[webdev] Web Design Update: November 21, 2013

Laura Carlson lcarlson at d.umn.edu
Thu Nov 21 06:31:56 CST 2013 

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 12, Issue 22, November 21, 2013.

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

++ISSUE 22 CONTENTS.

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

01: ACCESSIBILITY.
02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
03: DRUPAL.
04: EVALUATION & TESTING.
05: JAVASCRIPT.
06: MISCELLANEOUS.
07: USABILITY.

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

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

The National Federation of The Blind And The Association of American
Publishers Applaud Introduction of 'TEACH Act'
By  National Federation of the Blind.
"The National Federation of the Blind (NFB), the oldest and largest
nationwide organization of blind Americans, and the Association of
American Publishers (AAP), the leading trade association of the US
publishing industry, applaud Congressman Tom Petri (R-WI) for
introducing today the Technology, Education and Accessibility in
College and Higher Education Act (H.R. 3505)..."
https://nfb.org/national-federation-blind-and-association-american-publishers-applaud-introduction-%E2%80%9Cteach-act%E2%80%9D

Bill Would Require Instructional Technology to Be Accessible to All
By Megan O'Neil.
"Legislation introduced on Friday in the U.S. House of Representatives
would require colleges either to make instructional technology
accessible to disabled students or to provide them with equivalent,
alternative resources..."
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/bill-would-require-instructional-technology-to-be-accessible-to-all/48383

Captions in Everyday Use
By Aadrian Roselli.
"...In short, closed captions have value for all users..."
http://blog.adrianroselli.com/2013/11/captions-in-everyday-use.html

Caption Everything
By Dave Rupert
"Using HTML5 to create a real-time closed captioning system."
http://daverupert.com/2013/11/caption-everything/

HTML 5 Accessibility - Exclusive Presentation [VIDEO]
By Paul Bohman via Deque.
"...This talk focused on the new features in HTML 5 and how they
impact accessibility. Topics covered include new form input types
(date, email, number, etc.), new structural tags (nav, main, etc.),
native media players, and more..."
http://www.deque.com/html-5-accessibility-exclusive-presentation-video


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

Cutting Down on Vendor Prefixes
By Roger Johansson.
"Most web developers currently use vendor prefixes in CSS to enable
certain features in some browsers. That's fine, but sometimes I see
code examples and prefix-adding tools that go a bit overboard with the
support and add every possible prefix that has ever been in use (and
sometimes even ones that were never used). I think there are a bunch
of CSS properties that we can safely stop using vendor prefixes for,
or at least considerably cut down on the number of prefixes..."
http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/201311/cutting_down_on_vendor_prefixes/

How to Maintain Image Aspect Ratios in Responsive Web Design
By Craig Buckler.
"As series of responsive images works well if all have the same aspect
ratio...But how can you set a height if images have differing sizes?"
http://www.sitepoint.com/maintain-image-aspect-ratios-responsive-web-design/

Vertical Percentages in CSS
By Louis Lazaris.
"...using percentages on those vertical parts of a page are somewhat
different in the way they are calculated, compared to other properties
that take percentage values..."
http://www.impressivewebs.com/vertical-percentages-css/

CSS Shapes From Images
By Hans Muller.
"Defining CSS Shapes with the circle, rectangle, and ellipse shape
functions is easy and pretty effective if what you want are circles,
rectangles or ellipses. For more complex shapes you can use the CSS
polygon function. However enumerating a polygon's vertices can be
tedious. Tools can take much of the pain out of the task, but it still
tends to be a slow process..."
http://hansmuller-webkit.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/css-shapes-from-images.html


+03: DRUPAL.

Digging In to Apache's Rewrite Module and Drupal
By Chris Johnson.
"Apache's mod_rewrite module is a powerful tool behind Drupal's clean
URLs, but it can lead to some head scratching moments when attempting
to implement custom behavior. In this post, we'll walk through a few
examples and dig into some corner cases of Apache's Rewrite module and
Drupal..."
http://www.phase2technology.com/blog/digging-in-to-apaches-rewrite-module-and-drupal/


+04: EVALUATION & TESTING.

How Usability Testing Drastically Improved My Client's App
By Joshua Gross.
"Most designers spend too much time with their designs to be objective
about them. The best thing any designer can do is to collect feedback
from real users. Testing uncovers pain points and flaws in a design
that are not otherwise obvious..."
http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2013/11/19/how-usability-testing-drastically-improved-my-clients-app/


+05: JAVASCRIPT.

Accessible JavaScript Gestures
By Dylan Barrell.
"One of the problems with creating accessible dynamic HTML
applications that work well across multiple browser and AT platforms
is the issue of keyboard accessibility on a touch device. "
http://www.deque.com/accessible-javascript-gestures


+06: MISCELLANEOUS.

Scope Components, Not Pages
By Brad Frost.
"...how can you scope a project based on components rather than pages?
I think a good place to start is with an interface inventory. An
interface inventory is a comprehensive collection of the bits and
pieces that make up your interface..."
http://bradfrostweb.com/blog/post/scope-components-not-pages/

Content Choreography - Why Our Float Based Approach To Layout Should Evolve
By Steven Bradley.
"The easiest way to rearrange a design's layout for different devices
and conditions is simply to drop one column below another when space
no longer allows them to sit side by side. It may be easiest, but it's
hardly the best approach..."
http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/content-choreography/

Should Designers Code?
By Steven Bradley.
"Every industry has debates where people on either side hold rigidly
to a point of view without really thinking through the issue. The
world of web design is no exception and one of the debates we seem to
argue about is whether or not web designers need to code to be
effective web designers..."
http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/designers-code/

Who's in Charge Here?
By Tim Kadlec.
"I tried to resist writing this post. I really, really did. I've
ranted once about the standards process as it related to responsive
images. I had no interest in going there again. I'd prefer not to be
known as 'that ranty Wisconsin dude who sounds slightly Canadian when
he talks'..."
http://timkadlec.com/2013/11/whos-in-charge-here/


+07: USABILITY.

Image Carousel Click-through Rate Analysis
By Christian Watson.
"Following on from my recent post about why you shouldn't use rotating
image carousels I wanted to share the actual stats for a auto-rotating
carousel on a key page of an ecommerce site I manage in order to look
at how effective it is for showcasing multiple pieces of content..."
http://www.smileycat.com/miaow/archives/006606.php

Homepage Real Estate Allocation
By Jakob Nielsen.
"Websites spend too little homepage screen space on content of
interest to users and fail to utilize modern screen sizes. And? It's
worse now than it was 12 years ago."
http://www.nngroup.com/articles/homepage-real-estate-allocation/

When a Tiny Task is Important to the Organization
By Gerry McGovern.
"If you support the customer in what they want to do they are more
likely to support you...It is much more effective to have asks in
relevant content, than to interrupt people with banners and donate
now-buttons, when they are really trying to accomplish something
completely different...It's counter intuitive to think that if you
focus on customer top tasks and downplay tasks that are important to
the organization, then customers will complete more organizational
tasks. But it's true..."
http://gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/when-tiny-task-important-organization

5 Steps to More Scannable Lists
By Georgina Laidlaw.
"It's a golden rule of web writing: use lists to make your content
more scannable..."
http://www.sitepoint.com/5-steps-scannable-lists/

One Error Message Does Not Fit All
By Joanna Briggs.
"In this week's Best Practice of the Week, we're talking about error
messages and how they convey problems to users. Error messages should
be specific and let the user know what they need to do to fix it."
http://simplyaccessible.com/bpow/error-message-content/

Three Uses for Analytics in User-Experience Practice
By Jen Cardello.
In order to make the most of analytics data, UX professionals need to
integrate this data where it can add value to qualitative processes
instead of distract resources.
http://www.nngroup.com/articles/analytics-user-experience/

Mobile Usability Problems
By Erin Kissane.
"Nothing quite underscores accessibility and usability knowledge like
direct experience..."
http://the-pastry-box-project.net/erin-kissane/2013-november-12/


[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+08: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

Accessibility Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/accessibility.html

Association Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/associations.html

Book Listings.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/books.html

Cascading Style Sheets Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/css.html

Color Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/color.html

Dreamweaver Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/dreamweaver.html

Evaluation & Testing Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/testing.html

Event Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/events.html

Flash Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/flash.html

Information Architecture Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/architecture.html

JavaScript Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/javascript.html

Miscellaneous Web Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/misc.html

Navigation Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/navigation.html

PHP Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/php.html

Sites & Blogs Listing.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/sites.html

Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/standards.html

Tool Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/tools.html

Typography Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/type.html

Usability Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/usability.html

XML Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/xml.html

[Section two ends.]


++END NOTES.


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+ 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.]

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