The remaining path after the program is passed
to the CGI program in the PATH_INFO environment variable. In contrast, if query
parameters are passed in, they are passed to the CGI program
via the QUERY_STRING environment variable.
For example, if this is the script test.py:
import os
print "Content-type: text/plain\n\n"
print "PATH_INFO = %s" % os.environ['PATH_INFO']
print "QUERY_STRING = %s" % os.environ['QUERY_STRING']
And it handles the GET for this URI:
http://localhost/cgi-bin/test.py/reilly/12?id=234454
It will display:
PATH_INFO = /reilly/12
QUERY_STRING = id=234454
Note how the piece of the path below test.py has been stripped off and made
available via PATH_INFO, while the query parameters are
stored in the QUERY_STRING environment variable.
So HTTP, via the structure of a URI, gives you two distinct places to store information, one in the path and the second in the query parameters. This isn't even the full story, because if you are running Apache and have the ability to use .htaccess files you can use mod_rewrite and map URIs so that they appear as paths but show up in the CGI as query parameters, but we won't cover that now.
[BitWorking]2:25:40 PM
comment [] trackback [] DECAFBAD Quick links
5:52:11 AM
comment [] trackback [] Wiki integration for Thistle/PHPosxom
I've created a Wikify module for Thistle (should also work with PHPosxom), which automatically links WikiWords to appropriate pages of a specified... [Irate Scotsman]
5:40:29 AM
comment [] trackback [] Applications of RDF
Shelley Powers: RDF: Ready for Prime Time gives an overview of the many applications and services already deployed that use RDF in some way. Via that article, RDF in Mozilla Docs and RDF in fifty words or less, both published by the Mozilla project. [Artima Web Buzz]
5:27:33 AM
comment [] trackback [] SQL Junkies weblog...
of course there's .NET blogs too...and now here's the Java blogs.
[The Scobleizer Weblog]
5:16:20 AM
comment [] trackback [] Sputnik: A Radio Userland/ Manila E-xact bridge PROTOTYPE
"Sputnik" is a proof of concept DLL (which I call "Sputnik" because it is the first step to doing e-commerce transactions using E-xact's software) that allows Frontier applications such as Manila and Radio weblogs to perform e-commerce transactions using E-xact's technology.
Development seems to have stalled on this ... what a pity (like so many promising Frontier/RU projects over the years)
[found via an earlier post on Roland Tanglao's Weblog]12:31:43 AM
comment [] trackback [] Saturday, August 02, 2003...Another possible one that E-xact can use.
The RSS Magic component provides developers an easy way to download, read, write, and manipulate RSS data. Check out the following features:
- No knowledge of XML required.
- No need to write socket/TCP/download code.
- No file I/O code required.
- Easily create your own weblogger, news aggregator, or RSS creator.
3:25:35 PM
comment [] trackback [] Custom Feeds
Adrian Holovaty has custom RSS feeds. Nice innovation. As I begin to scale the number of RSS feeds I subscribe to, I am starting to think that I need multiple "news" pages. One for general reading and others for filtered feeds (based on keywords) that will prevent me from missing critical information in the general page (it "flips" very quickly).
[John Robb's Weblog]My custom feeds include the headline, full text and permalink from the 5 latest entries that include a word or phrase of your choosing. This lets you filter which Holovaty.com content you get. To access a custom feed, use the URL convention holovaty.com/rss/filterstring, where "filterstring" is the word or phrase you want to require in each entry... A few examples:
- holovaty.com/rss/washingtonpost.com -- last 5 entries including "washingtonpost.com"
- holovaty.com/rss/site+review -- last 5 entries including the words "site" and "review"
- holovaty.com/rss/"site+review" -- last 5 entries including the exact phrase "site review"
- holovaty.com/rss/"auto%20refresh" -- last 5 entries including the exact phrase "auto refresh"
3:00:09 PM
comment [] trackback [] If Amazon were giving out developer awards..
onfocus should get one. [Scripting News]
5:35:52 AM
comment [] trackback [] MetaWeblog API Spec Draft:
MetaWeblog API Spec. This is the unified spec, ready for developer review. Includes a provision for appkey transmission to meet one of the objections Google has with using the API with Blogger. Now is the time to review the spec for errors, things that aren't clear, omissions, deal-stoppers, but not for religious purity. I'd love to get Google on board with support of this API, I know it's not likely (not sure why), but I don't give up easily. [Scripting News] 5:34:21 AM
comment [] trackback [] XMail 1.0.2 is a new scripting addition for Mac OS X, you can send mails from Applescript very easily, you can of course use recipients of various type (To, Cc, Bcc), and you can send attachments with your email. XMail is free and under the GNU GPL License and source code is available. [Der Schockwellenreiter]
5:24:27 AM
comment [] trackback [] MySQL Subqueries
DevShed just posted part two of a two-part series (part one) on sub-queries in MySQL 4.1. The MySQL 4.x series is finally seeing some adoption by web hosts ( mine are up to 4.013) and hopefully, series like this will help egg some of the laggards along. [Artima Web Buzz]
5:16:02 AM
comment [] trackback [] Friday, August 01, 2003
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