5th june 2006

oh lordy, it's the scrutinizer

the scrutinizer has 'bookmark' written all over it. it's a home for all of the tests that we - developers - should be doing on everything we build. these tests include code validation tests, accessibility, search engine optimization and browser compatibility. very, very handy.

just try to ignore the design as it screams "web2.0!!!" at you continuously.

visit the scrutinizer.

related:

accessibility,

css,

web,

web dev

permalink:

http://www.oneplayer.co.uk/06/06/05/oh-lo...

20th april 2006

would hide a stain on your wall

when the thecssweblog wrote this week of a poster that "conveys the importance of web standards visually" i saw myself printing several out and sticking them all over my work's office, but...

i don't want to sound awful, but does anyone else see any kind of rhyme or reason in taking the time out to create something like the standards in a nutshell" poster? i'm sure natalie jost is a very nice person, and her site is very nice too, but c'mon. thecssweblog states that it "may be the key in driving home the point to those who have seemed unable or unwilling to grasp the concept". how exactly does it do that? imagine taking that into your next project pitch, and saying "you really should consider us because all our sites are developed with web standards in mind, observe...", and holding your "standards in a nutshell" poster up.

again, i really don't want to sound awful, but at least just present it as a quirky, humorous little poster to stick on your wall rather than "how to best explain web standards to someone unfamiliar" or something that "conveys the importance of web standards visually" (thecssweblog, not natalie).

if only zeldman had thought of this, 'designing with web standards' could have been a flyer.

related:

css,

web dev

permalink:

http://www.oneplayer.co.uk/06/04/20/would...

10th april 2006

w3c taming the xmlhttprequest animal

missed this last week - you may have noticed i haven't posted for a while as i've been soooo busy - but the standardisation of ajax seems to be on it's way.

the w3c kids published their first working draft on, my friend and yours, the xmlhttprequest object on wednesday. they're aiming to provide more interoperability between the various implementations of the object, so i guess no more new ActiveXObject / new XMLHttpRequest browser sniffing type code.

no doubt this will take a long, long time, but it's nice to know that they're making a start.

you can read the whole w3c working draft if you want to.

related:

ajax,

web,

web dev

permalink:

http://www.oneplayer.co.uk/06/04/10/w3c-t...

19th january 2006

"standards - schmandards! we have sport!"

you know what makes me angry? no? ill tell you... espn - the worldwide leader in sports - have just relaunched their new home page, "streamlining (their) navigation to better organise the most comprehensive sports content on the Web". now you would think that such a major site, with so much money behind them, and the site that gives the most "comprehensive sports content on the Web" would have heard - and have the quality of developers, or at the very least the budget to hire them - about such crazy ideas as standards compliance and accessibility. but no.

i just can't understand how a site as big as this can be happy with producing over 1900 - yes, i said 1900 - errors when their homepage code is passed through the w3 markup validator. why use an xhtml 1.0 transitional doctype if you're gonna completely ignore it's rules? turning the css off produces a list of almost 350 links - and nothing else - before we get to anything that even resembles 'content'. and you've then got a good few full turns on your scroll wheel before we get to the day's 'main story'. so they must have various 'skip' links then? nope.

it just amazes me that, in 2006, such large, popular, important sites can still get away with this. espn, if you're reading this (yeah, right), you need to hire me. espn developers, using "div" instead of "table" does not a quality-built site make.

if you like, you can take a look at this crap.

related:

rant,

sites,

web dev

permalink:

http://www.oneplayer.co.uk/06/01/19/stand...