Digital Web Magazine

We’re pleased to announce that we have a winner in the Voices That Matter: Web Design contest.
Congratulations to Krista Kostuch! She’s scored a free pass to the conference, which takes place in San Francisco later this month. Check out her winning entry here. Thanks so much to everyone who sent in an essay – it was tough deciding which one to choose!

So just last night I was sitting at a bar with Mike Davidson of Newsvine and a bunch of crew from MSNBC.com including Digital Web Magazine’s own talented Production Manager, Tiff Fehr. Unbeknownst to me but a deal was being made (the news was under embargo so go figure). Today the news went public, MSNBC.com Acquires Newsvine. You can read all about it on NewsVine and I am sure everyone and their mother’s dog is going to be blogging this one. So, lets take a moment and step outside of the deal itself. What does this mean to the news media industry as a whole and how will inpact the way we think of news? In short, dramatic change of pace.

For those who never have used Newsvine the short skinny is that it provides both community contributed news as well as wire news, rates it, and the good ripe stuff comes to the surface. This all good and the way news should have always been, brought to you according to what people believe is important.. people in your community. I know that others such as Dan Gillmore have explored and put great effort into the idea of citizen media. Today’s acquisition is the first is what I believe will be a long line of events surrounding the news media world in it’s transition to where we are today, to being truly news by the people for the people.

That said, congratulations to Mike Davidson and the entire Newsvine team. Also big congrats to MSNBC.com for making the first big step in the right direction.

This week Digital Web is proud to feature an excellent lesson on client-side load balancing by our newest contributor, Lei Zhu. Lei offers inventive tips to make sure your next awesome web application scales effectively. So take a moment to learn more about load balancing, app scalability and intelligent DNS management.

In addition, the clock is ticking down to the final moments of our contest for a free pass to Voices That Matter: Web Design. If you have a free moment between now and midnight tonight (PDT), give our contest a shot by answering

In your opinion, what voice will matter to the world of web design in the near future?

Hurry! Time is running out! Judging begins tomorrow, and the winner will be announced shortly!

The UI JavaScript library, Ext JS, has revealed their milestone 2.0 release, together with revised API documentation and a clean new design for their website. From its humble beginnings as a set of UI components built on top of Yahoo!‘s code, Ext has grown into a powerhouse of a library, with comprehensive documentation, a large user community, and (since v1.1) a native adapter on top of the original YUI/Prototype/jQuery flavors. If you haven’t already, check it out.

Anyone wanting to score a free pass to Voices That Matter: Web Design had better get cracking: the contest deadline is October 1st, 2007 at midnight (PDT). That’s tomorrow!

Check out the contest page for the details, and start writing. The person with the best essay wins! It’s like grade school, only with better prizes. And no dodgeball.

We’d like to remind you the deadline is near for Digital Web’s contest for a free spot at Voices That Matter: Web Design. The contest deadline is October 1st, 2007 at midnight (PDT). To enter, just answer our question:

In your opinion, what voice will matter to the world of web design in the near future?

Contest rules apply, and get your answers in soon! Your chances of scoring a free pass are good, so get writing.

Want to get into Voices That Matter: Web Design for free? Who doesn’t, right? Voices That Matter: Web Design is one of the premiere web design conferences of the year, and it’s coming up October 22-25, 2007 at the Grand Hyatt in San Francisco. Digital Web and Voices That Matter want to see you there! We’re giving away one free pass to the best response to the following question:

In your opinion, what voice will matter to the world of web design in the near future?

To enter, just send your response to the question (observing the rules) to digweb.contest~at~gmail.com. The contest starts tonight at Midnight (Pacific Daylight Time), and runs one full week, until midnight (PDT), October 1st. Check out the official details and get writing!

This week Digital Web brings you an in-depth interview with the talent behind Sidebar Creative. Digital Web’s own Matthew Pennell steals a moment from the boys (web experts Jonathan Snook, Bryan Veloso, Dan Rubin and Steve Smith) to learn more about their “freelance co-op”. This interview is a must-read for freelancers who enjoy working with a team of talent.

Also, very shortly we’ll be posting the kick-off for Digital Web’s contest for a free pass to Voices That Matter: Web Design, coming up October 22-25, 2007 in San Francisco. In just a minute (like, right after this issue posts), we’ll announce the contest topic, terms and official rules. Get ready!

A recent post by The Identity Woman alerted me to the upcoming unconference ShesGeeky.org, October 22-23, 2007, in Mountain View, CA at the Computer History Museum. In light of the ongoing discussions on women in technology, it’s encouraging to see further promotion of women-oriented geek events. In their words:

The She’s Geeky (un)conference will provide an agenda-free and friendly environment for women who not only care about building technology that is useful for people, but who also want to encourage more women to get involved.

She’sGeeky includes a registration wiki with profiles of planned attendees from all walks of the technology world, so the unconference topics should be fantastic.

In addition to the alert about She’s Geeky, The Identity Woman also mentioned O’Reilly’s ongoing, well-written September article series about Women in Technology: Hear Us Roar. O’Reilly’s series and the discussions about them are very strong, and cover some excellent topics. I hope this dialogue continues into the conferences and topics of 2008.

Ok, so after four sessions (one roundtable, one panel, one platinum session and one presentation) I am pretty beat, but I am looking forward to the last presentation of the day, Derek Featherstone’s closing keynote on Real World Accessibility… well that, and the Adobe/Coffee Cup party tonight! I can sleep later. I am live blogging this one.

Derek just took the stage after J doing his intro and thanking everyone for the conference. Derek points out that there is someone signing for a deaf attendee in the front row and is happy to see a conference putting accessibility in the forefront like that.

Ok, now Derek is swashing the “compliance” issue were it leads to a checklist syndrome. He uses the analogy that if we have rounded corners and gradients we are web 2.0 compliant. It just doesn’t work that way. He goes into a story about how a client didn’t care about one accessibility aspect cause it wasn’t on their compliance checklist. It doesn’t make since. It can be our start point but it can’t be our end point. Looking at accessibility as user experience expands our horizons.

Molly is heckling again :) She was calling out what Derek’s solution for radio buttons being more accessible to users who don’t have highly precision input devices such as using your knuckle to click on something. His “hack” is to use a user-side CSS file to increase the size of the radio button. Molly was saying he shouldn’t call it a “hack”.

Derek had a pretty good example of how someone with a screen reader can not use Google Maps since the map navigating buttons are not in fact buttons at all, they are divs. So seeing that he wanted to have a map on his ironfeather site he use the Google Maps API to hide their div-button zoom features and instead created his own zoom features that use the button tag.

Now Derek is talking about Flickr and editing the title element of a photo page. He points out the new addition of the edit link so people with keyboards can access this functionality that they may have not noticed before.

On to Amazon with a screen reader. He’s doing a search and the JS menu pops up. Then the screen reader had to read the source attribute of the image tag because there is not alt text.

Designers and developers need to work better together. And what I mean by that is translating from visual to code. He goes into an example of how someone designed a menu and how a developer built it.

One last example, crazy accessible crossword puzzle made out of XHTML form fields styled by CSS with a little bit of javascript. You gotta see it to really understand how crazy this thing is.

Derek is starting to wrap up. Its all about the people! Git ‘r dun!

So far the Webmaster Jam Session has been a huge success. Much larger turnout than last year. A lot of great speakers, far more than last year by all accounts. I think the thing that really made this year’s event was that each presentation was unique and intriguing on a level I rarely see at other conference, but also that there seemed to be an overarching theme of having cross-disciplined teams. For example, designers that known and understand how CSS and XHTML work. Developers who get what makes a good grid or architecture. There has also been a lot of talk about mobile experience and overall a better quality of user experience. Once again the guys at Coffee Cup have put on an amazing event.

John Maeda’s TED talk is not to be missed. Take a few minutes to watch. You’ll love it, and be thinking about it the next time you design, develop, create, or even make lunch. John is the brilliant man at MIT behind the book The Laws of Simplicity.

This week, Digital Web is proud to feature Andy Budd, who offers up some handy tips about Contract Killers. …Work contracts, not the more nefarious type, calm down. Andy sheds light on the art of quoting design/development work, and also covers alternatives contract types that might better fit certain projects.

In addition to a thorough breakdown of contracts, Digital Web is keeping track of a bevy of upcoming conference activity. Webmaster Jam Session kicks off next week in Dallas, Texas. Also, this past week the folks behind Web Directions North ’08 issued a “Save the Date”. Get your mid-winter travel plans under way early, because WDN’08 is set to throw down January 28-February 02, 2008, in Vancouver, BC and Whistler. As an attendee of last years’ conference, I highly recommend both the top-notch conference and the camaraderie of throwing yourself down Whistler-Blackcomb with other web geeks.

Also, a quick reminder for our upcoming contest in conjunction with Voices That Matter: Web Design conference. VTM:WD (if I can call it that) runs October 22-25th, 2007 in San Francisco. Digital Web has a free ticket to one lucky reader willing to try our little contest. Details coming soon!

GoogleBlog just mentioned a fun new feature called Google Presentation. It seems the much-rumored counter-offering to Microsoft’s ubiquitous PowerPoint is now out! It looks pretty slick alongside Google Doc’s online word processor and spreadsheet tools, and completes a strong set of publishing tools—all for the price of an internet connection, which is hard to beat. The GoogleBlog post also includes a very helpful video about online collaboration by our good friends at Common Craft. CommonCraft’s video helps explain the benefits of online collaboration with Google Docs. Lee and Sachi recently went full bore into unique, compelling video explanations, and as a fan, I think this one is their best yet.

Just published on the New York Times (and, I’m assuming this is not an April Fool’s Joke, given that it is currently September): Times to End Charges on Web Site

Some relevant passages:

The New York Times will stop charging for access to parts of its Web site, effective at midnight tonight. The move comes two years to the day after The Times began the subscription program.

In addition to opening the entire site to all readers, The Times will also make available its archives from 1987 to the present without charge, as well as those from 1851 to 1922, which are in the public domain. There will be charges for some material from the period 1923 to 1986, and some will be free.

(Hat tip to Sean McDonald‘s Tweet)

The iPhone is hot. The announcement of the iTouch (touch screen iPod) bolsters interest in these micro Macs. Yesterday’s announcement of the open source and free SIM unlock for the iPhone may be the event that allows for greater uptake and popularity of the iPhone in the world-wide hand-held market

The list of iPhone apps that are “out there” will continue to grow. Just a week ago we saw a great list of iPhone apps from ModMyiPhone. Right now developing iPhone apps seems to be the thing to do. Bravo for experimentation, innovation, and fun!

I’ve heard this a lot lately, and it is one of my favourite sayings too: just because we can, doesn’t mean we should. As professionals, we should always be looking for wonderfully simple solutions to the problems that we face. I find Jeffrey Zeldman’s tweet timely and appropriate:

That sweet iPhone Twitter client: http://twitter.com/home (iPhone has a browser, remember?)

Thank you for the reminder, Jeffrey!

Back from our late-summer break, Digital Web has a slew of news for you with this issue! First and foremost, we have another installment in our popular Web Design 101 series. Virgina DeBolt stops by to help us all wrap our noggins around floats in CSS. Beginners, this is a great introduction. Experts—don’t lie—we could all stand to improve our understanding of floats, one of the cascade’s more complicated concepts.

Secondly, Digital Web is glad to feature an excerpt from Kevin Potts’ new book, Web Design and Marketing Solutions for Business Websites. Kevin covers the basics of how to connect to your customers through an effective website. Focusing on landing page techniques, product page design and individual product pages is the key to keeping customers on the buying path.

Thirdly, I’d like to renew our thanks and appreciation to our Technical Director, Walker Hamilton. During our break, Walker launched Digital Web Magazine on a new CMS. This is the first issue published on the new system. Kudos, Walker!

Lastly, Digital Web is fortunate to sponsor the Voices That Matter: Web Design conference, coming up October 22-25th, 2007. In connection to the event, Digital Web is giving a way a free conference pass to one lucky reader. Contest details are coming soon to this very news feed. So stay tuned, and win a free pass to Voices That Matter: Web Design!

For those who have not registered for the Webmaster Jam Session, now is your chance kick it like a rockstar! The folks at Coffee Cup are giving you a chance to win an upgrade to a Presidential Suite at the Adam’s Mark hotel. That’s right, this is your chance to impress the hell out of your colleagues and friends by throwing the biggest hotel room party ever and invite everyone you know, cause there is certainly room in this 2,180 square foot pad! So what are you waiting for? Register before September 13th and you could win! Get jam’n, there are only three more days left to rock this deal!

After complimenting Brighton on the quantity and quality of its gay population. Tom Coates of Yahoo! Brickhouse — the internal startup incubator where they are designing for the internet of the future — wants us to realise that “your site is not your product.” You must be part of the web of data, find paths through that web, and turn those paths into navigation.

The idea of what we think of as a product is changing, says Coates: Google, Flickr, Upcoming, Facebook, they have all escaped from the browser and pushed into other environments, and they can all be built upon — creating more fun, value and enthusiasm in their users. The web is changing from a network of pages connected by links into a web of data connected by services and APIs, and anywhere the network goes, these products have an outlet: “ubiquitous invasive computing”.

Design for re-combination, we are told. It drives people to your service, and puts you in the middle of an ecosystem. FireEagle is a Brickhouse project about location (“it’s where you’re at!”). By sharing information on your current location, there is a huge amount of data you can access and provide to users.

Datasets are useful the larger they are, so pretty soon you’re going to have a scaling problem. How do you find your way around all that data? With more data, says Coates. Whether created during the production of the data (e.g. Flickr’s camera type and aperture information), obtained through direct analysis, or through crowd-sourcing (e.g. tagging), more data means more relationships between pieces of data, and thus more pathways through it.

Matt Webb, of design consultancy Schulze & Webb, knows lots of long words and isn’t afraid to use them. Conversational Implicature. Positive Interpersonal Emotion. And Adaptive Design, which is the somewhat obscured central point of his talk. “Design is the conscious and intuitive effort to impose meaningful order.” (Victor Papanek)

Webb’s Experience Stack of human factors (tangible, cognitive), interaction (customization, sociality), product (products and people living together), service (the life-cycle), and brand (implicature, or the tendency to find illusory order in what is said), is just one in a series of disconnected slides that bounces from quotes (“Nothing is easier than believing we understand experiences we’ve never had.” – Gwen Bristow; “We assume that the problem is with us, and not with the products we’re trying to use.” – Jonathan Ive) to defining what makes a product (shelf-demonstrable, explainable in a sentence, for an audience, identifiable, measurable, and predictable), to at one point apparently controlling his slides with a Wiimote. A key takeaway is the value of customization to the user experience; options are “lazy design”, whereas customization “bridges the gap between products and people”.