August Update

It’s now been a month since I moved house, and am still without a broadband connection due to BT taking it’s time installing a working phone line. So with access to a working Internet connection it seemed like a good time to catch up a little.

Thanks

Firstly I have to thank both Rosenfeld and Etre for linking to my review of the Web Form Design book. It’s a great feeling when the likes of Etre have highlighted my review as good enough to assist them in marketing the book. The reasons I want to say thank you is because not only have the links helped with incoming traffic in an otherwise quiet month but also the review and links are genuine. I know that it’s become increasingly popular for companies to approach blogs for reviews in return for free products, although I’m not against receiving freebies this blog is certainly not of a size yet to receive those sorts of perks. So to have bought the book myself, review it and then get such recognition is great.

Portfolio

Since launching the current version of my website the portfolio has remained fairly static and there are a few reasons for this. Predominantly I want the portfolio to show only the best of my work, which shows either a progression of skills or contains something not yet present in other sites within the portfolio. I also shy away from including sites where the involvement of the client has resulted in a design that has been too greatly modified to comfortably display as my own work.

I feel the new UK Bathrooms website meets both my own high standards and criteria for the portfolio and has become the latest addition. To read more please visit the portfolio section.

Browsers

The web browser is the one subject that gets the whole internet community talking and currently everyone is trying to figure out what impact the launch of new browser, Google Chrome will make.
The subject has already been covered everywhere in the blogosphere but I do have to highlight the 10 myths about Google Chrome as a good review. Personally I don’t see the benefits of Google entering the browser market other than to increase Google’s hold over the Internet. Their motto of ‘Don’t be Evil’ seems as applicable as “Four legs Good, Two Legs Bad”. The browser does appear to have some nice additions such as The V8 engine and applications shortcuts, although while still in beta there’s time for more to come. However knowing Google’s love of long beta periods (Google Mail anyone) we may never see a finished product.

Where Chrome leaves me cold, Internet Explorer beta 2 is fuelling a tiny flame inside me. IE8 is still far from competing with other browsers as my first choice browser but the IE team finally seem to be trying to fix their wrongs. The feature that has influenced my opinion most is the ‘compatibility view’, which on discovering a site with issues in IE8 allows the user to view the site as it was originally intended in an older browser. This potentially means that the IE team in working towards a more standards based rendering engine do not have to worry about sites breaking old sites as the compatibility view will remedy any problems. This feature is something I would like to see other browsers integrate as it effectively makes websites future proof.

I feel IE are finally moving in the right direction, they just have to speed up to catch the likes of Firefox and Opera.

Death to IE6

With IE8’s launch on the horizon and so many people going prematurely bald over IE6 there has been a growing discussion, led by the likes of 37 Signals and Facebook, to finally stop supporting IE6. There are loads of varying opinions floating around from outright abandonment to charging extra for support. Personally I will support the browser wherever I think the audience share is large enough.

Part of being a web developer is creating the best experience for your users, pushing the boundaries of what is available but gracefully degrading the experience for older browsers to ensure the best experience possible. Changing extra for support only shifts the responsibility to the client who may not be educated enough to understand the issue, or in the case where they may not use IE6, be completely unaware of the issue unless as a developer you tell them. Hopefully as time goes on IE6 will disappear, but then will the focus then move to IE7 as developers look for a browser to blame for holding them back?

FOWA

After attending the FOWD conference earlier this year I’ve decided to take a trip to FOWA this October. Although not able to justify the stretch to the conference tickets as I personally do little in the way of web applications, I decided at £5 having a look around the expo floor with good friend Scott Mallinson would be well worth it. The plan will be to blog about my experience at FOWA like I did previously at FOWD and hopefully get some good freebies along the way.

To Come

Hopefully when I have broadband installed the blog will jump back into life with more frequent blog posts as well as new additions to the portfolio and image sections. The plan is also to upgrade the version of wordpress so hopefully that should go without incident.