Siolon

Recently, the Internet Explorer team released IE 8 beta 2.  It’s a monumental leap forward for not only web designers but also the Internet.  However, it is not without controversy, but first it needs a little background. A Little Background Internet Explorer has for a long time been the bane of web developers.  Every since they won the browser war over Netscape (nearing a decade ago now) with what were judged unethical and illegal means which led to a monopoly investigation.  That was settled and Microsoft allowed to continue.  Since then web designers have had to hack, glue, and curse IE due (read more...)

I recently gave a presentation by this title at the Dayton [Ohio] Web Standards Group Meetup. Here are the slides that I presented as well as my references for the presentation. We also have a new Google Group for all designers interested in standards-based development regardless of location. Further Reading Comparisons XHTML 2 vs HTML 5 Preview of HTML 5 (X)HTML 5 Versus XHTML 2 HTML5, XHTML2, and the Future of the Web Specifications XHTML 2 HTML 5: W3C and WHATWG (read more...)

At work we are currently re-doing the architecture of our user interface (UI) layer. We sat down to discuss what our objectives should be in doing this initiative, and I found the objectives so compelling that I think it could apply to any user interface. Below are the major objectives in constructing a UI: consistency, usability, navigation, visual appeal, interoperability, performance, and accessibility. I should first say that this list and its corresponding description are not intended to be exhaustive. I realize that there are many layers of complexity in this endeavor. Also, you’ll see how inter-dependent (read more...)

The most important, and yet often under-valued tag in XHTML, has to be the anchor tag. It’s usually one of the first tags learned in XHTML, and it is usually because of its importance. Imagine if the anchor tag didn’t exist: there would be no “surfing,” users could only browse the Internet with the address bar, and ultimately the web would be a lot less interesting. There are some good practices in creating these tags, and that is the premise of this short tutorial. I want to emphasize meaningful links, accessible links, and well-formed links. Creating Meaningful Links Wikipedia has (read more...)

This file illustrates the way to include navigation dynamically to streamline your efficiency when updating your website. The code shows how to include navigation both with a text-based navigation and an image-based navigation. The code also includes a focus on XHTML and CSS compliance to W3C standards. Download File (read more...)