February 3rd, 2010
Every mail client I use allows multiple entries in the TO field. Is the CC field merely a social convention now, telling someone “just FYI”, or is there a valid reason to keep using it? BCC certainly has its uses, but I can’t think of a valid reason to CC someone versus just using TO.
UPDATE – a quick search show some programmatic uses for CC, parsing names and doing something different with them. But beyond that, why use it?
Tags: conventions, email
Posted in random | No Comments »
February 3rd, 2010
Tensile vs. Shear Strength
I’m betting my daughter will be more excited about science from reading Mythbusters than anything I can possible teach. I can recall three teachers in my middle/high school years who got me excited about learning – I hope she has at least one like that.
Tags: famiily, teaching, xkcd
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January 27th, 2010
What they said: http://www.marco.org/355605805.
Instapaper has changed how I read anything online. I feel I give reading my focus and concentration again, and I enjoy it more now.
Tags: kindle, reading
Posted in random | No Comments »
January 25th, 2010
I’ve just started playing with a Palm Pre and ran across some strange UI behavior. Below are two screenshots of the Phone preferences.
In the first image, the ‘turned-on’ item “Show Contact Matches” is blue. So color indicated activation. Got it. Below it is the DTMF tones item. Here, the text of the label is blue, but the arrow next to the choice seems to indicate that I should touch that item to get other choices.
So already I’m slightly confused – do I touch blue items, or items with an arrow?
Next image:
Now I’ve got two more items, but this time not only are they blue, they have arrows as well?
To top it off, the activation area on each item is different. For DTMF tones, touching the blue label does nothing. Touching the black ‘choice’ item with arrow slides out the options, coming from the right hand side, closer to the choice item.
For Voice Network, touching ANYWHERE on the line gives the options, sliding out from the black choices area, even though the arrow is next to the blue label. Same for Data Roaming (Voice Network must be set to Automatic to see this option).
Overall, this is incredibly confusing. If the label should be blue, why are the toggle switches blue when activated, and the toggle labels black? If the options should have the arrow, why do the blue labels have it, even though I can touch the option? And why are the labels sometimes on the left, sometimes on the right?
Overall, and this is just a first impression based on a few hours, the Pre seems to be an attempt to mimic the iPhone that falls short. Right down to the ‘Inspired by and designed in California” message on the plastic insert.
Tags: bugs, palm, pre, ui
Posted in mobile | No Comments »
January 21st, 2010
I’ve started a list of questions to establish constraints for project work. These are targeted to web development (since that’s my area), but should be part of a larger series of questions that are asked when taking on a project. The idea is to discover the constraints the project runs under, and to force the issue on decisions that need to be made but have not. I’ll try to update these as they change.
Browsers
- Is there a specific set of browsers that must be supported?
If not, then the [http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/articles/gbs/](YUI Graded Browser Support) will be used.
- If there are specifics, please specify for the following browsers. OSes tested on will be Windows XP and OS X 10.5+.
Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Opera.
Window size
- What is the smallest window size that must be supported?
If not specified, then 800×600 will be used.
- What is the largest window size that will should tested against?
If not specified, then 1440×900 will be used (size of the laptop I test on).
- Is there a preference for a fluid or fixed layout? If not specified, a fluid layout will be used. If a fluid layout is preferred, will mockups/images at multiple screen sizes be provided?
CSS
- Is the project already using a library for CSS, such as YUI Grids?
If not, then http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/3/ Grids/Base/Reset/Fonts CSS files will be used. This will be accessed via a Content Distribution Network hosted by Yahoo or Google (in other words, the files will be served from an outside network to increase page speed and take advantage of caching).
- Is there any restriction against using conditional comments for various versions of Internet Explorer?
If not, these will be used to target CSS and javascript fixes to versions of IE as needed.
- Is there any issue with progressively enhancing the website for advanced browsers? This means that certain effects such as rounded corners will NOT show on out of date browsers, such as IE6.
If not, CSS3 techniques will be used to create effects such as rounded corners.
Javascript
- Is the project already using a library for javascript, such as jQuery, YUI, Blueprint, etc?
If not, then either YUI or http://jquery.com/ will be used, usually the latest stable version available. Again, this will be accessed via a CDN where possible.
Working in a code base or on my own?
- Will I be working in the production code base or creating my own prototype?
Accessibility
- Are there any specific accessibility requirements?
If not, then [http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/](WCAG 2.0 “The latest a11y guidelines from the W3C”) and http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/aria will be targeted/implemented in the code.
Agile, waterfall, other?
- Is there a specific methodology being used for the project that I will need to participate in, such as daily standups? What are the dates and times for those meetings, and what I am expected to contribute to those?
IDE/environment
- Is there a specific IDE or environment that must be used, such as .NET studio, Eclipse, etc? Is there a specific version control system that must be used?
If not, I will use a text editor and our own vcs repository.
Server side Languages
- Is there a specific server side language that I must use?
If not, PHP will be used.
Final deliverables
- I will deliver HTML, CSS and javascript, optimized for performance. This means the CSS and javascript will be minified. All of the above will be delivered as URLs on our server, generated from a Server Side Language such as PHP. Is this sufficient, or do I need to provide a zipped/tarred version of the files?
- Will I be helping to integrate the delivered items into the production code base?
Debugging
- Will I be expected/asked to help debug production code issues once a release has occurred?
Tags: constraints, web development
Posted in web design | No Comments »
