Decided to mix it up a little on the blog today. Instead of tips on coding or deep thoughts on the future of the web, I decided to do a quick walk through on a new and improved feature that the design team has been using pretty regularly. If you have any questions feel free to ask in the comments and I'll do my best to respond.
One great side effect of having no standard way to convert a website for mobile browsing (sorry CSS, it's still not happening) is taking some time to sit down and think what should go on your mobile site.
With the recent homepage redesign it is clear twitter is out to take a chunk of the search market. Searching the web using twitter is a different type of search though. Traditionally search results are presented to a user because the search engine tells them these are the results that are most relevant. The end user really has no connection to that result and really doesn't understand why such a result is ranked and presented to them. Nearly all of the data in these search engines is either crawled by bots or submitted by individual sites.
The twitter search approach is much different. When you search for a topic you are presented with a bit of commentary then a link to an article or blog that relates to the topic you are searching for. The relationship information that you get when searching on twitter is what makes it important. You now have the individual's twitter name, their commentary, as well as when it was "tweeted" so you can take this all into account before you decide if that bit of information is relevant. All of the content you are searching is user submitted so only information that users feel is relevant is added to the search pool.
As usual there are people out there to game these systems but a relationship based search is definitely a smart move and I look forward to the evolution of the real-time web integrating with traditional search.
Right now each type of search has its place but be on the look for a merger of the two types. From a PR perspective its potentially a reputation management nightmare but definitely something to think about.
What are your thoughts on the future of real time search?
I'm constantly intrigued by how other designers execute different effects and styles on the web. The other day I figured out a quick way to create a fantastic looking pie chart in Adobe Illustrator.
As I was checking out the consumerist.com today, I noticed an article about Aviary.com and their Terms of Use. Normally, Terms documents are terrifically difficult to understand. This one, however, includes plain English explanations alongside the legal-jargon.
This is a fantastic little step forward to a better web, and one that I would love to see become more popular.
At 12:00 PM, Eastern Standard Time, most eyes were on the swearing in of Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States. But at the same time, a total redesign of the President's official website, whitehouse.gov, was being launched.
Our logo (the gear) lends itself to many-a-unique uses. It's been used to depict Rudolph on last year's Christmas card, a throwing star held by a ninja on some company t-shirts, and even used as a knock-off of the good 'ol Jolly Roger. We're always trying to come up with new ways to use and new things to put it on.
As a company brand evolves, it's often easy to forget about little things such as the email signature. The email signature, which appears at the close of a message, is usually where contact information exists, consisting of info like your name, title, dept, website, address, and phone number. I say "usually" because many people feel this is a spot to showcase a little bit about themselves. They do this with such things as banners, animated gifs, inspirational quotes, and even their photo. Read more →
Why do we put a copyright in the footer? Why not a publish date?
In web design we commonly put footers in the bottom of the page which include links, legal information, and usually a copyright date. But why? And is there something else we should include? Read on and I promise not to use any more bad puns.
Being very fond of the analogy of web design/development-as-architecture, I was overjoyed with this article, by Jeffrey Zeldman, on Alistapart: Understanding web design.
There isn't much more to say; it's the usual web-design-isn't-just-looks,-guys, but very eloquently and effectively worded. The kind of stuff to put on the wall.
Depending on how well of a response I get I might be doing this more. Figured since the holidays are right around the corner and you all have been pretty good lately I could give you a free mini button set. :) Enjoy
I just finished coding a new photography contest application for a client, and our graphic designer alerted me to some weirdness that Safari has with PNG images. To make a long story quite short, Safari doesn't translate PNG colors to match CSS colors reliably; it darkens them just a bit. The details are beyond me, so instead check out this article for those, and you can see an example in this image. The example labeled "Your Version" is the Safari rendering, and the box labeled "Our Version" is the Firefox rendering.
For you, this means that you shouldn't use PNG images where color matching is important, use GIF instead. However, if PNG use becomes more widespread, hopefully the treatment of PNG images by browsers and OSs will become more standard and can replace GIFs - which have fewer colors and larger filesizes.
When I was back in school, I would often tell people how my combined Art and Computer Science majors did not mean that I was doing graphic design, web design, or any other kind of mix of computers and art. To them, it was obvious that I would combine two usually separate majors into the usual combination. To me, however, art and computer science are totally separate. The purpose of art is in my mind to either 1) evoke an emotional response in your viewer or 2) create something beautiful. Computers are a communication medium, and the purpose of communication is to deliver information.
You can see examples of this every day - in websites of art schools that are impossible to divine information out of, or in strictly information websites that have no graphical content whatsoever. In the case of these two ideas, the graphic-less sites win out in function and usability, but the art school sites look better. The problem is, that the art school sites are impossible to use, and so it doesn't matter how good they look. The clear winner here is the plain, yet content centric site. And the lesson to learn is that content is king, and communicating that information well and effectively is the key to building a good website. Read more →
Two dollars is a small amount, but two is a magical number. Despite it's seeming insignificance, two represents the difference between doing a job, and doing it right.
One summer while I was still in college, I worked in a brewery in Colorado waiting tables. I recommend that everyone work in a restaurant at some time in their life. It teaches you a lot about life and service. While I was working there, I began to understand the value of such a small amount, and how much good work is worth.
I ran across a neat article from Sitepoint via Stylegala that you all should read on how to make your HTML 'perfect'. In the world of design, the concept of perfect is non-existant. There is no solution that will work for solving every problem, and there are exceptions to every rule. This article is no different. Read the full article, and then check out my comments. Read more →
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