[webdev] Web Design Update: April 24, 2009

[Laura Carlson]

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 7, Issue 43, April 24, 2009.

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

++ISSUE 43 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: DREAMWEAVER.
04: EVALUATION & TESTING.
05: EVENTS.
06: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.
07: JAVASCRIPT.
08: MISCELLANEOUS.
09: NAVIGATION.
10: PHP.
11: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.
12: TYPOGRAPHY.
13: USABILITY.
14: XML.

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

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Accessibility of WhiteHouse.gov
By Jim Thatcher.
"This is a note about the accessibility of WhiteHouse.gov. It may be  
the first in a series of notes about accessibility and administration  
web sites. This is not an audit of the site; in fact I am only  
discussing in-page navigation on the home page. That is a long way  
from an audit or even an assessment - which is what I usually do as a  
consultant. .."
http://www.jimthatcher.com/whitehouse.htm

YouTube Captioning
By Meryl K. Evans.
"Mashable has a post on CaptionTube, a service that makes it easier  
for users to add captions to their YouTube videos. CaptionTube  
requires a Google account (I think many of us have this by now)..."
http://www.meryl.net/ci/2009/04/captiontube_you.html

WCAG 2.0 and Future of Web Accessibility: Q and A Part 2
By Judy Brewer.
"In the second of a two-part interview, Judy discusses the new WCAG  
2.0 guidelines and their impact on Web accessibility now and in the  
future."
http://www-03.ibm.com/able/news/wcag20q&a2.html

How People with Disabilities Use the Web
By Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
"...detailed examples of people with different disabilities using Web  
sites, applications, browsers, and authoring tools. It is currently a  
draft, and will soon be updated to reflect current best practice."
http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/PWD-Use-Web/

A New Era for Accessibility
By Paul Harris.
"An impressive wave of computer-based technologies will soon help  
millions of people with disabilities communicate, learn, and become  
more productive workers. Learning professionals are invited to catch  
this global tide."
http://www.astd.org/TD/Archives/2009/April/0904_A_New_Era.htm

New Accessibility Guidelines Part III: Understandability
By Joseph C. Dolson.
"This article addresses “understandability,” and is part three in a  
series discussing the impact of WCAG 2.0 on your website..."
http://tinyurl.com/dcvn7d

PDF Forms and WCAG 2.0
By Mike Paciello.
"The recording and slide set from the PDF Forms & WCAG 2.0 webinar,  
presented by TPG in conjunction with Adobe, is now available.."
http://www.paciellogroup.com/blog/?p=197


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

30 Exceptional CSS Navigation Techniques
By Kawsar Ali.
"In this article, you will find a collection of excellent navigation  
techniques that use the CSS to provide users with an impressive  
interface."
http://sixrevisions.com/css/30-exceptional-css-navigation-techniques/

Ding Dong the Wicked Six is Dead?
By Bruce Lawson.
"My modest proposal to finally rid the world of the blight of IE 6 is  
published on ZDNet: It's time to end the misery of IE 6..."
http://tinyurl.com/dfnz44

Where Have All the Flexible Designs Gone?
By Craig Buckler.
"Has anyone noticed that flexible/fluid and elastic website designs  
are becoming rarer? Although it is not possible to determine numbers,  
it seems that flexible designs are not as popular or widespread as  
they were a few years ago..."
http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/04/17/flexible-designs-dying-out/


+03: DREAMWEAVER.

Advance Dreamweaver Design - For Web Professionals (Webinar)
By Adobe.
"Use the new CSS starter pages in Dreamweaver CS3 and take using CSS  
to the next level. Learn how to choose and customize the right design  
for your project. You'll learn how to optimize your content for  
different devices using CSS and the style rendering toolbar, as well  
as explore other CSS features, such as the unified CSS panel, Browser  
Compatibility Check, CSS Advisor, and more."
https://admin.adobe.acrobat.com/_a227210/p95014341/


+04: EVALUATION & TESTING.

Usability Testing Does Not Equal a Good User Experience
By Paul Sherman.
"...Find and fix usability is like making a turn. It's a good thing  
to do… If you know where you're going. And that's where strategy -  
and strategic user experience - comes into play."
http://www.apogeehk.com/articles/UTNotEqualToAGoodUserExperience.html


+05: EVENTS.

Do Web Accessibility Guidelines Guarantee Universal Design?
May 7, 2009.
Oslo, Norway.
http://tinyurl.com/d48vgr

Swedish Web Developer Conference
May 25, 2009.
Stockholm, Sweden.
http://www.swdc2009.com/

Spring <br /> Conference
June 9, 2009.
Athens, Ohio, U.S.A.
http://2009.sbconference.com/

Techshare 2009
September 16-18, 2009.
London, United Kingdom.
http://tinyurl.com/cwjke2

Full Frontal (JavaScript)
November 20, 2009.
Brighton, United Kingdom.
http://2009.full-frontal.org/


+06: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.

I Love Wireframes
By Ivana Jurcic.
Examples of interface sketches wireframes and prototypes.
http://wireframes.tumblr.com/


+07: JAVASCRIPT.

Debugging JavaScript: Understanding JavaScript Error Messages
By Rob Gravelle.
"One of the most pervasive criticisms about JavaScript is that it's  
painfully difficult to debug. The good news is that you don't have to  
be intimidated or turned off by JavaScript. In this article, we will  
be taking a look at the types of errors that you are likely to  
encounter in JavaScript development and how to minimize the chance of  
them cropping up in your code."
http://www.webreference.com/programming/javascript/rg31/

Callbacks vs Events
By Dean Edwards.
"A callback system works by storing event handlers in an array. When  
the underlying event is detected the dispatch system loops through  
the array calling the callback functions in turn. So what's wrong  
with that? Before I answer that, let's look at some code...."
http://dean.edwards.name/weblog/2009/03/callbacks-vs-events/

JavaScript and the Document Object Model (DOM)
By Paul J. Deitel and Harvey M. Deitel.
"In this chapter we introduce the  Document Object Model (DOM). The  
DOM gives you access to all the elements on a web page. Inside the  
browser, the whole web page-paragraphs, forms, tables, etc.- is  
represented in an object hierarchy. Using JavaScript, you can create,  
modify and remove elements in the page dynamically..."
http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1333888


+08: MISCELLANEOUS.

Interview with Accessible Twitter Creator Dennis Lembree
By Ian Lloyd.
"Accessify recently spoke to founder of Accessible Twitter Dennis  
Lembree, who is also behind Web Overhauls and web accessibility  
podcast Web Axe. We wanted to find out more about the background to  
Accessible Twitter, what prompt.ed it and where it might go next.  
Here's what Dennis had to say..."
http://tinyurl.com/ccvjl4

Designing for Big Data (video)
By Jeffrey Veen.
"This is a 20-minute talk I gave at the Web2.0 Expo in San Francisco  
a couple weeks ago. In it, I describe two trends: how we're shifting  
as a culture from consumers to participants, and how technology has  
enabled massive amounts of data to be recorded, stored, and analyzed.  
Putting those things together has resulted in some fascinating  
innovations that echo data visualization work that's been happening  
for centuries..."
http://www.veen.com/jeff/archives/001000.html


+09: NAVIGATION.

Let Your Links look like Links
By Roger Johansson.
"One of the strongest conventions on the Web is that links should be  
underlined and that underlined text is linked..."
http://tinyurl.com/dcp9sc


+10: PHP.

Math and Number Handling in PHP - The ABCs of PHP Part 6
By Peter Shaw.
"Last time we looked at text and strings in variables, in this  
episode we're going to continue with our exploration of PHP variables  
and delve deeper into math and number handling in PHP..."
http://www.phpbuilder.com/columns/peter_shaw04202009.php3


+11: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.

The Web of Data: Creating Machine-Accessible Information
By Alexander Korth.
"In the coming years, we will see a revolution in the ability of  
machines to access, process, and apply information. This revolution  
will emerge from three distinct areas of activity connected to the  
Semantic Web: the Web of Data, the Web of Services, and the Web of  
Identity providers. These webs aim to make semantic knowledge of data  
accessible, semantic services available and connectable, and semantic  
knowledge of individuals processable, respectively. In this post, we  
will look at the first of these Webs (of Data) and see how making  
information accessible to machines will transform how we find  
information..."
http://tinyurl.com/c3m9vx

The Road to HTML 5 - Link Relations
By Mark Pilgrim.
"The feature of the day is link relations..."
http://blog.whatwg.org/the-road-to-html-5-link-relations

rel=accessibility
By  Bruce Lawson.
"While I was on my holidays there was a storm(ette) about  
rev=canonical and how it isn't possible in HTML 5 because rev isn't  
in the spec. (Apparently, the answer is to use rel=shortlink  
instead)..."
http://www.brucelawson.co.uk/2009/rel-accessibility/


+12: TYPOGRAPHY.

The Typographic Desk Reference
By John Boardley.
"One can never have too many books about type and typography. One of  
the most recent additions to my own library is Theodore Rosendorf's  
The Typographic Desk Reference or, if you're in a hurry, simply TDR..."
http://ilovetypography.com/2009/04/21/the-typographic-desk-reference/

px - em - % - pt - keyword
By Chris Coyier
"When it comes to setting the size of type in CSS, you have lots of  
options. You can apply a “keyword”, like p { font-size: small; } or a  
numerical value. When using a value, you need to declare a unit of  
measure which itself has four options. Which is best? It depends of  
course. Let's take a look..."
http://css-tricks.com/css-font-size/

Real Fonts on the Web: An Interview with The Font Bureau's David Berlow
By David Berlow,  Jeffrey Zeldman.
"s there life after Georgia? We ask David Berlow, co-founder of The  
Font Bureau, Inc, and the first TrueType type designer, how type  
designers and web designers can work together to resolve licensing  
and technology issues that stand between us and real fonts on the  
web..."
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/realfontsontheweb

Fuck the Foundries
By Mark Pilgrim.
"The more I read about embedded web fonts, the more I crystallize my  
thinking. Take, for example, this latest “A List Apart” article where  
Jeffrey Zeldman interviews David Berlow..."
http://diveintomark.org/archives/2009/04/21/fuck-the-foundries

Web Fonts - Do Something Positive
By Kevin Yank.
"This debate isn't simple, but it isn't terribly complicated either..."
http://tinyurl.com/dzurhq


+13: USABILITY.

Facial Avoidance in Page Design
By William Hudson.
"In a separate study, Tullis and colleagues not only found that  
facial images reduced performance; they also had the completely  
unexpected effect of reducing user confidence. Figure 2 shows the  
quite common approach that was tested (with and without the images)"
http://www.syntagm.co.uk/design/blog/?p=21

You Can't Automate Everything
By Gerry McGovern.
"The biggest challenge a website manager has is to understand how   
humans work, not how content management software or search engines  
work..."
http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/nt/2009/nt-2009-04-20-web-automate.htm

How Text Formatting Can Enhance the Readability and Persuasiveness of  
Text
By Kath Straub.
"...Text formatting with ReadSmart improves readability and  
actionability.You demonstrated it..."
http://connect.humanfactors.com/profiles/blogs/how-text-formatting-can

In Defense of Eye Candy
By Stephen P. Anderson.
"We've all seen arguments in the design community that dismiss the  
role of beauty in visual interfaces, insisting that good designers  
base their choices strictly on matters of branding or basic design  
principles. Lost in these discussions is an understanding of the  
powerful role aesthetics play in shaping how we come to know, feel,  
and respond..."
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/indefenseofeyecandy

How To Use Help Elements To Improve Your Designs?
By Matt Cronin.
"When designing a website, the most important thing is to make it as  
usable and convenient as possible. On a website on which users could  
possibly get confused, it is best to include help elements. Help  
elements come in all different shapes and sizes: an entire page, a  
suggestion box or a quick tip. But they all have one thing in common:  
besides doing the obvious (i.e. helping the user), help elements  
provide an extra convenience that brings the website closer to that  
sought-after usability..."
http://tinyurl.com/d5ubbt

Why Do People Hate Usability?
By Peter J. Meyers.
"We're proud to introduce User Effect's newest staff member: our  
Muppet intern, Yoozer. Yoozer is here to answer your toughest  
questions about usability..."
http://www.usereffect.com/topic/why-do-people-hate-usability


+14: XML.

Switched
By Dave Shea.
Dave talks about switching from XHTML to HTML 4.01 because HTML5 is  
the future, not XHTML.
http://mezzoblue.com/archives/2009/04/20/switched/


[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+15: 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.

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As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to  
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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.]