Behind the Screen
The opinions, views, and insights stated within this Monologue are my own. The facts, fallacies, and errors, however, belong to someone else (see disclaimer).
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
Mom, this post is just for you.
I know I make fun of you for being my site's biggest fan. So when I came across this story from The Onion about a 30-year-old who just learned that his mother discovered his Web site, I couldn't help but think of you. Here's the story and a few quotes that made me laugh out loud.
The Onion | Mom Finds Out About Blog
MINNEAPOLIS, MN—In a turn of events the 30-year-old characterized as "horrifying," Kevin Widmar announced Tuesday that his mother Lillian has discovered his weblog.
"Really, the blog is just a record of what I think about the world and how I spend my free time," Widmar said. "In other words, exactly the sort of information that no 30-year-old wants his mom to have access to."
"I know Mom will instantly become the site's most avid reader and most vocal fan," Widmar said. "As I write it, I'll think, 'How would Mom feel about this?' Even worse, I'm sure she'll give the address to all our relatives."
Thanks mom for being my biggest fan.
SprintPCS.com released its new re-designed Web site this weekend that meets Web Standards for XHTML and CSS. This is big news, for it's another comercial site that has made the conversion to a more accessible Web.
There are only a few comercial sites that try to meet Web Standards. Most of the sites that do try to design to these standards are hobbiest sites like my own, or sites that are designed for Web developers (like A List Apart and SitePoint).
Every time a comercial site joins the Web Standards movement, my job gets just a little bit easier for I'm able to show our clients another example of how standards could benifit them.
The site that really got it all started was Wired, back in October 2002. Other standard-based comercial sites include...
It's limited, I know. But it is growing.
Thursday, November 13, 2003
By the way, if you are ever interested in submitting an article to ALA, members of their team are great to work with. Simply stroll over to their Contribute page to learn more.
I simply pitched my idea to Erin Kissane (managing editor and producer) and Jeffrey Zeldman (site designer). Within a few days, Erin wrote back saying she liked the idea and that I should put something together. So I did.
A few weeks later, I finished my article and sent it back their way. They responded within days, made only a few changes (thanks, they were good changes), and posted it that Friday.
I have no idea if the process is as painless for others, but I found them to be a pleasure to work with. So if you've got a good idea, don't sit on it. Pitch it to ALA so that one day, others can benefit.
I've received good feedback on my CSS/PHP article, which was published by A List Apart last Friday. Though some are critical of the PHP code I used, many have liked the article and offered ideas to expand upon it. Thank you all for the great comments. Do keep them coming -- yes, even the critical ones.
Though I'm pleased by the response, I wish I had been a little more prepared. For starters, I'm embarrassed by my personal Web site's state of affairs. I really should have taken the time to clean it up, update content, and improve its code. Though I'm not unhappy with my site, it just doesn't accurately reflect my abilities.
For you non-programmers and designers, it's like inviting everyone over for an open house before finishing your kitchen counters. And if I ever wanted an open house for my personal Web site, publishing an article on ALA was the grand invitation.
On Friday, November 7, traffic to my site soared within hours of my article's posting. On a typical day, I used to get about 30 unique visits a day (27 of which are likely my mother). Now, my site receives more than 100 unique visits each day, averaging 3.3 pages per visit.
Google rankings also jumped. A search for Jason Pearce has held the top ranking for several years. Other projects I've worked on appeared in the search results, but in no particular order.
Now? Well, my article on ALA is listed second in Google's rankings. Furthermore, all of those other projects that I've worked on have jumped up to the top as well. Now my obscure Peace Corps profile and genealogy research receive similar acclaim. Oh the power of Google's PageRank technology.
Sadly, it will be some time before I perform some house cleaning on my personal site. So, thanks for dropping by -- please excuse the mess.
Friday, November 07, 2003
It gives me great pleasure to report that A List Apart accepted and published an article of mine. For the next week, my article appears on the front page of their site.
A List Apart Magazine (ISSN: 1534-0295) explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on techniques and benefits of designing with web standards. I've learned so much from them over the years and wanted to give a little back.
So I submitted an article on how to use PHP and CSS to keep track of your current page in navigational menus. Here it is:
Keeping Navigation Current With PHP: A List Apart
by Jason PearceTurning unordered lists into elegant navigational menus has become the new favorite pastime for many web developers. Adding a unique id or class attribute to indicate which menu item reflects a user’s current page, however, can become laborious. Even if you use body id attributes instead, as ALA does, some labor is involved and it is easy to make mistakes. But thanks to PHP, we can add these current-page indicators automatically." ...more
Thanks ALA for the years of ideas, tutorials, and articles.
TechTV just highlighted a neat tool that identifies colors. I will be using this tool alot, for it will keep me from having to capture screen shots and pasting them in Photoshop to identify colors.
Nattyware / Pixie: "Pixie is an easy-to-use, fast and tiny utility designed especially to fit the needs of Webmasters and Designers. Its a colour picker that includes a mouse tracker. Run it, simply point to a colour and it will tell you the hex, RGB, HTML, CMYK and HSV values of that colour. You can then use these values to reproduce the selected colour in your favorite programs. Pixie will also show the current x y position of your mouse pointer. Its the only tool you'll need for working with colours."
Monday, November 03, 2003
I had a rather festive weekend. On Friday, the roommates and I dressed up in costume and headed out to SoNo, Norwalk's bar district. Scott dressed as Gilligan and Adam dressed as a hockey player. I was Scuba Steve. There were many in costume, which made for a fun evening.
Saturday was for Winter cleaning. The big project was moving the game room, which contains the Xbox and PS2, from the non-insulated porch to the nursery room upstairs. It was kind of a big project because the room upstairs had become storage. That, and getting a big TV upstairs was a pain. But now our thumbs won't freeze when we want to enjoy a few games.
Saturday evening Adam and I joined Scott and his buddies for a game of poker. Though I consider myself a novice at the game, I've managed to come out ahead all three times that we've played. Perhaps a solid three-months of cards while in the Peace Corps helped.
On Sunday, we finished up the remaining Winter-cleaning jobs. That evening, I took the train into NYC to have dinner with Merritt Olsen and two of her friends. She finished the race in under five hours with a time of 4:55. She was happy with the time, but rather sore. Nice job Merritt.
That's about it. Oh, I did submit an article to A List Apart, one of my favorite online magazines that focuses on Web development. The editors seem to like it, so we'll see.