Internal Server Error
what the voices in my head tell me to write
Monday, September 03, 2007
which comes first
The html or the css?
For a change I am currently working on a lot of box-fresh new designs rather than extending existing stuff. There are lots of very detailed design in psd or jpg form for me to convert into nice semantic html/css.
Its been interesting working out the best way to create the semantic meaning of content in html and then convert that into a working layout using css. Starting from scratch means I have complete control but also means a lot more to work out.
Labels: css, webdevelopment, wireframes
Permanent link and Comments posted by Rob Cornelius @ Monday, September 03, 2007
Friday, August 03, 2007
semantic HTML is hard to do
I am working on a rather complicated form for a new project at the moment. Its a search form basically but there are a few more options than the google front page. There are all kinds of faceted search features on there which require a lot of form controls.
I have got the basic layout working (in FF at least) using just <fieldset> tags instead of <div> tags. <ul> tags provide lists of form controls and there are <legend> and <label> tags everywhere. Everything is semantic and accessible. I even carefully chose the id and class attributes of the elements to add even more meaning.
Now I have the achieve the layout required. Now I have to add in empty <div> tags to create nice borders and curved corners. Straight away there has to be a compromise and loss of semantic meaning. Ok so a <div> doesn't really have any semantics attached to it but when it wraps other tags there is an implication that it is "superior" to them.
I just cant wait for CSS3 when I can attach images to borders and corners.
Labels: css, webdevelopment
Permanent link and Comments posted by Rob Cornelius @ Friday, August 03, 2007
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Back to javascript for form validation
Many years ago I used to spend ages with dreamweaver doing form validation stuff. I pointed and clicked to my hearts content setting up validation rules.
Then Jackob Nielsen came along and said "too much javascript is a bad thing. Do server side form validation instead." And we saw it was a good thing and did server side form validation.
Recently we got absolutely fed up with using JSF for forms at ingenta for one of the projects we are working on. Its a nightmare at the best of times and it cant handle dynamically generated forms which is what we wanted to do. So guess what we are using for form validation now? Go on guess.
I spent some time skipping around the DOM with javascript myself to try and write my own script to do it. Then I thought, "Why bother, someone else must have done it before me.
This is a great way of doing things. Include the libraries, a few snippets of javascript to link it into the page and a bit of css and away you go.
I can't help feeling I am going round in little circles though.
Labels: webdevelopment
Permanent link and Comments posted by Rob Cornelius @ Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Monday, January 15, 2007
this is what I have been talking about
I just read IA as an extension of web design over at digital-web.com. This is what I think is missing with so many aspects of web developement in general. The recognition that there are not really hard boundaries between the various "disciplines" involved in creating a large scale web site.
OK so you might have a DBA creating a schema who can't write a line of HTML and doesn't want to but they still have to be aware that users of the site and therefore the database will be expecting data in a certain format and also they may well be generating data in various formats too.
But in the realm of actually putting stuff on the screen there are a large number of different roles that contribute. Engineers writing the middleware, graphic designers, IAs, IDs, and humble web monkeys writing the html and css. All of them tend to have different terminologies and jargon for exactly the same things. An engineer will use a language like UML to describe something that an IA uses a wireframe and a html developer uses a bunch of markup and css.
The article is written by an IA so the writer sees IAs at the center of web development and everyone should use the same names for things as the IAs deliverables. Fair enough you have to pick one naming system I guess so why not use the IAs instead of the database schemeas or middleware's names for objects. The point of naming your CSS clases to fit wireframes is valid. I hate sites that have classnames like .bigBlueText. Why not use .formHeading or something meaningful
I also saw a recent job posting that supports this view. The IA position was described as being a mediator between the coding and design departments and as a user centered design champion (come back 2001 you job title is here) IAs can perform this role. Its not quite a project manager role but its ensuring that everyone has a common focus. It might not be IA focused or user focused but as long as everyone can sign from the same hymn sheet its going to be a lot easier.
Labels: IA, webdevelopment
Permanent link and Comments posted by Rob Cornelius @ Monday, January 15, 2007
Saturday, January 13, 2007
taking wireframes too literally
Or when to just admit something won't fit.
Sometimes you get given some wireframes and page mock-ups that just cant be done. The most annoying sort are ones that look simple but due to the limitations of the technologies your working with you just can't acheive the "layout" in a wireframe.
A lot of people seem to think that a wireframe is a page mock up. To my mind they are two totally different things. A wireframe shows the content that should go on the page. It illustrates groups of content and the relationships between content but it isn't prescriptive in how you implement the layout. A page mock up is one step down from the final HTML. It has nearly all the features of the final page and looks pretty much like how the final page should look.
So why do so many people treat wireframes as mock ups? They get so annoyed if you tell them "It won't work that way".
Of course web developers like to think they can achieve any layout you care to dream up. And pretty much say that sort of stuff regulary. Give them the change to hand code every last bit of code and this is easyish. Once you start working with code that generates code you are hamstrung by the quality of the generated code. If your code generating code writes bad HTML there is nothing you can do about it.
So in this situation even the most carefully crafted page mock up might be impossible.
The moral of the story is you dont know exactly how things will turn out until you try them.
Labels: IA, webdevelopment, wireframes
Permanent link and Comments posted by Rob Cornelius @ Saturday, January 13, 2007
