[webdev] Web Design Update: March 7, 2008

[Laura Carlson]

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 6, Issue 37, March 7, 2008.

An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design 
and development.

++ISSUE 37 CONTENTS.

SECTION ONE: New references.
What's new at the Web Design Reference site?
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdesign/
New links in these categories:

01: ACCESSIBILITY.
02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
03: EVALUATION & TESTING.
04: EVENTS.
05: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.
06: JAVASCRIPT.
07: MISCELLANEOUS.
08: NAVIGATION.
09: PHP.
10: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.
11: TYPOGRAPHY.
12: USABILITY.

SECTION TWO:
13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Screen Readers Lack Emphasis
By Steve Faulkner.
"Using the semantic elements strong and em does not convey any useful 
information to users of JAWS or Window Eyes under typical browsing 
conditions. While it is good to know this, it is not a reason to not 
use these elements to convey meaning.  Accessibility is not just about 
people with vision impairment, it's about all user's with disabilities, 
and web standards is not just about accessibility. This is merely 
another example where screen reader vendors are not serving their 
customers well. As these tests only cover 2 of the screen readers 
available, it would be interesting to know if other products exhibit 
the same lack of support. so please test with your favorite screen 
reader and leave a comment with the results."
http://www.paciellogroup.com/blog/?p=41

The Four Principles of Web Accessibility
By Mike Cherim.
"...These principles are the foundation of web accessibility and the 
beginning of the WCAG 2.0. Without any one of these principles access 
will be denied to someone. It is from these four principles that the 
twelve guidelines and their success criteria are derived and defined. 
Here is my interpreted overview..."
http://green-beast.com/blog/?p=261

Comparing Tagged PDFs from Office and Acrobat
By Alistair Campbell.
"After my initial disappointment with the Office 2007 plug-in for 
creating PDFs, I've had some discussion with the Microsoft team, and a 
chance to do a bit more testing. This post compares the conversion of a 
simple Word 2007 document with the Office plug-in, Acrobat 8.1, and 
OpenOffice..."
http://tinyurl.com/295wnv


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

Specify a Maximum Width for em-based Layouts
By Roger Johansson.
"As someone who likes to bump up text size a notch or even two on many 
sites, I often notice that this behavior is not something that web 
designers in general anticipate. However, layouts do tend to be a 
little bit more robust now than a few years ago, at least at a moderate 
increase in text size. That's good, though I think in many cases it is 
just a matter of luck that nothing gets obscured as text size is 
increased. One technique that can easily make reading a site a lot more 
uncomfortable is using an elastic, or em-based, layout such as the one 
I use here..."
http://tinyurl.com/2dqe5b

CSS: Pushbutton Links
By Mike Cherim.
"With this Pushbutton Links experiment I made real, working pushbuttons 
out of ordinary links. This can be done with any link. Is this retro? 
Yeah, maybe it is, but it's still cool..."
http://mikecherim.com/gbcms_xml/news_page.php?id=31#n31

Planning Your Stylesheet - The Definitive Guide
By Brigitte Simard.
"Don't let your stylesheet files get out of control - follow these 
guidelines right from the start and you'll easily be able to manage and 
update your CSS files."
http://tinyurl.com/28lrdw

Simple CSS: Removing the Underline from Links
By David Rodriguez.
We frequently get responses and e-mails from viewers, and I see it 
requested all the time in user forums and elsewhere around the web: how 
do you remove the underline from links in your Web page?
http://tinyurl.com/2buk2m

reForm: CSS Form Design Template for Any Layout
By Joe Lippeatt.
"This post describes a form element layout technique that will shrink 
and grow with the available space. This allows designers to create 2 
and 4 column form layouts without breaking the design. It also allows 
the user to resize their browser window and change font size without 
rendering the form unusable."
http://css.dzone.com/news/scriptless-self-adjusting-form


+03: EVALUATION & TESTING.

Measuring Satisfaction: Beyond the Usability Questionnaire
By David Travis.
"Most usability tests culminate with a short questionnaire that asks 
the participant to rate, usually on a 5- or 7-point scale, various 
characteristics of the system. Experience shows that participants are 
reluctant to be critical of a system, no matter how difficult they 
found the tasks. This article describes a guided interview technique 
that overcomes this problem based on a word list of over 100 
adjectives. We also include a spreadsheet to generate and randomize the 
word list..."
http://www.userfocus.co.uk/articles/satisfaction.html


+04: EVENTS.

Web Design World Chicago
May 5-7, 2008.
Chicago, Illinois U.S.A.
http://webdesignworld.com/2008/chicago/

Access U
May 6-7, 2008.
Austin, Texas, U.S.A.
http://www.knowbility.org/conference/

HOW Design Conference
May 18-21, 2008.
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A.
http://www.howconference.com/

TODCon (The other Dreamweaver Conference)
June 6-8, 2008.
Orlando, Florida, U.S.A.
http://www.todcon.org/

webDU 2008
June 12-13, 2008.
Sydney, Australia
http://www.webdu.com.au


+05: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.

Paper Prototyping Video
By Joe Arnold.
http://www.joearnold.com/2008/03/paper_prototyping.html


+06: JAVASCRIPT.

AJAX Accessibility for Websites
By Brigitte Simard.
"AJAX or Asynchronous JavaScript and XML, is an innovative way of using 
existing technologies to create highly interactive web applications. 
AJAX allows portions of the page to be updated without having to 
refresh and reload the entire page. It can increase site performance 
significantly and provide cutting edge user interfaces. Unfortunately 
it can also be a source of concern for delivering fully accessible web 
sites..."
http://tinyurl.com/2ol28e


+07: MISCELLANEOUS.

On Creativity
By Andy Rutledge.
"As designers, we're wrongly perceived as custodians and exponents of 
creativity. This matters because business currently overvalues 
creativity. To avoid the inevitable backlash, we must lead our clients' 
perceptions."
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/oncreativity

Design is in the Details
By Naz Hamid.
"Stop worrying about how good a designer you are, and start worrying 
about the myriad tiny details that can elevate your work from passable 
to near-perfect."
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/designisinthedetails

Things Every Web Designer Should Know
By David Rodriguez.
"If you're a new designer or you're already building pages and need to 
up your game, read on. These are the things that every Web designer 
should know..."
http://www.wpdfd.com/issues/85/things_every_designer_should_know/

Shawn Henry Interview
By Bryan Crump.
"Shawn Henry talked with Bryan Crump for Radio New Zealand National 
while in New Zealand for Webstock 08. They talked about the potential 
for the Internet to enable people with disabilities to participate more 
actively in everyday life and business; the work of the World Wide Web 
Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI); and including 
accessibility from the begriming when developing technology."
http://www.w3.org/WAI/highlights/200802radioNZ


+08: NAVIGATION.

The Externalities of Search 2.0
By Michael Zimmer.
"Web search engines have emerged as ubiquitous and vital tools for the 
successful navigation of the growing online informational sphere. As 
Google puts it, the goal is to "organize the world's information and 
make it universally accessible and useful" and to create the "perfect 
search engine" that provides only intuitive, personalized, and relevant 
results. Meanwhile, the so-called Web 2.0 phenomenon has blossomed 
based, largely, on the faith in the power of the networked masses to 
capture, process, and mashup one's personal information flows in order 
to make them more useful, social, and meaningful. The (inevitable) 
combining of Google's suite of information-seeking products with Web 
2.0 infrastructures - what I call Search 2.0 - intends to capture the 
best of both technical systems for the touted benefit of users. By 
capturing the information flowing across Web 2.0, search engines can 
better predict users' needs and wants, and deliver more relevant and 
meaningful results. While intended to enhance mobility in the online 
sphere, this paper argues that the drive for Search 2.0 necessarily 
requires the widespread monitoring and aggregation of a users' online 
personal and intellectual activities, bringing with it particular 
externalities, such as threats to informational privacy while online."
http://tinyurl.com/2bqng9


+09: PHP.

Getting Rid of the Headers Already Sent Error
By scross99.
"The 'Headers Already Sent' error is incredibly common, and I receive 
many many questions from all over about what it is and what caused it. 
So let's clear all of this up once and for all."
http://www.phpbuilder.com/columns/anonymousjoe20080225.php3

Turn Text Files into Pull Down Menus
By Tiffany B. Brown.
"I developed this PHP function for a project I'm working on. I'm 
posting it here in case I need it again, or in case you find it 
handy..."
http://tinyurl.com/39cvuz


+10: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.

Acid3: Putting Browser Makers on Notice, Again.
By Drew McLellan.
"It's been three years since we told browser makes that we want to see 
them smile, but now we wanna hold their hand..."
http://tinyurl.com/37w42n

Microsoft's Interoperability Principles and IE8
By Dean Hachamovitch.
"We've decided that IE8 will, by default, interpret web content in the 
most standards compliant way it can. This decision is a change from 
what we've posted previously..."
http://tinyurl.com/2th4jw

Microsoft Expands Support for Web Standards
By Ray Ozzie.
"Company outlines new approach to make standards-based rendering the 
default mode in Internet Explorer 8, will work with Web designers and 
content developers to help with standards behavior transition..."
http://tinyurl.com/2obelv

Reactions to Microsoft's Reversal on Version Targeting:

Celebrate, C'mon! IE8 Standards Mode To Be Default
By Molly E. Holzschlag.
http://www.molly.com/2008/03/03/ie8-standards-mode-to-be-default/

IE8: Standards Mode by Default
By Shelley Powers.
http://realtech.burningbird.net/standards/ie8-standards-mode-by-default/

IE 8 Will Use Standards Mode as the Default Rendering
By Robert Nyman.
http://tinyurl.com/ys3f35

IE Team Changes Its Mind on IE8 Default Behavior
By Peter-Paul Koch.
http://www.quirksmode.org/blog/archives/2008/03/ie_team_changes.html

Internet Explorer 8 Standards-Compliant by Default
By Stuart Langridge.
http://tinyurl.com/2cf2k4

Meta-Change
By Eric A. Meyer.
http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2008/03/03/meta-change/

Microsoft Backflips on Browser Version Targeting
By Matthew Magain.
http://tinyurl.com/22nh29

Microsoft Rethinks IE8's Default Behavior
By Aaron Gustafson.
http://tinyurl.com/23blcm

Microsoft Reverse Versioning Decision in IE8
By Mel Pedley.
http://tinyurl.com/yo2l6y

Surprise of the Year: IE8 will use Standards Mode by Default
By Roger Johansson.
http://tinyurl.com/36uodb

Unbreaking the Web
By John Resig.
http://ejohn.org/blog/unbreaking-the-web/

Principles and Legality
By Eric A. Meyer.
http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2008/03/04/principles-and-legality/


+11: TYPOGRAPHY.

A Guide to Web Typography
By John Boardley.
"...First, it's worth noting that Typography is not just about choosing 
a font, or even distinguishing one typeface from another. In recent 
experiments, trained Monkeys were able to correctly identify Helvetica 
90% of the time..."
http://ilovetypography.com/2008/02/28/a-guide-to-web-typography/


+12: USABILITY.

Twelve Things Most Sites Need - Part I
By Mike Cherim.
"There are a plethora of Websites out there, each one unique in its 
design, its content, markup, features, functionality, and in myriad 
other ways. Yet, despite these differences, there are specific needs 
that should be met with near consistency, Internet-wide, regardless of 
the site. Let's take a look at twelve of these common denominators. 
Below are the first six. They appear in the order in which I thunk 'em 
up. They're just numbered so you can refer to them more easily..."
http://www.wpdfd.com/issues/85/twelve_things_most_sites_need_1/

Culture, Internationalization and Usability
By Joanna Bawa.
"Although usability engineering as a profession has been developed in 
the western countries for over twenty years, its development in other 
parts of the world like China remains relatively unknown. The study 
reported in this paper seeks to compare the practice of usability 
professionals in the United Kingdom, Germany and China. It focuses on 
the development of interactive products for local markets and for the 
other markets. The major objective of this research is to have an 
initial understanding of usability practice for each country..."
http://www.usabilitynews.com/news/article4562.asp

Company Name First in Microcontent?
By Jakob Nielsen.
Typically, you should deemphasize your company's name in links, but a 
new guideline recommends front loading the name for search engine links 
under certain conditions."
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/microcontent-brand-names.html

3 Important Usability Challenges for Designing Web Apps
By Jared Spool.
"Web-based applications are different from content-based web sites 
because the users are involved in a transaction. In our work 
researching the usability of a content-based site, we focus on how 
users will find and react to the information. However, with web-based 
applications, there are many other considerations we account for..."
http://tinyurl.com/3bv6u6

[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

Accessibility Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/accessibility

Association Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/associations

Book Listings.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/books

Cascading Style Sheets Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/css

Color Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/color

Dreamweaver Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/dreamweaver

Evaluation & Testing Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/testing

Event Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/events

Flash Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/flash

Information Architecture Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/architecture

JavaScript Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/javascript

Miscellaneous Web Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/misc

Navigation Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/navigation

PHP Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/php

Sites & Blogs Listing.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/sites

Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/standards

Tool Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/tools

Typography Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/type

Usability Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/usability

XML Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/xml

[Section two ends.]


++END NOTES.


+ SUBSCRIPTION INFO.

WEB DESIGN UPDATE is available by subscription. For information on how 
to subscribe and unsubscribe please visit:
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdevlist
The Web Design Reference Site also has a RSS 2.0 feed for site updates.


+ TEXT EMAIL NEWSLETTER (TEN).

As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to the 
accessible Text Email Newsletter (TEN) guidelines.  Please let me know 
if there is anything else we can do to make navigation easier. For TEN 
guideline information please visit:
http://www.headstar.com/ten


+ SIGN OFF.

Until next time,

Laura L. Carlson
Information Technology Systems and Services
University of Minnesota Duluth
Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009
mailto:lcarlson at d.umn.edu


[Issue ends.]