Of all the tyrannies,a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.
I found this quote by C.S. Lewis is some recent reading and wanted to share it. I think its extremely timely.
One of the difficulties of web development is that no O/S or browser renders designs in quite the same way. It’s time consuming (and sometimes impossible) to get your design looking just so for every possible combination. It’s also hardware and software intensive. Not everyone has access to PCs running Windows 98,XP,and/or 2000 plus Macs with OS 9 or OS X plus Linux or Unix machines,not to mention the plethora of browsers available on those platforms.
Drum roll please…until now. I stumbled across browsershots.org yesterday and it’s wonderful!
Enter the URL you want test in different platforms and browsers and browsershots.org uses distributed computing to snap screenshots in your choice of browser/platform. Those screenshots are then uploaded for your viewing pleasure. Problem solved.
I don’t get it.
I went to the mall today to run an errand and grab some lunch. While I was there,I saw two high school kids walking around.
One had headphones on and the other had a cell phone glued to his ear.
Why did they even go together?
I don’t get it. I guess I’m old.
Last week I finished one of Citigroup’s Online Learning Courses and got certified in “Upgrading Web Development Skills from ASP to Microsoft® ASP.NET”
They made the mistake of giving me access to their entire online learning catalog (which is like giving a kid free reign in a candy shop) so this week I’m starting an introduction to C# course.
I also received a trial “ASP.NET Using Visual C# 2005 ” training CD-ROM from www.appdev.com so I need to try that out.
It feels good to finally be learning .NET/C# after putting it off for so long. Or not necessarily putting it off but finally making it a priority and being able to cross it off my To-Do list. Hopefully you’ll see me posting some .NET-related Brainbench certifications here in the next few months before my subscription there expires in November.
I’m pretty excited that this week I added some pretty cool drag and drop functionality to an application I’ve been working on. I talked about Yahoo!’s UI library here a while ago and finally put it to use.
I’ve been converting a PowerPoint presentation and exercises used by Human Resources to train new hires into a web application and drag and drop seemed like the perfect design for a term matching exercise.
The application isn’t available outside our corporate network but I hope (I use that term loosely given the frequency of my posts lately) to post some examples of what’s possible at some point.
I don’t want to downplay my Javascript skills but Yahoo! has made it pretty easy to implement these libraries. There’s a downloadable zip of dependent files for each library that developers link to in their applications. After that,the API provides you with the methods for adding whatever interaction you like. I was able to put together a passable application in an afternoon and now it just needs some polishing and finishing touches.
Check out Yahoo!’s UI Library and create!
It’s been well over 90 here today and after spending 10 hours in front of a computer during the day it’s just too hot to do it now. I am wondering one thing however…
I saw a realty sign today that had this name on it: Spaminato. If that was really your last name,how could anyone ever receive email from you sent using your real name?
If you’ve wondered what I’ve been up to all this time,you’ll be glad to know that michaelrichardmurphy.com is almost complete.
That will be home of my web development business. I’ve mentioned here a few times that I’ve been working with some clients on the side and now I’ve started to get more serious about it.
The announcement will be made here within the next few weeks so stayed tuned. Hopefully when that’s complete,I’ll have a little more time to start writing here again since I’ve been working on some cool things that I’d really like to talk about.
A few thoughts:
The Student Loan Corporation is pretty good about employee appreciation. They put on about 6,very nice,internal events a year that differ in themes. There’s always a holiday party around Christmas time but throughout the rest of the year they mix it up with events like an Olympic-themed series of games,a Casino Night,Spring Break,etc. Pictures from these events get posted to the Internal Events page of the intranet. A screenshot of that page is below:
What you can’t tell from that picture is that most of the images are animated gifs. Between all the movement and the differing,non-matching,background colors,I go into convulsions everytime I see this page. When it was time this week to post the latest round of pictures,I couldn’t take it anymore. It was time to spruce things up a little so I took an hour or so to do some spring “cleaning”:
Now each event is linked to by a ‘polaroid snapshop’ of an icon representing it rather than a dancing turkey or swinging medal. I like its cleaner,more professional look. What do you think?
I am pleased to announce the debut of BVEMusic.com.
BVEMusic.com is the website of Brendan Van Epps,a jazz saxophonist from Syracuse,New York. This website supports the release of Brendan’s new CD,When She Dances. The site also allows Brendan to communicate appearance dates to his audience. BVEMusic.com interfaces with Brendan’s existing Paypal account,providing fans with a simple convenient way to purchase When She Dances.
Please join me in congratulating Brendan on his new website,BVEMusic.com,and wishing him much success in the future.
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