User Interface-UI Designs

120 Excellent Examples of CSS Horizontal Menu

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 20:22:00 +0000

Menu is an important element of website. Menu has to be user-friendly and match the design in order to facilitate navigation. In this list you will find 120 excellent examples of css horizontal menu.

Free vector ui patterns for web apps

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 06:41:00 +0000

here are a set of ui patterns i've created for myself. you can download it for free; modify, share, do whatever you want with it. (adobe illustrator cs recommended. tested with adobe illustrator cs, adobe photoshop, adobe fireworks)

download it: ui patterns.zip (2,3m)

package contains:

input box
text area
buttons
golden ratio box
links
pulldown menu
checkbox
optionbox
image placeholder
browse field
scroll bars
tabbed menu
tabbed box
header menu
search box
pagination
captcha
mini calendar
rating stars
breadcrumbs
uploading indicator
logo placeholders
volume slider
some text blocks
icons for: email, search, close, cancel, player actions, settings, information, calendar, fullscreen...

file formats

adobe illustrator 9 .ai
adobe illustrator cs .ai
adobe illustrator 9 .eps
pdf

let me know if you need the set in any other format or about the modified versions you make.

quick tips for beginners:

always use pen and paper to sketch. it's faster this way.
use a thick marker while sketching.
after you are done, use this set to see the results in more realistic view.
test, test, test. ask your friends if you have no budget.
"text is the ui." use dummy text only in the very early stages.
start designing with the smallest unit such as name field for a sign up form; or a blog item for blog site.
don't fell in love with your design. be open to change.

19 most useful articles from web on Adobe AIR

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 10:01:00 +0000

This post might help you guys in reaching out most of the awesome and robust applications which has been developed using Adobe AIR. Below are the respective article, which I came across in the world of web (might be more than which I have listed below) might help you in some aspects. Below listed are some of the articles which has helped me a lot in learning basics of Adobe AIR.

http://www.developersnippets.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/adobeair.jpg

What is Adobe AIR?

Adobe AIR is a cross-operating system runtime that enables web developers to use their existing web development skills, code and tools to build and deploy rich web applications and content to the desktop.

Adobe AIR has a rich set of features, with support for building applications using HTML, JavaScript, Flex and Flash.

Adobe AIR War Desktop Example – theflashblog.com
Six must-see Adobe AIR sample applications – adobe.com
101 Adobe AIR Resources to Add to Your Toolbelt of Awesomeness – jasonbartholme.com
Adobe AIR for Linux – labs.adobe.com
How to update Adobe AIR applications automatically with JavaScript – AIRUpdater.js – robertnyman.com
Super-simple SQLite example for Adobe AIR 1 Beta – seantheflexguy.com
Adobe AIR Goes to Work: 6 Apps for the Corporate Desktop – readwriteweb
Simple Tasks v2 – Multiple lists, NativeWindows and Reminders – extjs.com
Adobe AIR Series – Truveo Sample App – dev.aol.com
Examples of Adobe® AIR™ Applications with ActionScript 3 Code Provided – interactivemultimedia.wordpress.com
10 Adobe AIR -Must See- Applications – webresourcesdepot.com
Adobe AIR SpitEmOut Video Example – theflexblog.com
Keep your eye on this AIR application: Pownce – riapedia.com
Walk on AIR: Create a To-do List in Five Minutes – sitepoint.com
Adobe Air – Chromeless Window Example Application – jonathanhfisher.co.uk
Backbase Enterprise Ajax in Adobe AIR – bdn.backbase.com
Cool RIA Sample Apps: Buzzword, Parleys.com Beta – canoo.com
AIR, what’s it good for? 3 sample apps – downloadsquad.com
30+ Great Adobe AIR Apps for Designers and Developers – mashable.com
If you have more useful articles related to Adobe AIR, please do post a comment, so that I can add the same to this post. And please do send in your valuable suggestions on this post.

source:http://www.developersnippets.com/2009/01/12/19-useful-articles-from-web-on-adobe-air/

12 Quick Tips To Search Google Like An Expert Read more

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 11:39:00 +0000

If you’re like me, you probably use Google many times a day. But, chances are, unless you are a technology geek, you probably still use Google in its simplest form. If your current use of Google is limited to typing a few words in, and changing your query until you find what you’re looking for, then I’m here to tell you that there’s a better way – and it’s not hard to learn. On the other hand, if you are a technology geek, and can use Google like the best of them already, then I suggest you bookmark this article of Google search tips. You’ll then have the tips on hand when you are ready to pull your hair out in frustration when watching a neophyte repeatedly type in basic queries in a desperate attempt to find something.

The following Google search tips are based on my own experience and things that I actually find useful. The list is by no means comprehensive. But, I assure you that by learning and using the 12 tips below, you’ll rank up there with the best of the Google experts out there. I’ve kept the descriptions of the search tips intentionally terse as you’re likely to grasp most of these simply by looking at the example from Google anyways.

12 Expert Google Search Tips

Explicit Phrase:
Lets say you are looking for content about internet marketing. Instead of just typing internet marketing into the Google search box, you will likely be better off searching explicitly for the phrase. To do this, simply enclose the search phrase within double quotes.
Example: "internet marketing"
Exclude Words:
Lets say you want to search for content about internet marketing, but you want to exclude any results that contain the term advertising. To do this, simply use the "-" sign in front of the word you want to exclude.
Example Search: internet marketing -advertising
Site Specific Search:
Often, you want to search a specific website for content that matches a certain phrase. Even if the site doesn’t support a built-in search feature, you can use Google to search the site for your term. Simply use the "site:somesite.com" modifier.
Example: "internet marketing" site:www.smallbusinesshub.com
Similar Words and Synonyms:
Let’s say you are want to include a word in your search, but want to include results that contain similar words or synonyms. To do this, use the "~" in front of the word.
Example: "internet marketing" ~professional
Specific Document Types:
If you’re looking to find results that are of a specific type, you can use the modifier "filetype:". For example, you might want to find only PowerPoint presentations related to internet marketing.
Example: "internet marketing" filetype:ppt
This OR That:
By default, when you do a search, Google will include all the terms specified in the search. If you are looking for any one of one or more terms to match, then you can use the OR operator. (Note: The OR has to be capitalized).
Example: internet marketing OR advertising
Phone Listing:
Let’s say someone calls you on your mobile number and you don’t know how it is. If all you have is a phone number, you can look it up on Google using the phonebook feature.
Example: phonebook:617-555-1212 (note: the provided number does not work – you’ll have to use a real number to get any results).
Area Code Lookup:
If all you need to do is to look-up the area code for a phone number, just enter the 3-digit area code and Google will tell you where it’s from.
Example: 617
Numeric Ranges:
This is a rarely used, but highly useful tip. Let’s say you want to find results that contain any of a range of numbers. You can do this by using the X..Y modifier (in case this is hard to read, what’s between the X and Y are two periods. This type of search is useful for years (as shown below), prices or anywhere where you want to provide a series of numbers.
Example: president 1940..1950
Stock (Ticker Symbol):
Just enter a valid ticker symbol as your search term and Google will give you the current financials and a quick thumb-nail chart for the stock.
Example: GOOG
Calculator:
The next time you need to do a quick calculation, instead of bringing up the Calculator applet, you can just type your expression in to Google.
Example: 48512 * 1.02
Word Definitions:
If you need to quickly look up the definition of a word or phrase, simply use the "define:" command.
Example: define:plethora

Hope this list of Google search tips proves useful in your future Google searches. If there are any of your favorite Google expert power tips that I’ve missed, please feel free to share them in the comments.

HOW TO FACE INTERVIEWS

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 04:44:00 +0000

Sample Interview Questions: How will you answer? Your career may depend on it...

Tell me about yourself...

(Your answer should contain much more about your job skills than your personal life.) Talk about the growth of your career, what you learned from previous employment or even things like how your volunteer worked help you develop your organizational, time management and leadership skills.

What are your strengths?

(If you really enjoy new challenges and tackle them in an organized manner, this would be a useful strength in almost any situation.) You can talk about your ability to find unique solutions to problems. Be prepared with some concrete examples, since that may be the follow-up question.

What are your weaknesses?

(A "good" weakness might be that you have trouble leaving the office behind when you go home in the evenings.) This is a very difficult question that is not asked often, but it's one you should prepare for anyway. If you talk about your temper, your tendency to gossip or the fact that you're lazy, you may as well pack up and go home right then. If you mention a weakness such as your lack of patience with people who don't do their share of the work, you should also mention that you keep this impatience to yourself and try very hard not to express it toward others.

Do you have any questions about our company?

(If you have paid attention during the interview and if you have done your homework, this would be a good time to ask for more details about some aspect of the company's organizational structure or products. It would not be a good time to ask about your first raise. You could also ask questions about the community, their training program or details about the work environment.)

Where do you expect your career to be in 10 years?

(Be careful here. You do not want to give the impression that you're simply using this company as a stepping stone to another career. Think of a related managerial position within the company that would interest you.) There is a story about a young accountant who was asked this question by a CPA firm during an interview. The young accountant replied that he saw himself as the comptroller of a large corporation. In other words, "I'm just using your firm to teach me and then after you spend your resources training me, I will leave to go work for someone else." Needless to say, he was not offered a position with the CPA firm. They know that 75% of the people they hire will leave within 10 years, but they do not want to hire someone who comes in with that plan.

What skills do you have that would benefit our company?

(If your skills are not exactly those that the company may have requested, you can point out the skills you have that would be valuable to any company. Examples of these skills are: your ability to plan and execute long-term projects, your ability to organize information into usable data, your ability to research complicated issues, or your ability to work well with a team.) If your skills are not perfect for this particular company, you can mention how quickly you were able to adapt and learn in other situations. Again, be prepared with specific examples in case you are asked to elaborate.

Why did you leave your last job?

(This is not an opening to speak badly of your former employer. There is almost always a way of wording the explanation so that you do not sound like a "problem employee" and your former employer does not sound like an undesirable company.) As unfair as it may seem, there is almost no time when you should say something bad about your former employer. You can talk about the lack of potential for upward mobility, the fact that your job responsibilities changed to the point that it no longer fit into your career plan, your need to move to be closer to your aging parents, the need to reduce travel time, your need for a more challenging job, or anything else that does not get into personalities or other conflicts. If you were fired for cause, you may want to be up front about it, explain the circumstances and accept responsibility for your actions. Practice your answers to this question with someone who has interview experience. However, don't lie. If you can't say anything positive about your former employer, don't say anything. It could come back to haunt you.

IMPORTANT INTERVIEW TIPS:

1. Arrive a little early. If you arrive about fifteen minutes before the scheduled interview time, you will have time to collect your thoughts, wipe the perspiration from your hands, and scan the lobby for current company information. You will also show your interviewer that you value his or her time.

2. Do your homework. Know the interviewer's name and how to pronounce it. Know the company's major products or services, the organization of the company (divisions, parent company, etc.), current business news about the company and the company's major customers and competitors. You can learn most or all of this information from the company's website, annual report or company literature.

3. Bring a Spare Copy of Your Resume.

4. Expect to Spend Some Time Developing Rapport. Personal chemistry is a main ingredient in the hiring process. Try to relax and become comfortable with the interviewer.

5. Watch Your Non-Verbal Communication. Maintain an open body posture and appropriate eye contact. Seat yourself at a reasonable distance from the other person. Smile.

6. Don't Be Embarrassed by Nervousness. Interviewers are human, and they often become nervous, too. In fact, nervousness is a good sign - it shows that you are taking the interview seriously. Avoid nervous mannerisms such as tapping your fingers, feet, playing with pens, etc.

7. Body language is powerful! Good eye contact, a warm, natural smile and a firm handshake can help you overcome nervousness, develop a personal rapport and present a confident image.

8. Don't Play Comedian. It is important to be personable, but do not overdo it.

9. Don't Exaggerate or Lie. You might be tempted to embellish your achievements in the interview, but it will come back to haunt you on the job!

10. Follow the Interviewer's Lead. Don't try to take over the interview. Stick to the main subject at hand, but do not dwell too long on one point. It is better to deal with many questions rather than just one or two in-depth questions, unless that's where the interviewer leads you.

11. Be Prepared For Personal Questions. Anticipate how you will handle personal questions without blowing your cool. Some interviewers may not be aware of what they can and cannot legally ask you. Be sure you understand the question. It is okay to ask for clarification.

12. Emphasize the Positive. Be frank and honest, but never apologize for lack of experience or weaknesses. You can be self-confident without being overconfident If you are new to the job market, your lack of experience has one very positive feature: you do not have to "unlearn" bad habits or different practices learned from previous employers.

13. Many employers like the idea that you can be taught their individual company procedures without needing to get rid of other training first.

14. Wait for an Offer to Bring Up Salary. Let the interviewer bring up this subject. Often salary and benefits are not discussed at all on the first interview. Even though everyone knows that salary is important, you do not want to give the impression that it is the only consideration. If it is, you can be easily lured away be a competitor offering a slightly higher salary. The interviewer needs to see that you are interested in the other aspects of the job like the potential for growth, learning or the challenge of the position.

15. Don't be Afraid to Think Before You Speak. Use silence and intentional pause to your advantage. Time is occasionally needed to think and to reflect. The interviewer will respect you for taking a questions seriously enough to give it a moment or two of consideration before answering.

16. Emphasize What You Can Do For The Organization. This means emphasizing your transferable skills. However, be careful not to reveal trade secrets from a previous employer. Employers are concerned most with what you can do for them. Focus on your ability to tackle new situations, your communication skills, interpersonal abilities, analytical thinking talents, and other skills developed while in college or in previous positions.

17. Don't give "Prepared Answers". Most employers know a these stock answers when they hear them. This is a good reason to use interview question / answer guide as just that - guides. If your answers are not personalized to your situation, they will sound forced and unnatural. You might be surprised to learn how often interviewers hear the phrase, "I really like working with people." The phrase is used so often that it has lost it's meaning!

18. NEVER Speak Badly about a Former Employer. If there were problems with previous experiences, try to put your answers in the positive rather than the negative. If you slight a former employer, the interviewer may assume that you will someday do the same to him or her.

19. Watch Your Grammar and Your Manners. Employers are interested in candidates who can express themselves properly. Even if you have to slow down to correct yourself -- do it! Use slang expressions very sparingly. If your knowledge of rules of etiquette are rusty, take a "refresher course" from a knowledgeable friend.

20. Be Prepared to Ask Questions. Almost all interviewers will ask if you have any questions. You should have some ready and should have at least one that is related to the conversation you have just completed. This demonstrates that you are both prepared and interested. Your questions should be related to details about the company and should be based on the information you learned from the homework you have done. You should not ask questions like "How long to I have to wait before I can take a vacation?" Save those what's-in-it-for-me questions for later.

21. Use Telephone Interviews. If you are applying for jobs in places in other states, you can suggest a short telephone interview. Even a preliminary telephone interview can help you assess whether or not it would be worth your time and expense to travel for a personal interview.

22. Don't Expect an Immediate Job Offer. Offers usually follow the interview, a few weeks later. If you are offered the position on the spot, it is appropriate for you to ask for one or two days to think about the offer before responding.

23. Be Careful With the Closing. Thank your interviewer for the interview. Smile.

24. Be Yourself! You do not want to get hired on the basis of something you are not. You want to be hired for who you are!

Good communication skills are like a stimulating black coffee, just as hard to sleep after….Anne Masrow Linbergh

Being in HR one needs to be a very good communicator. But by having mere “Good Communication” will do? Guess NO. Along with good communication an effective HR should also have good attitude and ample amount of patience (which actually one should have in one’s professional/personal life as well).

Having “Good Communication Skills” will definitely do but they are like an ingredient for any dish, one will any how have it if he is hungry but being presentable is more important. Good communication skills along with polite and sweet talk are like icing on the cake that one must adhere to while communicating. These icing do wonders they make the customers buy it and eat it as well, same is with HR, the softer and polite a HR is, the sooner people are impressed and the work gets done.

Not many of us get into top industries where all are highly educated and excellent in their communications. We at many times encounter people who are not even average at their Comm. Skills; this is where your attitude and people skills get into the action. By being in a consulting firm this is your daily cup of tea, you need to listen to people, convince them and follow them for jobs, training etc. During this phase of your day you need to be quite patient, good listener, and have that smile on your face in order to show them that you are having great time talking to them (which is trust me a Hercules task).

Yes!!! One should not be arrogant in dealing with such people (no matter how bad your mood for the day is) else your prospective candidate is lost (as we all work in target driven industries). But, lets us not ignore that, YES!!! Polite and sugary talks is one such attribute which every person should possess or imbibe (especially if your have just stepped in the industry) as many people like to be addressed in a polite and a sweet manner.

No doubt one has to have good communication skills but at the same time the icing is very important, else people may buy it but may not actually have it. In fields like Marketing and HR these are the key attributes one MUST HAVE in order to succeed in life.

ALL THE BEST for all those who are going to take their step into the industry and hope the next time you are communicating your thoughts or ideas before them, you make sure that you are polite and sweet towards them.

DRESSING RIGHT!!! DOES MAKE A DIFFERENCE...

Do you know it takes less than 20 seconds to make that first impression and in casting this, the way you look matters the most. You either make it or you don’t.

In this expanding and fierce global village, every single organization is now seeking for employees who are versatile in all the aspects. “Being domain specific”- is no longer the mantra, employers hire individuals who are “Generalized” (General here means having little or adequate knowledge in all the functionalities of the industry).

Employers in today’s scenario are seeking for individuals who are presentable and extroverts. When s/he is employed in an organization from that very first day they become the face of the organization, which indirectly portray the work cult of the organization as well.

I work as a HR in a Consulting firm and my daily job includes interacting with different cadre of people. As I work in a Consulting firm my day starts with seeing different people looking for jobs, and that I end up judging them and there level of intellect (through the way they carry them selves ). YES!!! One does cast an impression when you look at them, which is an undeniable fact.

It has been seen that organization fires employees who do not adhere to the dressing rules mentioned by them. These days it is compulsory that when one goes for an interview or work place maintaining proper and decent attire is a must.

By being into HR field, people tend to follow you. HR becomes the face of the company. They generally look up to you for your communication skills, people skills, and other non-verbal aspects as well where dressing also plays a vital role. It has also been observed that people are more inclined to you when you’re properly dressed and presentable that is when people take you seriously.

No matter in which field/domain you are in or which industry you belong to, you need to be respected and looked up for, this not only makes you feel good but also boosts your confidence levels from within and also helps you in having an edge over the others.
Powered: http://www.theskillmill.blogspot.com/

How-To: Disable and Re-enable USB Storage Devices

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 16:05:00 +0000

The motivation behind writing this post came when over the weekend, i got a chance to meet a few friends who happen to work with an IT Giant here in Bangalore. After a cup of coffee and usual discussions, one of them pointed out that they have an interesting situation in their office, wherein the System Admin team has disabled access to the USB Port thereby leaving their iPods, Digi cams, USB Sticks useless in workspace environment.

To disable the access to USB port, in windows XP and 2000, follow the steps below
1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. In the Open box, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Locate, and then click the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\UsbStor
4. In the right pane, double-click Start.
5. In the Value data box, type 4, click Hexadecimal (if it is not already selected), and then click OK.
6. Quit Registry Editor.

To re-enable a disabled port, follow these steps below

1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. In the Open box, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Locate, and then click the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\UsbStor
4. In the right pane, double-click Start.
5. In the Value data box, type 3, click Hexadecimal (if it is not already selected), and then click OK.
6. Quit Registry Editor.

10 Amazing Avatar movie Photoshop Tutorials

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 19:05:00 +0000

3D computer graphic adventure Avatar is the most expensive film in history, it took $500 million and 10 years to make. The James Cameron film, uses pioneering 3-D technology and computer graphics.
Here is a compilation of some great Photoshop tutorials which will help you to create your own Na’vi Avatar from a picture of yourself.

1. Na’vi Avatar Photo Manipulation

This is a Photoshop tutorial showing you all the steps you need to take in order to photo-manipulate yourself into a Na’vi (based on the characters in James Cameron’s movie “Avatar”).

2. How to create Avatar Movie Poster in Photoshop

Tuhin is the founder of Inspiring Pixel, and in his first tutorial for the year 2010, he shows you how to create the Avatar movie poster in Photoshop.

3. Turn yourself into Na’vi from James Cameron’s movie Avatar

It’s Johnny Depp’s turn to be avatarized in this french tutorial (screenshots for every step). You can translate the whole page into english with Google Translator for exemple.

4. Birth of an AVATAR

Peter Ammentorp Lund (an art director based in Copenhagen), has made a video showing the step by step process of transformation.

5. Create James Cameron’s AVATAR Movie Poster in Photoshop Tutorial

In this tutorial you will learn how to make your own Avatar movie poster from a portrait picture of yourself, using some simple but efficient techniques.

6. Creating Avatar Movie Wallpaper

Here is an interesting tutorial how to create Avatar movie wallpaper in Photoshop.

7. Zei’s Na’vi Avatar Tutorial

This tutorial is designed to guide you through through the precess of creating your own Na’vi Avatar in Photoshop CS4.

8. Avatar Tutorial by ~Siryann

This is an Avatar photomanipulation done in Photoshop CS3. This tutorial is not for “experimented” persons i think, you just have not to fear and you can still erase and try new things.

9. Avatar Movie Photoshop Tutorial

Anybody with medium photoshop skills, will have no problem following this Avatar Movie tutorial.

10. How to Photoshop Yourself Into an AVATAR Na’vi

Sasha H. Muradali, like a lot of other Photoshop addicts, was awed by the graphics in James Cameron’s ‘Avatar.’ In this tutorial that she made, you can learn how to transform yourself into a Na’vi.

Web Developer ann UI designer Interview Questions

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 19:56:00 +0000

The main technologies required for a web developer are CSS, HTML and JavaScript. A good web developer also needs to have a grasp of and interest in both web standards and accessibility. While most web developer roles require other technologies such as Unix, Apache and server management, MySQL & PHP or SQL & ColdFusion or other dB and programming technologies, CVS, Perforce, or other source control management interfaces, I am only going to cover the technologies that span all Web Developer job descriptions: HTML, Web Standards and Accessibility, CSS and JavaScript.

The main skill I look for in a web developer is intelligence*, a desire to learn and an adoration of web standards. These questions target knowledge rather than capacity to learn. So, for each question remove 2 points if the answer, whether correct or not, sounded like it was quoted from a text book or this blog entry (unless, of course, you are interviewing me). Add points for interviewee efficient thought processes: if they didn’t know the answer to start with but figured it out in the end.

Please have a look at Web Developer Resume Screening for thought on how to filter through resumes to find good Web Developer applicants.

* Note: Intelligence ≠ Education. A Masters or PhD may just mean that they had the time and money to delay getting a job. Look for people who can think, not ones who regurgitate text books.
Please note that these questions are two years old.
… and … quoting @seldo: “I am adding ‘Can you use the men’s room without peeing all over the floor?’ to my list of phone screen interview questions.” Generally not necessary if interviewing women.

XHTML, CSS & JavaScript Web Developer Applicant Questions

XHTML Web Standards Interview Question

Question:
What is a DTD? What DTD do you generally use? Why? Pros and cons.

Answer
See the bottom half of DTD: the Document Type Declaration

Answer Rating:
Completely wrong answer though pretends to know it
I don’t know (I give points for honesty), trying unsuccessfully but honestly to give the right answer
Knowledge of the definition, but doesn’t know why they are used.
Knowledge of which one to use and why
Explanation of Quirks mode versus Regular mode and analysis of which one is best for different media
Accessibility Interview Question
Question
Tell me some considerations in selecting font size?

Answer
Font sizes should be declared using relative measurement values, such as ems, via a style sheet, without the use of the term !important. There are issues with browser font size enlarging which can be rectified via CSS.

Answer Rating
uses tag
Gives an answer using pixels using CSS
Explains that font size should be declared using relative font sizes
Explains that font size should be declared using ems or percentages
Gives the answer above
CSS Interview Question

Question
a) What are the possible values for the display attribute that are supported by all browsers?
b) What is the default value for the display attribute for the image element? (what is the difference between inline and block level elements)
c)What does display: run-in do?
d) Difference between “visibility:hidden” and “display:none”? What are the pros and cons of using display:none?
Answer
main values: none, block, inline, list-item, run-in
all values: inline block list-item run-in compact marker table inline-table table-row-group table-header-group table-footer-group table-row table-column-group table-column table-cell table-caption none inherit
default value: inline, block or list-item, depending on the element. The is an inline element.
Run-in should make the run-in element be the first line of the next sibling block level element, if it is before a block level element that is not floated or absolutely positioned. If the next sibling is positioned or floated, then the run-in element will be a block level element instead of appearing in-line.
PPK’s Quirksmode explains it well. The w3schools lists table display values.
When visibility is set to hidden, the element being hidden still occupies its same place in the layout of the page. If the display is set to none, the element does not occupy any space on the page — as if it didn’t exist..
Answer Rating
Doesn’t know
Knows the answer to A
Knows the answer to A and D
Knows the answer to A, B and D
Knows the answer to C too!
CSS Interview Question

Question
a) What are the five possible values for “position”?
b) What is the default/initial value for “position”?
c) How does the browser determine where to place positioned elements
d) What are the pros and cons of using absolute positioning?
e) if they are really advanced, ask about IE z-index issues with positioned elements.

Answer
a) Values for position: static, relative, absolute, fixed, inherit
b) Static
c) They are placed relative to the next parent element that has absolute or relative value declared
d) Absolutely positioned elements are removed from the document flow. The positioned element does not flow around the content of other elements, nor does their content flow around the positioned element. An absolutely positioned element may overlap other elements, or be overlapped by them.
e) IE treats a position like a z-index reset, so you have to declare position of static on the parent element containing the z-indexed elements to have them responsd to z-index correctly.

Answer Rating
Doesn’t know
Knows 4 out of 5 answers in part A
Knows A & B
Knows A, B & C
Knows A-D
Knows E too
CSS Interview Question

Question:
Write a snippet of CSS that will display a paragraph in blue in older browsers, red in newer browsers, green in IE6 and black in IE7

Possible Answer:
#content p{color:blue}
html>body #content p {color:red}
* html #content p{color:green}
html>body #content p {*color:black;}

Answer Rating
Doesn’t know
Knows how to declare one color, but no hacks
knows the html>body hack and * html hack
Knows all the hacks, but doesn’t validate or uses conditional comments in the HTML
Gives you the right answer and explains why the CSS won’t validate, or, uses a valid hack, other than conditional IE comments, instead of the above answer.
Basic Javascript Interview Question

Question:
What is the correct way to include JavaScript into your HTML?

Answer:
See Including Javascript in XHTML for answers.

Answer Rating:
and other incorrect answers
verbally explains the theory but doesn’t know how to do it
correct explanation using inline event handlers or inline code
discusses and knows how to implement javascript event listeners
Explainst how you include JS within an XHTML document and ensure it validates using CDATA, explains
Basic Javascript Array / XHTML Form Interview Question

Question
Are the following all equal, and, if so, what would your code look like to make the following all equal the same thing:

alert(document.forms["myform"].elements["field"].value);
alert(document.forms[1].elements[1].value);
alert(document.myform.field.value);
answer:

Answer includes knowing that the form is the second form on the page, and that the field input element is the second element within that form.

Answer Rating
Doesn’t know how to code forms and doesn’t know that the first index of an array is 0.
Knows either how to code forms with valid XHTML or that array starts at 0, but not both.
Knows how to code forms but not correctly, but omits something like doesn’t know that the form needs to be the second one on the page, and the element is the second one in the form. Would know how to do it if they actually put thought into it.
Codes the form correctly, but uses ID instead of name
Codes everything correctly
JavaScript Interview Question

Question:
How do you dynamically add a paragraph with stylized content to a page?

Possible Answer:
newParagraph = document.createElement('p');
newParagraph.setAttribute('class', 'myClass');
newText = document.createTextNode('this is a new paragraph');
newParagraph.appendChild(newText);
myLocation = document.getElementById('parent_of_new_paragraph);
myLocation.appendChild(newParagraph);
Answer Rating:
Wrong Answer (i.e. “you can’t”), I don’t know.
Use JavaScript, with no knowledge or incomplete knowledge of how that is done. Suggesting innerHTML, but not really knowing. Or explanation of accessibilty issues surrounding this.
Able to explain how you create a node, add content to the node, add a class attributes to that element, and then add that node as a child of the parent element (the above example)
Explanation of how to do it (worth 3 points) and explanation as to issues that arise when doing it, such as screen readers not knowing that text has changed, IE6 and IE7 not applying styles included with added content, not duplicating IDs, etc.
Has no clue how to do it to start, but can figure it out with guidance: extra points for the quick learner!
Other questions ideas:

Q: How do you organize your CSS? How do you come up with id and class names (what naming conventions do you use)?
A: While there are no right answers, there are best practices. Issues to look for are not having div mania, no inline CSS, no presentational markup, minimal use of classes, understanding the CSS cascade.

Q: What do you think of hacks? When should you use them? If you use them, how do you maintain them? What can be done to avoid needing to use box-model hacks? (if they aren’t pros, you can ask them what is the issue with x-browsers and the box model)

Q: What are the pros and cons of using tables for layout? Do you use tables? What are the pros and cons of tableless design? How do you generally layout your pages?
A: check for them NOT using tables

Q: Check to ensure that they separate structure and semantics first from presentation later? Do not ask about this during HTML, but do in webstandards.

Q: What are some deprecated elements and attributes that you use, and in what instances do you use them?
A: List of deprecated elements and attributes.

Q: What is involved in making a website accessible? What are arguments you use to convince others to invest in making their web site accessible.
A: See Making the web Accessible. Making sites accessible also makes them more search engine friendly (saves money), makes your pages accessible to the 20% of the population that has some type of disability (so you can make more money) and it’s the law in many places.

Q: Define what web standards mean to you? How do you implement web standards?

Q: In CSS, how can you make a form elments background-color change when the user is entering text? will this work in all browsers?

Q: How can you target an element in your HTML using the DOM?

5 Google Search Tricks for SEO

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 15:52:00 +0000

“intitle:”/”allintitle:” Start your query with this tag and follow with your keywords to see who is using good SEO by targeting these keywords in their title tag. Using only “intitle” will show pages with title tags containing any of the keywords you search for, and “allintitle” will only show pages with title tags containing all the keywords. Doing your search with this tool will help you determine who is tightly targeting your keywords by using them in the title tag.
“inanchor:”/”allinanchor:” When trying to find what backlinks any particular page has, there are several options. Google itself will not display every backlink, but using this tag can help you determine who is using the searched keyword in their anchor text for backlinks. This can be used to find both your own site’s anchor text use and how your competition is doing with anchor text.
“intext:”/”allintext:” If you’re trying to determine which pages are using your searched keywords most effectively in the page content, this is your tag. Results here will display which pages are using the target keywords most in their visible content.
“link:” This is another tag you can use when doing backlink research. When you use this tag with a domain or a full page URL you can see what pages Google has listed that are linking to this page. Again, Google will not list all backlinks, but this can give you a quick rundown of backlinks to specific pages.
“site:” This is a tag that is often missed for its true value. When you use this tag and follow it with a domain name, it will display all pages that Google’s robots have crawled. If, in addition to this, you add keywords – it will display only pages inside that domain that match the keyword query. This is an easy way to determine if Google has cached a specific page, or for finding out relevant information within a particular domain. You can even do a partial search with this tag to find out all sites of a certain class that match your query. For example, typing “site:.edu” will list all relevant results that only have domains with the “.edu” extension.

Using any (or all) of these tags can help you in your SEO research quite nicely. They are valuable tools to research competition or even measure your own levels of progress.

This guest post is by Eric Gesinski who does Tulsa website design and search engine optimization. You can also write a guest article and share your favorite tips. Read more articles by Eric.

Curved corner (border-radius) cross browser

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 21:03:00 +0000

This is a behavior htc file for Internet explorer to make CSS property " border-radius " work on all browsers. At present, all major browsers other than IE shows curved corner by adding 4 lines of csshe HTML:

.curved {

-moz-border-radius:10px; /*Firefox*/

-webkit-border-radius:10px; /*Safari and chrome*/

-khtml-border-radius:10px; /*Linux browsers*/

border-radius:10px; /*CSS3*/ }

<div class="curved">Curvd div</div>

For firefox, you can set border-radius by prefixing “-moz” to the css property. And ofcource for webkit use “-webkit” . Now IE ?? .. As IE is not a good browser to work with css, we need to make it so.

Here, you need to use a nice css hack. Some how I managed to have an htc file to make border-radius work in IE . Now adding the htc with one more line of css will make the curve work in IE browsers also behavior:url(border-radius.htc). You can download below source.

Download for radius.htc file : http://curved-corner.googlecode.com/files/border-radius.htc

More details are on http://www.htmlremix.com/css/curved-corner-border-radius-cross-browser
http://code.google.com/p/curved-corner/

Find Web Design Jobs, Part-time jobs, Freelance Jobs for UI Designer

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Sat, 22 May 2010 16:19:00 +0000

27 Places to Find Web Design Jobs

By Steven Snell | Published January 28th, 2009 in Business/Freelance

Sponsored by: 1,850,724 Sites built with Wix. Make your own!

With the current economic conditions many people in just about every industry are looking for jobs. Web designers and web developers have the advantage of having some great resources to help them find work. Last week the DesignM.ag job board was launched to give employers a free place to post jobs, and to help designers and developers find the right opportunities.

In addition to our job board, there are a number of other niche specific places to look for work. In this post we’ll take a look at 27 of the options for designers and developers. Whether you’re looking for full-time work, freelance gigs, or just part-time work, there are opportunities out there.

DesignM.ag Job Board

Our own job board is less than a week old, so there is admittedly not much posted there yet. But if you want to stay up-to-date as new jobs are posted, you can subscribe to the job board’s RSS feed.

Smashing Jobs

Smashing Magazine’s job board has a large selection of jobs posted. There is a good variety of freelance and full-time jobs, as well as both design and development.

37signals

37signals also has an active job board. Theirs has more postings for development jobs, but still a goo number of design jobs.

Authentic Jobs

Authentic Jobs focuses exclusively on design and development, and there are a good number of listings.

Coroflot

Coroflot has an active job board that includes jobs in all different types of design.

Xemion

Xemion’s Web Design and Development Jobs page is an aggregator that displays recent job listings from a number of different job boards.

CrunchBoard

CrunchBoard focuses on tech jobs, including web development.

ReadWriteWeb

Almost all of the jobs posted at ReadWriteWeb (which is currently more than 100 jobs) are in the programming/development category.

Ars Technica

Ars Technica includes a large selection of IT and programming jobs, with a smaller, but still decent, number of jobs in the design category.

Ajaxian

Ajaxian has a good selection of development jobs, but very little for design.

Slashdot

Slashdot has another tech-focused job board that includes a number of development jobs. However, there are not as many listings as most of the others mentioned so far.

Wired Job Board

Wired has a popular job board with a lot of listings in development and programming.

Mashable Jobs

Mashable’s job board includes web development, although there is not much in the area of design.

Creative Hotlist

Creative Hotlist is a rather large job board that includes jobs in a variety of creative fields, including design and development.

Favourite Website Awards Job Board

The job board at Favourite Website Awards includes a number of jobs in both design and development.

design:related

design:related has a somewhat active job board that includes jobs in design of all kinds.

AIGA

AIGA has a good number of jobs listed, mostly for web and graphic design.

Freelance Switch

Freelance Switch includes web design and development along with other types of freelance opportunities. Users must pay $7 per month to get access to contact information for those posting the jobs.

CenterNetworks

CenterNetworks has a good mix of design and development, but not as many jobs as some other boards.

Just Tech Jobs

Just Tech Jobs lists jobs from over 100 different websites.

Zend

Zend is a good place to look for PHP work, but there not all that many jobs listed.

Jobs on the Wall

Jobs on the Wall is another new job board from a leading design blog. There are not a lot of jobs posted, but the quality is good and this job board is likely to grow.

Behance Network JobList

The Behance Network has a fairly small job board that includes design jobs.

Krop

Krop is a large job board for design and development. Its listings are displayed on a number of other websites and blogs.

Highend Careers

Highend Careers includes design and development, among other things.

Freshwebjobs

Freshwebjobs includes design and development, but very few jobs have been posted recently.

PeoplePerHour

PeoplePerHour helps companies find freelancers in a variety of industries, including web design and development.

PureDesignResources

PureDesignResources is an aggregator and includes a column that shows listings from several job boards.

for more Ref : http://designm.ag/freelance/find-web-design-jobs/

18 Do’s and Don’ts Of Usability On The Web

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Mon, 03 May 2010 18:12:00 +0000

18 Do’s and Don’ts Of Usability On The Web

POSTED BY MIKE SMITH » 14 COMMENTS » ADD YOUR OWN

Are you a web designer or do you run a website? Good, because this article is for you. If you’re designing websites for a living or running your business online, there are 18 tips in this article that you should definitely read and remember.

You can have the best visual design skills on the planet, but if you build a website that works like crap and doesn’t allow the visitor to feel comfortable going from item to item and page to page, you are missing the very core of a good website design. So in today’s article I’m going to go over some of the do’s and don’ts of usability on the web.

Do utilize a grid for your website structure

Before you get upset and start screaming that a grid is a box for creativity, I’m not saying to ensure your entire site is boxed in. What I do want you to understand though about a grid is that it helps structure your site and keep the eye flow going for your visitor, which is key. Once you’ve got the main structure down and it’s clean – create the funky stuff you do to go around it all and incorporate everything into a killer design, but don’t forget the grid.

Do Not forget your search form

A lot of people will go to your site and immediately look for a search box. It’s just instinctive I guess. So, if you don’t have one, guess what happens – they leave. They’re not going to feel comfortable on a site where they don’t feel in control. The ideal spot for a search bar is somewhere towards the top of the page on the right hand side as this is where users are used to it being displayed.

Do make your navigation easy to find & readable

If you’re designing a site and your navigation is supposed to take your visitor from point A to point B, why the hell would you place it in a weird spot or use images that do not generally showcase the type of links they are (ie: a house for the home page is ok, but a circle with a lightning bolt inside of it for services isn’t). Try keeping the navigation easy to read, right at the top of the site so the visitor can easily navigate through your site.

Do Not make your “contact” link in your navigation bar a mailto: link

A lot of people (myself included) will hover over a link and see what the bottom of our browser screen says before we click on it, especially the contact link since some people think it’s a bright idea to link this directly to your email address, causing an email program to open up. This is not a good UX practice. Create a contact page, put your email address on it and also add a contact form – your user will thank you – and will actually email you more often.

Do utilize UX Apps as much as possible for web tests

Keeping track of the various forms of data from your website is something you should definitely get a grasp on if you haven’t already. Google analytics is perfect for seeing where your visitors are coming from, what pages they’re going to and how long they’re on your site. A UX app likeCrazy Egg is perfect for learning where your visitors are clicking and seeing what parts of your site are getting the most attention. You can also use a site like Feedback Army to test how users see and use your site. Learning these types of stats for your site can ensure you’re utilizing space as well as possible and making sure that you’ve got the important stuff where it needs to be.

Do Not flood your website’s sidebar with tons of widgets

O.K. We get that you’re running a blog and there are a million widgets you can use on it – but you don’t actually need to use them all. Think of it like a bedroom. If there’s clutter everywhere and it’s not clean, that special someone you brought home might not want to stay – so tidy up and keep things organized. Your readers don’t (in most cases) need to see your google friend’s, mybloglog friends, friendfeed friends and the various other social profiles you’re a part of, so leave them alone and stick to the things that matter most for the user experience on your site.

Do make sure that your website displays well on various browsers

We all know that IE6 is dead and no one is complaining about that, but do not forget that there is still a lot of users on IE7, IE8, Opera, Safari, Firefox, Chrome, ect. Just because your website looks good on one or two of them doesn’t mean the visitor using another browser will like that your site isn’t displaying properly. Take a couple hours, dig into the code and make sure it all works across the various browsers.

Do Not make your visitor jump through hoops to fill out a form

Your contact form shouldn’t be a mile long and neither should a sign up form. Keep things simple. The chances that people will turn away when they’re faced with a 20 part sign up form is far greater than if they were staring at three simple questions (name, email, comments).

Do ensure your various pages are consistent in structure

Unless you’re a design blog and you’re structuring/designing every one of your posts different like (insert names here), you need to remember that people want familiarity when they’re viewing your site. If they feel like they’re somewhere different when they load a new page up, they’re going to click the back button – and fast.

Do Not forget a print stylesheet for those who want to print your content

This is especially true for blogs/content sites. If your reader wants to print off content (trust me, many still do, especially older visitors), you shouldn’t require them to print off your entire design, plus all of the comments and advertisements across the page. That’s unnecessary clutter. If you look at the print preview on this post about why better blogging equals better business for freelancers, you’ll see a clean page, black and white, no images, no comments, no sidebar. The content is what matters for printing, so make sure it stands out.

Do make sure your content is easy to scan and follow along with

In general, people have short attention spans. So, by utilizing section titles (h2, h3 or h4 tags) to split your article up, you allow the visitor to scan the article quickly and see if it’s something they’re looking to read and if they’ll be able to get anything out of it. When you’re writing your content, you should also be aware of the size of each paragraph as users will tend to get tired of scanning 20+ lines in a paragraph. Things are much easier to read when split up into 5-10 lines (at most).

Do Not cram more into a space than what can fit comfortably

Minimalism. We love it here at Spyre Studios and I know readers here do as well. That’s why this tip is so important to all of us – crowding things into a small space and not allowing the users eye to focus on the important stuff is counter productive. Yes, you’ve got a ton of information above the fold, but why would you worry about the fold so much? Paddy Donnelly already debunkedthe life below 600px, so allow your design and content to breath. Your users will thank you.

Do make sure to include breadcrumbs in your design

Breadcrumbs are useful in giving your visitor control over where they’re at and what they’re going to do next. If they’re on a sub page of your about page, your breadcrumbs will look something like this (Home > About > Sub Page Title). This tells the user exactly what page they’re on and how to go back various levels if they’d like to.

Do Not forget to utilize color and contrast to shift focus

If you use a heading and then a sub heading for sections of your site, try various shades of color to allow the visitor to notice the important stuff first (ie: #464646 for the title and #c1c1c1 for the subtitle). These shifts in color and contrast will dictate what your user sees next, ultimately bringing them into a space where you want them to be (a sign up page, a contact form, a subscription page, ect).

Do check for broken links and images

Checking for broken links and images in your older articles is great because you may have visitors coming to your page from a search engine and if there are broken links, they’re going to assume one of two things: 1, you’re an old site that isn’t being updated anymore or 2. you’re not keeping up to date on the value of your site, so they’re going to go elsewhere. If you’re a wordpress user, there’s a plugin that is amazing for this: Broken Link Checker. You can also head over to iwebtool and use their free broken link checker (5 requests per hour is the limit).

Do Not neglect your footer and the power it has

So, you’re on a website and you scroll through everything and get to the bottom of the page only to find a bland, single line of text telling you that there’s a copyright on the site. Boring. Why not spruce your footer up a bit, add some extra content into it like popular articles, a search box, a newsletter subscription, ect. If you’d like to find some ideas on how to design a killer footer for your site, you should check out Footer Fetish, not to be confused with the other foot fetish.

Do use wireframing in your design process

Drawing out wireframes for your site on paper (or in simple box shapes in photoshop) can really help you visualize what’s the most important aspect of the page and how you can use it as a central focus point. By doing this, you’re also able to experiment with various layout options without having to break up a killer design you may have been creating already. For wireframe inspiration, I check out the I love Wireframes group on flickr – it’s full of amazing wireframe drawings.

Do Not write for search engines – write for your readers

Last, but not least is the tip that you should be writing for your readers, not search engines. Keyword stuffing may have worked in the past (and may still today), but if you have an actual reader come across your page, only to find the word “designer” 100X times in 3 paragraphs, what do you think the odds are that they’re going to hit their back button and never step (virtual) foot on your page again? Yeah, the odds of that happening are extremely high.

A tip I’ve heard before is to read your content out loud and if it doesn’t sound like a natural flowing conversation you’d normally have, rewrite it until it does. People will read your content and expect it to sound like something a real person would say, so make sure it does sound that way.

We’d love to hear your thoughts

Drop a comment and let us know what usability tips you’ve acquired over the time you’ve been a designer. We’d love to hear them.

Vertical align text in floating div using css

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 03:55:00 +0000

Do you know how to vertically align a text in a floating div? When a content is dynamically generated and you want to align it automatically according to it?

Today i was experimenting about this for a long time and finally i have got a solution which will work in all the browsers including ie6. There are many ways of doing it, but i would like to work the code in all the majore browsers inculding ie6.

So here is the code...

HTML:

It works! Vertically Center Align!

CSS:
.contentdiv{ width: 135px; height: 84px; display: table; border:2px solid red;}
.contentdiv p{ display: table-cell; vertical-align: middle; text-align: center;}

Hack for ie:
.contentdiv p{*margin-top: expression(this.offsetHeight < this.parentNode.offsetHeight ? parseInt((this.parentNode.offsetHeight - this.offsetHeight) / 2) + "px" : "0");}

Hack for ie7:
*+ html .contentdiv{}

Hack for ie6:
* html .contentdiv{}

According to the height you increase, the content will get vertically aligned center. My only worry is iam using expression. We must try to avoid using more expression. But it looks very simple. Fine, any other method of handle this will be a great help! Please feel free to post.

Web browser hacks, Css hacks - ie, firefox, chrome, safri, Opera

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 19:26:00 +0000

CSS hacks take advantage of browser bugs for hiding CssRules from specific web browsers. Listed below are the hacks for major browsers like ie6, ie7, firefox2, firefox3, Google chrome, safari and opera.

Inline Hack for IE
* (star) can be used as the inline hack for both ie6 and ie7.

For Example:
Syntax: .selector{*property:value;}
.logo{*margin-left:10px;}

IE6 browser inline Hack
_ (underscore) can be using only for ie6

For Example:
Syntax: .selector{_property:value;}
.logo{_margin-left:10px;}

Firefox inline style
content:"\"/*" can be used for firefox only where IE cannot recognize it.

Internal Style
Use * html for ie6 and *+html hack for ie7

For Example:
Synatax: * html .selector{property:value;} , * + html .selector{property:value;}

* html .logo{margin-left:10px;} for ie6
* + html .logo{margin-left:20px;} for ie7

IE7 and Firefox browser Hack
Use html>body hack for ie7 and firefox.

For Example:
Syntax: html>body .selector{property:value;}

html>body .logo{margin-left:10px} will take only in ie7 and firefox

Mordern browser Hack or Firefox Hack
Use html>/**/body {} hack which will support only in both firefox2 and firefox3.

For Example:
Syntax: html>/**/body .selector{property:value;}

html>/**/body .logo{margin-left:10px} will take only in firefox.

Browser hack for Opera versions 9 and below
Use html:first-child {} for opera browser. Also you use
Syntax: @media all and (min-width:0px) {head~body .selector {property:value;}}

For Example:
@media all and (min-width:0px) {head~body .logo {margin-left:10px;}} only for opera

Firefox3 browser hack
Use html>/**/body .selector, x:-moz-any-link, x:default {property:value;} for firfox3 only.

For Example:
Syntax: html>/**/body .pro_yl, x:-moz-any-link, x:default {background:red;}

Google Chrome browser hack
Use body:nth-of-type(1) .elementOrClassName{property:value;} only for google chrome.

For Example:
body:nth-of-type(1) .logo{margin:20px;}

Safari browser hack
Use Syntax: body:first-of-type .elementOrClassName{property:value;}

Fox Example:
body:first-of-type .logo{margin-top:10px;} only for safari.

Hope this information will be useful for you. Please use the browser hacks in a proper manner. For example, you might know double margin bug in ie6. In such case you can use display inline which will render correctly by all the browsers instead of you using ie6 hack seperately.

How firefox3.5 will be useful for web developers?

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 19:10:00 +0000

Firefox3.5 is 10 times faster than firefox2 versions. A good news from mozilla, that firefox3.5 have many new features for web site and application developers.

HTML 5
Using audio and video in Firefox. In the older version of firefox, you need to download a plugin for flash to view the videos in Youtube. But using firfox3.5 and HTML5 you can view the videos without any plugins installed. And also they are very faster than ever.

Offline resources in Firefox
Firefox 3.5 now fully supports the HTML 5 offline resource specification.

Drag and drop
The HTML 5 drag and drop API allows support for dragging and dropping items within and between web sites. This also provides a simpler API for use by extensions and Mozilla-based applications.

Newly-supported CSS features
The :before and :after pseudo-elements have been updated to full CSS 2.1 support, adding support for the position, float, list-style-*, and some display properties.

opacity
The -moz-opacity Mozilla extension to CSS has been removed in favor of the standard opacity property.

text-shadow
The text-shadow property, which allows web content to specify shadow effects to apply to text and text decorations, is now supported. Also..
-moz-box-shadow, -moz-border-image, -moz-column-rule, -moz-column-rule-width, -moz-column-rule-style, -moz-column-rule-color added newly.

Shadow effects in a canvas
Canvas shadow effects are now supported.

Applying SVG effects to HTML content
You can now apply SVG effects to HTML and XHTML content; this article describes how.

And many more....

But the hope is that ie8 should support HTML5 and css3 with out any bugs. Coz a report says that majority of the people are using ie6 still. for more information on HTML5, please read HTML5

Web Design Resources - Web Design Guide

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:23:00 +0000

Javascript

javascript resources and libraries...

AJAX / jQuery

Ajax development reference...

Navigation / Menu

Different website navigation...

XHTML Resources

Usefull XHTML reference..

CMS - Content Management

The best CMS systems available...

Web Standards

A selection of standards based information...

CSS Specification

CSS reference...

CSS Resources

A collection of useful CSS reference websites.

CSS Links

Useful CSS link sites.

Usability

Web usability stuff...

Accessibility

design and development resources...

Apps

Web accessibility stuff...

App Sheriff

Colour Tools

Useful colour tool...

Web Hosting

Host those websites...

Web Monitoring

Keep an eye on your websites...

ipPatrol - server monitoring

SEO

search engine optimization...

The Big Names

Leading names in the business...

Social Networking

twits, tweets and faces...

Firefox Extensions

add-in tools for designers..

Misc. Resources

Other things that are nice...

iPhone

Graphics and apps for the iphone...

The UK Law

Legal stuff...

Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (c. 50)

Top 20 CSS Galleries / Showcase

There are hundreds obviously!
Here's our Top 20...

Other CSS Galleries / Showcase

The best of the rest...

Wordpress / CMS Galleries

Specialist galleries and resources...

Web Design Magazines

Design magazine sites that publish regular articles and useful design related features...

Tutorials

Improve your skillset...

Design Blogs

Comments and news in the web world of web design and development...

Discussion Forums

online forums...

Podcasts

Design and development podcasts...

Ecommerce

Online shopping...

Shopify

Books

Design related literature...

Emprint

Photoshop

Photoshop reference...

Image Galleries

Get the picture...

Flash

Movin'...

Sound

and groovin'...

Melody Loops

Patterns / Vectors / Icons

Web backgrounds / graphics...

source from:http://www.web-design-list.com

Different Redirection Options

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:01:00 +0000

Lately, I’ve been having to work with a lot of redirects and I was going through different redirection options with a client. So I thought I would do a quick write up about the different types of redirection.

I also haven’t seen a collection of these in one place, so I thought I would put this together.

There are a few different types that are commonly use when redirecting users:

.htaccess / apache
php header
javascript
meta refresh

The top two are the one’s you’ll be using most often, I don’t really recommend the last two. But they are available, so I think they’re worth noting. So here they are in the order I would recommend:

1. .htaccess / apache redirects

Redirect /old_directory http://example.com/newdirectory

This redirection is most efficient at the apache level, but if you’re like me and are on shared hosting, getting into the apache installation probably isn’t an option. In that case you can put this in an .htaccess file in the root directory of your site.

Using an .htaccess redirection is great for moving entire sites because you can not only redirect a page, but you can redirect entire sites and subdirectories with one line of code.

2. PHP header redirects

PHP header redirects are good for single page redirects and if you’re not comfortable working with the .htaccess file. This code goes at the very top of the page you’re trying to redirect. If it’s not there you may get a “headers already sent” error.

If you’re publishing out static HTML files, you can still use this by adding this code into your .htaccess file:

AddType application/x-httpd-php .php .html .htm

This will let you execute PHP in an HTML file.

3. JavaScript redirects

JavaScript redirects are generally not used unless you’ve exhausted the other two options. If you don’t have access to the .htaccess file AND you can’t run server-side script on your page, this is an OK fallback option, but you have to make sure to provide a link to the forwarding page incase a user is browsing without JavaScript.

4. Meta redirects

As your last option, I don’t see this in the wild anymore, but it’s worth mentioning that it does exist and does technically work (I’m not sure about it’s validity in HTML 5). You would place this in the document HEAD with the rest of the meta elements.

content=0 is a second timer for the redirect, I have this one set to 0 so it will redirect immediately.

Those are the options I’ve used in the past; did I miss anything? Maybe an ASP redirect? Let me know!

source from: http://www.csskarma.com/blog/redirection-options/

Color Wheel Color Calculator

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:18:00 +0000

The Sessions Color Calculator is an interactive color wheel that helps designers select HTML, RGB, or CMYK colors and identifies color harmonies and schemes. Our Color Wheel works faster than any other color wheel or html color chart.

Designers may save HTML safe color values, CMYK color schemes, or RGB colors to an integrated clipboard and email the colors to colleagues or clients. You can also rotate shapes on the color wheel to identify harmonious color schemes, adjust the saturation and lightness of colors, or select a color plan to use for a corporate identity or design project.

Colors may be selected and applied to both print and Web design – the Sessions color wheel color calculator saves hours of work. A color scheme can be further refined by choosing different designs or patterns with different complexity levels.

For a thorough examination of Color, its systems, interactions and how to advantageously use this knowledge in art and design, please see Color Theory.

Requires Flash Plug-in 5.0 or later!

Creating Old Paper With Custom Brushes

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:15:00 +0000

In this Photoshop tutorial I’ll show you how to create a Custom Brush using a folded piece of paper and then how to use that brush to create an old piece of paper.
Step 1

To begin this tutorial I took a plain white piece of paper, folded it in fours and left it in my pocket for a few hours. Next I scanned the paper using the Grayscale setting on my scanner. Because the both the paper and the scanner back are white, I placed a dark colored magazine behind the paper giving the cool result of a little text showing through onto my scan as you can see below.

I’ve imported the scan into Photoshop directly from the scanner by using the File>Import dialog from the main menu and then placed the scan above a white background layer. (*note: You can make a Custom Shape from ANYTHING you can bring into Photoshop from photos to line drawings.)

No matter what you’re trying to make into a Custom Brush, it will need to be black and white. If you’re using a color photo or image, you can quickly discard the color information by choosing Image>Adjustments>Desaturate from the main menu.
Step 2

It is important to understand that when we create a Custom Brush anything on the stage that is white will be transparent when we convert the image to a brush, black will be opaque and the gray areas in between will be partially transparent.

Choose the Rectangular Marquee tool from the Tools bar by pressing the M key, then draw a selection around the area that you would like turn into your Custom Brush.
Step 3

With the selection made, choose Edit>Define Brush Preset from the main menu, give the new brush a name and click OK. How easy was that? Your new brush has now been saved and if you switch to the Brush tool by pressing the B key and choose the brush drop down from the Brush Options menu at the top of Photoshop, you’ll see that the newly created brush has been added to the end of the list.
Step 4

I can now delete the Scanned Paper layer from my document and get to work creating a new piece of paper.

Create a new layer called Paper Background and set the foreground and background colors in the Tools bar to #d3c29d and #b7a783 respectively. Press the M key to call up the Rectangular Marquee tool and since the standard aspect for a piece of paper is 8.5 x 11, we will set the constrain options for the Marquee tool to Fixed Aspect Ratio with a width of 11 and a height of 8.5.
Step 5

Now that we’ve got our colors selected and the Marquee tool setup, lets go ahead and drag a nice big selection onto the stage and fill it with the foreground color by pressing Option-Delete (PC: Alt-Backspace).
Step 6

With the selection still active choose Filter>Render>Clouds from the main menu. This will create a nice variant of color on our old paper using a mixture of the foreground and background colors we set in Step 4.

At this point it’s safe to deselect by pressing Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D).
Step 7

We will now use an Inner Glow layer style to darken the edges of the paper.

To call up the Layer Styles dialog you can either double click to the right of the layer name in the Layers palette, or Control-Click (PC: Right-Click) on the layer and choose Blending Options, then click on Inner Glow text on the left to add the following effect. Click OK when you’re done.
Step 8

Add a new layer by clicking the Add New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers palette and name it Folds.
Step 9

Now we’re going to use our new brush to create the folds and texture of the paper.

Press the D key to reset the foreground and background colors to black and white, then press the B key to switch to the Brush tool and from the Brush drop down at the top choose the new Folded Paper brush we created earlier. If you were following along at home you’ll now notice that the brush we created is oriented horizontally, but our paper is vertical. This problem can be solved easily by opening the Brushes palette from the main menu by choosing Window>Brushes. Click on Brush Tip Shape in the menu on the right and change the Angle to 90°.
Step 10

Position the brush over the paper and use the bracket keys [ or ] to enlarge or reduce the brush size until it’s just a few pixels larger than the paper size then simply click once to paint one instance of the brush onto the stage.
Step 11

Next lets Control-Click (PC: Right Click) on the Folds layer and choose Create Clipping Mask. This will clip the Folds layer to the Paper Background layer and will effectively hide anything outside the papers area. The clipping mask also allows the Inner Glow layer style which was added to the Paper Background layer to apply to the Folds layer as well.
Step 12

Now lets make the Folds layer blend correctly with the underlying layer by changing the Blend Mode to Color Burn and the layer’s Fill opacity to 40%.
Step 13

An old piece of paper should have some blemishes around the edges so lets click back down to the Paper Background layer in the Layers palette to select it and then add a Layer Mask by clicking the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette. This will allow us to rough up the edges of the paper without actually erasing from the actual layer. When the Layer Mask is added you will notice that it is by default selected (*note: You can tell the layer mask is selected rather than the actual content of the layer because of the black brackets that appear around the icon of the layer mask.)
Step 14

Press the B key to switch to the Brush tool, then choose the Chalk 60 pixels brush from the Brush Picker. This will be the rough edge brush I’ll be using to antique the edges of the paper.
Step 15

With the foreground color set to black use the brush to paint black into little sections around the edge of the paper, effectively removing those areas from view. The black we paint onto the stage with the layer mask selected will be masked away.
Step 16

With the Paper Background still selected, press the Create A New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers palette to add a layer directly above it. Notice that the new layer is also clipped to the Paper Background layer just like the Folds layer.

Press the X key to change the foreground color to white, then using the same brush with it’s opacity set to 30% paint around the worn edges with white to add a little dimension to the wear.
Step 17

If you downloaded the grunge brushes from the Create An Old Envelope tutorial you can use them here on a new layer called Grunge to add some nice watermarks and grungy effects to the paper. I used a blend mode of Color Burn and lowered the fill opacity to 22%.
Step 18

Click back to the Paper Background layer and add a nice Drop Shadow layer style as shown below.
Step 19

The last thing our paper needs is some writing. Click on the Folds layer (or whatever you called your top layer) and switch to the Type tool by pressing the T key. With the Type tool drag a rectangle onto the stage where the text on the paper should live then using a font like Bickham Script Pro or Champignon, type out your text.
Step 20

Of course we’ll need to age the text to match the paper, and luckily we’ve already done most of the preparation. Change the layer blend mode to Color Burn and lower the opacity to 50%.

While still on your Text layer hold down the Command (PC: Ctrl) key and click on the thumbnail for the Folds layer to load the layer as a selection. This will create a selection using only the information contained on the Folds layer.

Now simply click the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the layers palette to convert the selection into a Layer Mask that will instantly age the text consistent with the folds and wrinkles on the paper.
Step 21

Because of the blend and opacity changes the text is now too light, so simply press Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to duplicate the Text layer. This will double the effects of the Color Burn blend mode as well as effectively increase the density of the text creating a more convincing effect.
Step 22

And there you have it, a nice effect produced by creating your own Photoshop Custom Brush. Nice work!

source: http://www.tutorialkit.com/tutorials/Creating-Old-Paper-With-Custom-Brushes-63174.html

Get "JavaScript Design Patterns"

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:10:00 +0000

"As a web developer, you'll already know that JavaScript™ is a powerful language, allowing you to add an impressive array of dynamic functionality to otherwise static web sites. But there is more power waiting to be unlocked--JavaScript is capable of full object-oriented capabilities, and by applying OOP principles, best practices, and design patterns to your code, you can make it more powerful, more efficient, and easier to work with alone or as part of a team."

Can you download some javascript code examples. click here (zip file 80KB)

5 Simple, But Useful CSS Properties

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 18:46:00 +0000

This post is about 5 useful CSS properties that you should be very familiar with, but will most likely rarely use. I’m not talking about the new fancy CSS3 properties. I’m referring to the old CSS2 properties such as: clip, min-height, white-space, cursor, and display that are widely supported by all browsers. So, don’t miss this post because you might be surprised how useful they are.

1. CSS Clip

The clip property is like a mask. It allows you to mask the content of an element in a rectangle shape. To clip an element: you must specify the position to absolute. Then, specify the top, right, bottom, and left value relative to the element.

Image Clip Example (demo)

The following example shows you how to mask an image using clip property. First, specify the

element to position: relative. Next, specify the element to position: absolute and the rect values accordingly.

.clip {

position: relative;

height: 130px;

width: 200px;

border: solid 1px #ccc;

}

.clip img {

position: absolute;

clip: rect(30px 165px 100px 30px);

}

Image Resize and Clip (demo)

In this example, I’m going to show you how to resize and clip images. My original images are in rectangle format. I want to scale it down by 50% to create a thumbnail gallery in a square format. So, I used the width and height property to resize the images and mask them with the clip property. Then, I used the left property to shift the images to the left by 15px.

.gallery li {

float: left;

margin: 0 10px 0 0;

position: relative;

width: 70px;

height: 70px;

border: solid 1px #000;

}

.gallery img {

width: 100px;

height: 70px;

position: absolute;

clip: rect(0 85px 70px 15px);

left: -15px;

}

2. Min-height (demo)

The min-height property allows you to specify the minimum height of an element. It is useful when you need to balance the layout. I used it on my job board to ensure the content area is alway taller than the sidebar.

.with_minheight {

min-height: 550px;

}

Min-height hack for IE6

Note: min-height is not supported by IE6, but there is a min-height hack.

.with_minheight {

min-height:550px;

height:auto !important;

height:550px;

}

3. White-space (demo)

The white-space property specifies how white-space is handled in an element. For example, specify white-space: nowrap will prevent the text from wrapping to next line.

em {

white-space: nowrap;

}

4. Cursor (demo)

If you change the behavior of a button, you should change its cursor as well. For example, when a button is disabled, the cursor should be changed to default (arrow) to indicate that it is not clickable. So, the cursor property is extremely useful for developing web apps.

.disabled {

cursor: default;

}



.busy {

cursor: wait;

}



.clickable:hover {

cursor: pointer;

}

5. Display inline / block (demo)

In case you didn’t know: block elements are rendered on a new line, whereas inline elements are rendered on the same line.

, , and

tags are examples of block elements. Examples of inline tags are: , , and . You can override the display style by specifying display: inline or block.

.block em {
display: block;
}

.inline h4, .inline p {
display: inline;
}

70 Expert Ideas For Better CSS Coding

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 19:41:00 +0000

CSS isn’t always easy to deal with. Depending on your skills and your experience, CSS coding can sometimes become a nightmare, particularly if you aren’t sure which selectors are actually being applied to document elements. An easy way to minimize the complexity of the code is as useful as not-so-well-known CSS attributes and properties you can use to create a semantically correct markup.

We’ve taken a close look at some of the most useful CSS tricks, tips, ideas, methods, techniques and coding solutions and listed them below. We also included some basic techniques you can probably use in every project you are developing, but which are hard to find once you need them.

And what has come out of it is an overview of over 70 expert CSS ideas which can improve your efficiency of CSS coding. You might be willing to check out the list of references and related articles in the end of this post.

We’d like to express sincere gratitude to all designers who shared their ideas, techniques, methods, knowledge and experience with their readers. Thank you, we, coders, designers, developers, information architects – you name it – really appreciate it.

You might be interested in reading our article 53 CSS-Techniques You Couldn’t Live Without, which should provide you with a basic toolbox for CSS-based techniques you might use in your next projects.

Update (29/05/2007): Brazilian-Portuguese translation of the article is also available. Thanks to Maurício Samy Silva.

1.1. Workflow: Getting Started
After you have a design, start with a blank page of content. “Include your headers, your navigation, a sample of the content, and your footer. Then start adding your html markup. Then start adding your CSS. It works out much better.” [CSSing]
Use a master stylesheet. “One of the most common mistakes I see beginners and intermediates fall victim to when it comes to CSS is not removing the default browser styling. This leads to inconsistencies in the appearance of your design across browsers, and ultimately leaves a lot of designers blaming the browser. It is a misplaced blame, of course. Before you do anything else when coding a website, you should reset the styling.” [Master Stylesheet: The Most Useful CSS Technique], [Ryan Parr]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
master.css
@import url(“reset.css”);
@import url(“global.css”);

@import url(“flash.css”);
@import url(“structure.css”);
master.css

@import url("reset.css");
@import url("global.css");

@import url("flash.css");
@import url("structure.css");
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?

Reset your CSS-styles first. “You can often eliminate the need to specify a value for a property by taking advantage of that property’s default value. Some people like doing a Global white space reset by zeroing both margin and padding for all elements at the top of their stylesheets. [Roger Johansson]
Keep a library of helpful CSS classes. Useful for debugging, but should be avoided in the release version (separate markup and presentation). Since you can use multiple class names (i.e.

...

), make use of them debugging your markup. (updated) [Richard K. Miller]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
.width100 { width: 100%; }
.width75 { width: 75%; }
.width50 { width: 50%; }
.floatLeft { float: left; }
.floatRight { float: right; }
.alignLeft { text-align: left; }
.alignRight { text-align: right; }
CSS:

.width100 { width: 100%; }
.width75 { width: 75%; }
.width50 { width: 50%; }
.floatLeft { float: left; }
.floatRight { float: right; }
.alignLeft { text-align: left; }
.alignRight { text-align: right; }
Eric Meyer’s Global Reset, Christian Montoya’s initial CSS file, Mike Rundle’s initial CSS file, Ping Mag’s initial CSS file.
1.2. Organize your CSS-code
Organize your CSS-styles, using master style sheets. “Organizing your CSS helps with future maintainability of the site. Start with a master style sheet. Within this style sheet import your reset.css, global.css, flash.css (if needed) and structure.css and on occasion a typography style sheet. Here is an example of a “master” style sheet and how it is embedded in the document:”
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
h2 { }
#snapshot_box h2 {
padding: 0 0 6px 0;
font: bold 14px/14px “Verdana”, sans-serif; }
#main_side h2 {
color: #444;
font: bold 14px/14px “Verdana”, sans-serif; }
.sidetagselection h2 {
color: #fff;
font: bold 14px/14px “Verdana”, sans-serif; }
h2 { }
#snapshot_box h2 {
padding: 0 0 6px 0;
font: bold 14px/14px "Verdana", sans-serif; }
#main_side h2 {
color: #444;
font: bold 14px/14px "Verdana", sans-serif; }
.sidetagselection h2 {
color: #fff;
font: bold 14px/14px "Verdana", sans-serif; }
Organize your CSS-styles, using flags. “Divide your stylesheet into specific sections: i.e. Global Styles – (body, paragraphs, lists, etc), Header, Page Structure, Headings, Text Styles, Navigation, Forms, Comments, Extras. [5 Tips for Organizing Your CSS]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
/* ———————————–*/
/* ———->>> GLOBAL <<<———–*/ /* ———————————–*/ /* -----------------------------------*/ /* ---------->>> GLOBAL <<<-----------*/ /* -----------------------------------*/ Organize your CSS-styles, making a table of contents. At the top of your CSS document, write out a table of contents. For example, you could outline the different areas that your CSS document is styling (header, main, footer etc). Then, use a large, obvious section break to separate the areas. [5 Steps to CSS Heaven] Organize your CSS-styles, ordering properties alphabetically. “I don’t know where I got the idea, but I have been alphabetizing my CSS properties for months now, and believe it or not, it makes specific properties much easier to find.” [Christian Montoya] view plaincopy to clipboardprint? body { background: #fdfdfd; color: #333; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4; margin: 0; padding: 0; } body { background: #fdfdfd; color: #333; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4; margin: 0; padding: 0; } Separate code into blocks.. “This might be common sense to some of you but sometimes I look at CSS and it’s not broken down into “sections.” It’s easy to do an it makes working with code weeks, months, or years later much easier. You’ll have an easier time finding classes and elements that you need to change. Examples: /* Structure */, /* Typography */ etc.” [CSS Tips and Tricks] Hook, line, and sinker. Once you have your CSS and sections in place start considering where your selector “hooks” will live by using structural hooks in your mark up. This is your saving grace for future editing and maintenance of the site. This will also give you strength in your document.” [Ryan Parr] Break your style sheet in separate blocks. “I break down my style sheet into three separate blocks. The first is straight element declarations. Change the body, some links styles, some header styles, reset margins and padding on forms, and so on. […] After element declarations, I have my class declarations; things like classes for an error message or a callout would go here. [..] I start by declaring my main containers and then any styles for elements within those containers are indented. At a quick glance, I can see how my page is broken down and makes it easier to know where to look for things. I’ll also declare containers even if they don’t have any rules.” [Jonathan Snook] 1.3. Workflow: Handling IDs, Classes, Selectors, Properties Keep containers to a minimum. “Save your document from structural bloat. New developers will use many div’s similar to table cells to achieve layout. Take advantage of the many structural elements to achieve layout. Do not add more div’s. Consider all options before adding additional wrappers (div’s) to achieve an effect when using a little nifty CSS can get you that same desired effect.” [Ryan Parr] Keep properties to a minimum. “Work smarter, not harder with CSS. Under this rule, there are a number of subrules: if there isn’t a point to adding a CSS property, don’t add it; if you’re not sure why you’re adding a CSS property, don’t add; and if you feel like you’ve added the same property in lots of places, figure out how to add it in only one place.” [CSSing] Keep selectors to a minimum. “Avoid unnecessary selectors. Using less selectors will mean less selectors will be needed to override any particular style — that means it’s easier to troubleshoot.” [Jonathan Snook] Keep CSS hacks to a minimum. “Don’t use hacks unless its a known and documented bug. This is an important point as I too often see hacks employed to fix things that aren’t really broken in the first place. If you find that you are looking for a hack to fix a certain issue in your design then first do some research (Google is your friend here) and try to identify the issue you are having problems with. [10 Quick Tips for an easier CSS life] Use CSS Constants for faster development. “The concept of constants – fixed values that can be used through your code [is useful]. [..] One way to get round the lack of constants in CSS is to create some definitions at the top of your CSS file in comments, to define ‘constants’. A common use for this is to create a ‘color glossary’. This means that you have a quick reference to the colors used in the site to avoid using alternates by mistake and, if you need to change the colors, you have a quick list to go down and do a search and replace.” [Rachel Andrew] view plaincopy to clipboardprint? # /* # Dark grey (text): #333333 # Dark Blue (headings, links) #000066 # Mid Blue (header) #333399 # Light blue (top navigation) #CCCCFF # Mid grey: #666666 # */ # /* # Dark grey (text): #333333 # Dark Blue (headings, links) #000066 # Mid Blue (header) #333399 # Light blue (top navigation) #CCCCFF # Mid grey: #666666 # */ Use a common naming system. Having a naming system for id’s and classes saves you a lot of time when looking for bugs, or updating your document. Especially in large CSS documents, things can get a big confusing quickly if your names are all different. I recommend using a parent_child pattern. [10 CSS Tips] Name your classes and IDs properly, according to their semantics. “We want to avoid names that imply presentational aspects. Otherwise, if we name something right-col, it’s entirely possible that the CSS would change and our “right-col” would end up actually being displayed on the left side of our page. That could lead to some confusion in the future, so it’s best that we avoid these types of presentational naming schemes. [Garrett Dimon] Group selectors with common CSS declarations. “Group selectors. When several element types, classes, or id:s share some properties, you can group the selectors to avoid specifying the same properties several times. This will save space – potentially lots of it.” [Roger Johansson] Isolate single properties that you are likely to reuse a lot. “If you find yourself using a single property a lot, isolate it to save yourself repeating it over and over again and also enabling you to change the display of all parts of the site that use it.” [5 Steps to CSS Heaven] Move ids and class naming as far up the document tree as you can. Leverage contextual selectors as much as possible. Don’t be afraid to be verbose in your selectors. Longer selectors can make css documents easier to read while also cutting down the chances of developing class- or divitis. [Chric Casciano] Learn to exploit the cascading nature of CSS. “Say you have two similar boxes on your website with only minor differences – you could write out CSS to style each box, or you could write CSS to style both at the same time, then add extra properties below to make one look different.” [5 Steps to CSS heaven] Use Your Utility Tags: , and . “Many times you’ll have a section in your design that calls for various typographical weights/looks all on the same line, or very close to each other. drop in random divs and classes because I feel they’re not semantic and defeat the purpose of your nice XHTML everywhere else.” Instead, use semantic tags. [Mike Rundle’s 5 CSS Tips]
1.4. Workflow: Use shorthand notation
Shorten hexadecimal colour notation. “In CSS, when you use hexadecimal colour notation and a colour is made up of three pairs of hexadecimal digits, you can write it in a more efficient way by omitting every second digit: #000 is the same as #000000, #369 is the same as #336699 [Roger Johansson]
Define pseudo classes for links in the LoVe/HAte-order: Link, Visited, Hover, Active. “To ensure that you see your various link styles, you’re best off putting your styles in the order “link-visited-hover-active”, or “LVHA” for short. If you’re concerned about focus styles, they may go at the end– but wait until you’ve read this explanation before you decide.” [Eric Meyer]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
a:link { color: blue; }
a:visited { color: purple; }
a:hover { color: purple; }
a:active { color: red; }
a:link { color: blue; }
a:visited { color: purple; }
a:hover { color: purple; }
a:active { color: red; }
Define element’s margin, padding or border in TRouBLed-order: Top, Right, Bottom, Left. “When using shorthand to specify an element’s margin, padding or border, do it clockwise from the top: Top, Right, Bottom, Left.” [Roger Johansson]
You can use shorthand properties. “Using shorthand for margin, padding and border properties can save a lot of space.
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
margin: top right bottom left;
margin: 1em 0 2em 0.5em;
(margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; margin-bottom: 2em; margin-left: 0.5em
CSS:

margin: top right bottom left;
margin: 1em 0 2em 0.5em;
(margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; margin-bottom: 2em; margin-left: 0.5em;)
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
border: width style color;
border: 1px solid #000;
CSS:

border: width style color;
border: 1px solid #000;
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
background: color image repeat attachment position;
background: #f00 url(background.gif) no-repeat fixed 0 0;
CSS:

background: color image repeat attachment position;
background: #f00 url(background.gif) no-repeat fixed 0 0;
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
font: font-style (italic/normal) font-variant (small-caps) font-weight font-size/line-height font-family;
font: italic small-caps bold 1em/140% “Lucida Grande”,sans-serif;
CSS:

font: font-style (italic/normal) font-variant (small-caps) font-weight font-size/line-height font-family;
font: italic small-caps bold 1em/140% "Lucida Grande",sans-serif;
1.5. Workflow: Setting Up Typography
To work with EMs like with pxs, set font-size on the body-tag with 62.5%. Default-value of the font-size is 16px; applying the rule, you’ll get one Em standing for roughly ten pixels (16 x 62.5% = 10). “I tend to put a font-size on the body tag with value: 62.5%. This allows you to use EMs to specify sizes while thinking in PX terms, e.g. 1.3em is approximately 1.3px. ” [Jonathan Snook]
Use universal character set for encoding. “[..] The answer is to use a single universal character set that’s able to cover most eventualities. Luckily one exists: UTF-8, which is based on Unicode. Unicode is an industry standard that’s designed to enable text and symbols from all languages to be consistently represented and manipulated by computers. UTF- 8 should be included in your web page’s head like this. [20 pro tips]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?

You can change capitalisation using CSS. If you need something written in capitals, such as a headline, rather than rewriting the copy, let CSS do the donkey work. The following code will transform all text with an h1 attribute into all capitals, regardless of format”. [20 pro tips]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
h1 {
text-transform: uppercase;
}
h1 {
text-transform: uppercase;
}
You can display text in small-caps automatically. The font-variant property is used to display text in a small-caps font, which means that all the lower case letters are converted to uppercase letters, but all the letters in the small-caps font have a smaller font-size compared to the rest of the text.
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
h1 {
font-variant: small-caps;
}
h1 {
font-variant: small-caps;
}
Cover all the bases – define generic font-families. “When we declare a specific font to be used within our design, we are doing so in the hope that the user will have that font installed on their system. If they don’t have the font on their system, then they won’t see it, simple as that. What we need to do is reference fonts that the user will likely have on their machine, such as the ones in the font-family property below. It is important that we finish the list with a generic font type. [Getting into good coding habits]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
p {
font-family: Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif;
}
p {
font-family: Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif;
}
Use 1.4em – 1.6em for line-height. “line-height:1.4” for readable lines, reasonable line-lengths that avoid lines much longer than 10 words, and colors that provide contrast without being too far apart. For example, pure black on pure white is often too strong for bright CRT displays, so I try to go with an off-white (#fafafa is a good one) and a dark gray (#333333, another good one).” [Christian Montoya]
Set 100.01% for the html-element. This odd 100.01% value for the font size compensates for several browser bugs. First, setting a default body font size in percent (instead of em) eliminates an IE/Win problem with growing or shrinking fonts out of proportion if they are later set in ems in other elements. Additionally, some versions of Opera will draw a default font-size of 100% too small compared to other browsers. Safari, on the other hand, has a problem with a font-size of 101%. The current “best” suggestion is to use the 100.01% value for this property.” [CSS: Getting into good habits]
1.6. Workflow: Debugging
Add borders to identify containers. “Use plenty of test styles like extra borders or background colors when building your documents or debugging layout issues. div { border:1px red dashed; } works like a charm. There are also bookmarklets that apply borders and do other things for you.” You can also use * { border: 1px solid #ff0000; }. [Chric Casciano]. Adding a border to specific elements can help identify overlap and extra white space that might not otherwise be obvious. [CSS Crib Sheet]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
* { border: 1px solid #f00; }
* { border: 1px solid #f00; }
Check for closed elements first when debugging. “If you ever get frustrated because it seemed like you changed one minor thing, only to have your beautiful holy-grail layout break, it might be because of an unclosed element. [10 CSS Tips]
2.1. Technical Tips: IDs, Classes
1 ID per page, many classes per page. “Check your IDs: Only one element in a document can have a certain value for the id attribute, while any number of elements can share the same class name. [..] Class and id names can only consist of the characters [A-Za-z0-9] and hyphen (-), and they cannot start with a hyphen or a digit (see CSS2 syntax and basic data types).” [Roger Johansson]
Element names in selectors are case sensitive. “Remember case sensitivity. When CSS is used with XHTML, element names in selectors are case sensitive. To avoid getting caught by this I recommend always using lowercase for element names in CSS selectors. Values of the class and id attributes are case sensitive in both HTML and XHTML, so avoid mixed case for class and id names.” [Roger Johansson]
CSS classes and IDs must be valid. “I.e. beginning with a letter, not a number or an underscore. IDs must be unique. Their names should be generic, describe functionality rather than appearance.” [CSS Best Practices]
You can assign multiple class names to a given element. “You can assign multiple class names to an element. This allows you to write several rules that define different properties, and only apply them as needed.” [Roger Johansson]
2.2. Technical Tips: Use the power of selectors
Roger Johansson has written an extremely useful series of articles about CSS 2.1 Selectors. These articles are highly recommended to read – some useful aspects can be found in the list below. Note that selectors ‘>’ and ‘+’ aren’t supported in IE6 and earlier versions of Internet Explorer (updated).

You can use child selectors. “A child selector targets an immediate child of a certain element. A child selector consists of two or more selectors separated by a greater than sign, “>”. The parent goes to the left of the “>”, and whitespace is allowed around the combinator. This rule will affect all strong elements that are children of a div element. [Roger Johansson]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
div > strong { color:#f00; }
div > strong { color:#f00; }
You can use adjacent sibling selectors. An adjacent sibling selector is made up of two simple selectors separated by a plus sign, “+”. Whitespace is allowed around the adjacent sibling combinator. The selector matches an element which is the next sibling to the first element. The elements must have the same parent and the first element must immediately precede the second element. [Roger Johansson]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
p + p { color:#f00; }
p + p { color:#f00; }
You can use attribute selectors. Attribute selectors match elements based on the presence or value of attributes. There are four ways for an attribute selector to match:
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
[att]
Matches elements that have an att attribute, regardless of its value.
[att=val]
Matches elements that have an att attribute with a value of exactly “val”.
[att~=val]
Matches elements whose att attribute value is a space-separated list that contains “val”. In this case “val” cannot contain spaces.
[att=val]
Matches elements whose att attribute value is a hyphen-separated list that begins with “val”. The main use for this is to match language subcodes specified by the lang attribute (xml:lang in XHTML), e.g. “en”, “en-us”, “en-gb”, etc.
[att]
Matches elements that have an att attribute, regardless of its value.
[att=val]
Matches elements that have an att attribute with a value of exactly “val”.
[att~=val]
Matches elements whose att attribute value is a space-separated list that contains “val”. In this case “val” cannot contain spaces.
[att=val]
Matches elements whose att attribute value is a hyphen-separated list that begins with “val”. The main use for this is to match language subcodes specified by the lang attribute (xml:lang in XHTML), e.g. “en”, “en-us”, “en-gb”, etc.
The selector in the following rule matches all p elements that have a title attribute, regardless of which value it has:
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
p[title] { color:#f00; }
p[title] { color:#f00; }
The selector matches all div elements that have a class attribute with the value error:
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
div[class=error] { color:#f00; }
div[class=error] { color:#f00; }
Multiple attribute selectors can be used in the same selector. This makes it possible to match against several different attributes for the same element. The following rule would apply to all blockquote elements that have a class attribute whose value is exactly “quote”, and a cite attribute (regardless of its value):
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
blockquote[class=quote][cite] { color:#f00; }
blockquote[class=quote][cite] { color:#f00; }
You should use descendant selectors. “Descendant selectors can help you eliminate many class attributes from your markup and make your CSS selectors much more efficient. ” [Roger Johansson]
2.3. Technical Tips: Styling Links
Be careful when styling links if you’re using anchors. “If you use a classic anchor in your code () you’ll notice it picks up :hover and :active pseudo-classes. To avoid this, you’ll need to either use id for anchors instead, or style with a slightly more arcane syntax: :link:hover, :link:active” [Dave Shea]
Define relationships for links. “The rel attribute is supposed to indicate a semantic link relationship from one resource to another.
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
a[rel~="nofollow"]::after {
content: “\2620″;
color: #933;
font-size: x-small;
}
a[rel~="tag"]::after {
content: url(http://www.technorati.com/favicon.ico);
}
a[rel~="nofollow"]::after {
content: "\2620";
color: #933;
font-size: x-small;
}
a[rel~="tag"]::after {
content: url(http://www.technorati.com/favicon.ico);
}
“These make use of the attribute selector for space separated lists of values. Any a element with a relationship containing those values will be matched. Links with the nofollow relationship will be followed by a dark red skull and crossbones (?) and those with the tag relationship will be followed by the Technocrati icon.” [Handy CSS]
You can mark external links automatically. Many people make use of the non-standard rel="external" relationship to indicate a link to an external site. However, adding that to each and every link is time consuming and and unnecessary. This style rule will place an north east arrow after any link on your site to an external site. [Handy CSS]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
a[href^="http://"]:not([href*="smashingmagazine.com"])::after {
content: “\2197″;
}
a[href^="http://"]:not([href*="smashingmagazine.com"])::after {
content: "\2197";
}
You can remove dotted links with outline: none;. To remove dotted links use outline: none;:
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
a:focus {
outline: none;
}
a:focus {
outline: none;
}
2.4. Technical Tips: CSS-Techniques
You can specify body tag ID. “In most cases placing an ID in the body tag will allow you manipulate CSS presentational items and markup elements by page by page basis. Not only will you be able to organize your sections you will be able to create multiple CSS presentations without changing your markup from template to template or page to page.” [Ryan Parr, Invasion of Body Switchers]
You can create columns with equal heights with CSS. Equal Height Technique: a method to make all columns appear to be the same height. But without the need for faux column style background images. Faux Columns: with background images.
You can align vertically with CSS. “Say you have a navigation menu item whose height is assigned 2em. Solution: specify the line height to be the same as the height of the box itself in the CSS. In this instance, the box is 2em high, so we would insert line-height: 2em into the CSS rule and the text now floats in the middle of the box!” [Evolt.org]
You can use pseudo-elements and classes to generate content dynamically. Pseudo-classes and pseudo-elements. Pseudo-classes and pseudo-elements can be used to format elements based on information that is not available in the document tree. For example, there is no element that refers to the first line of a paragraph or the first letter of an element’s text content. You can use :first-child, :hover, :active, :focus, :first-line, :first-letter, :before, :after and more.
You can set

to separate posts beautifully. “Restyling the horizontal rule (

) with an image can be a beautiful addition to a web page. [CSS: Best Practices]
You can use the same navigation (X)HTML-code on every page. “Most websites highlight the navigation item of the user’s location in the website. But it can be a pain as you’ll need to tweak the HTML code behind the navigation for each and every page. So can we have the best of both worlds?” [Ten More CSS Tricks you may not know]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
XHTML:

Home

About us

Contact us

XHTML:

Home

About us

Contact us

Insert an id into the tag. The id should be representative of where users are in the site and should change when users move to a different site section.
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
#home .home, #about .about, #contact .contact
{
commands for highlighted navigation go here
}
CSS:

#home .home, #about .about, #contact .contact
{
commands for highlighted navigation go here
}
You can use margin: 0 auto; to horizontally centre the layout. “To horizontally centre an element with CSS, you need to specify the element’s width and horizontal margins.” [Roger Johansson]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
XHTML:

XHTML:

view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
CSS:
#wrap {
width:760px; /* Change this to the width of your layout */

margin:0 auto;
}
CSS:

#wrap {
width:760px; /* Change this to the width of your layout */

margin:0 auto;
}
You can add CSS-styling to RSS-feeds. “You can do a lot more with an XSL stylesheet (turn links into clickable links, etc), but CSS can make your feed look much less scary for the non-technical crowd. [Pete Freitag]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?

…

...
You can hide CSS from older browsers. “A common way of hiding CSS files from old browsers is to use the @import trick. [Roger Johansson]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
@import “main.css”;
@import "main.css";
Always declare margin and padding in block-level elements. [10 CSS Tips]
Set a width OR margin and padding. “My rule of thumb is, if I set a width, I don’t set margin or padding. Likewise, if I’m setting a margin or padding, I don’t set a width. Dealing with the box model can be such a pain, especially if you’re dealing with percentages. Therefore, I set the width on the containers and then set margin and padding on the elements within them. Everything usually turns out swimmingly.” [Jonathan Snook]
Avoid applying padding/borders and a fixed width to an element. “IE5 gets the box model wrong, which really makes a mess of things. There are ways around this, but it’s best to side-step the issue by applying the padding to the parent element instead of the child that gets a fixed-width. [CSS Crib Sheet]
Provide print styles. “You can add a print stylesheet in exactly the same way that you would add a regular stylesheet to your page:
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?

or

or

This ensures that the CSS will only apply to printed output and not affect how the page looks on screen. With your new printed stylesheet you can ensure you have solid black text on a white background and remove extraneous features to maximise readability. More about CSS-based print-Layouts. [20 pro tips]
2.5. Technical Tips: IE Tweaks
You can force IE to apply transparence to PNGs. “In theory, PNG files do support varied levels of transparency; however, an Internet Explorer 6 bug prevents this from working cross-browser.” [CSS Tips, Outer-Court.com]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
#regular_logo
{
background: url(‘test.png’); width:150px; height:55px;
}
/* \ */
* html #regular_logo
{
background:none;
float:left;
width:150px;
filter:progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.AlphaImageLoader(src=‘test.png’, sizingMethod=’scale’);
}
/* */
#regular_logo
{
background: url('test.png'); width:150px; height:55px;
}
/* \ */
* html #regular_logo
{
background:none;
float:left;
width:150px;
filter:progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.AlphaImageLoader(src='test.png', sizingMethod='scale');
}
/* */
You can define min-width and max-width in IE. You can use Microsoft’s dynamic expressions to do that. [Ten More CSS Trick you may not know]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
#container
{
min-width: 600px;
max-width: 1200px;
width:expression(document.body.clientWidth <> 1200? “1200px” : “auto”);
}
#container
{
min-width: 600px;
max-width: 1200px;
width:expression(document.body.clientWidth <> 1200? "1200px" : "auto");
}
You can use Conditional Comments for IE. “The safest way of taking care of IE/Win is to use conditional comments. It feels more future-proof than CSS hacks – is to use Microsoft’s proprietary conditional comments. You can use this to give IE/Win a separate stylesheet that contains all the rules that are needed to make it behave properly. ” [Roger Johansson]
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?

Workflow: Get Inspired
Play, experiment with CSS. “Play. Play with background images. Play with floats.” [Play with positive and negative margins. Play with inheritance and cascading rules. Play. [Chric Casciano]
Learn from others. Learn from great sites built by others. Any site’s HTML is easily accessible by viewing a page’s source code. See how others have done things and apply their methods to your own work. [20 pro tips]
Sources and Related Posts
CSS Tips and Tricks by Roger Johansson
(The Only) Ten Things To Know About CSS by John Manoogian
CSS Crib Sheet by Dave Shea
My Top Ten CSS Tricks [CSS Tutorials] by Trenton Moss
CSS Tips by Philipp Lenssen
Top CSS Tips by Jonathan Snook
Ten CSS tricks — corrected and improved by Tantek Çelik
Ten More CSS Trick you may now know by Trenton Moss
CSS techniques I use all the time by Christian Montoya
CSS Tip Flags by Douglas Bowman
My 5 CSS Tips by Mike Rundle
5 Steps to CSS Heaven by Ping Mag
Handy CSS by Lachlan Hunt
Erratic Wisdom: 5 Tips for Organizing Your CSS by Thame Fadial
15 CSS Properties You Probably Never Use (but perhaps should) by SeoMoz
10 CSS Tips You Might Not Have Known About by Christopher Scott
A List Apart: Articles: 12 Lessons for Those Afraid of CSS and Standards by Ben Henick
Tips for a better design review process by D. Keith Robinson
20 pro tips – .net magazine by Jason Arber
CSS Best Practices by Richard K Miller
10 Quick Tips for an Easier CSS Life by Paul Ob
10 CSS Tips from a Professional CSS Front-End Architect by 72 DPI in the shade team blog
Web Design References: Cascading Style Sheets by Laura Carlson
Getting Into Good Coding Habits by Adrian Senior

source from : http://csscircle.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/70-expert-ideas-for-better-css-coding/

Javascript fluid design, new approach to fluid design

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 13 May 2009 16:06:00 +0000

Got this from ajaxian, a cool approach of implementing fluid design using javascript, a small javascript library by Yusuf Akyol. Check out the demo page and resize the browser to see the layout and font size changes. This done by a small CSS and:

HTML

Javascript
view source print ?
01.var fluidLayout = {
02.myFontSize: 100,
03.getBrowserWidth: function() {
04.if (document.documentElement && document.documentElement.clientWidth != 0) {
05.return document.documentElement.clientWidth;
06.} else if (document.body) {
07.return document.body.clientWidth;
08.}
09.return 0;
10.},
11.dynamicLayout: function () {
12.var defaultFontSize = fluidLayout.myFontSize * 100;
13.var browserWidth = fluidLayout.getBrowserWidth();
14.document.body.style.fontSize = (defaultFontSize * browserWidth / 100000) + "%";
15.},
16.addEvent: function (obj, type, fn) {
17.if (obj.addEventListener) {
18.obj.addEventListener( type, fn, false );
19.} else if (obj.attachEvent) {
20.obj["e"+type+fn] = fn;
21.obj[type+fn] = function(){ obj["e"+type+fn]( window.event ); }
22.obj.attachEvent( "on"+type, obj[type+fn] );
23.}
24.},
25.init: function(fontSize) {
26.this.myFontSize = fontSize;
27.this.addEvent(window, 'load', this.dynamicLayout);
28.this.addEvent(window, 'resize', this.dynamicLayout);
29.}
30.}

Embedding(import) your own fonts on the web

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 13 May 2009 15:34:00 +0000

Title:
Embedding your own fonts on the web

Entry:
The CSS @font-face rule allows you to specify & upload a font that will be downloaded to the clients machine, so the web page will be rendered exactly as you expected it to be, no matter where!

A huge step forward for typography on the web. Mozilla finally announced that its new Firefox 3.5 (download beta) will support the @font-face CSS rule. Opera is supposed to do the same with the next 10 version. It’s worth to know that this feature is working already on Safari (3.1 +) using webkit. Internet Explorer (4.0+) Supports this too, but with .eot or .ote font file extensions only.

HISTORY
Since May 1998 in the CSS 2 specification, every one was interested in being able to embed your own fonts on any web page using @font-face rule. It would help you make sure that your visitors will see your design just as you created it. however this was not implemented on every browser, so it was later removed from the recommendation is CSS 2.1.

DISADVANTAGES
The copyright issues! using this method means that any one can go through your code and download the font you are using. This arises a problem since there are many fonts you are not allowed to re-distribute. There should be a way of encoding font files or otherwise we will have to stick with open source fonts, which can’t be the answer!

ALTERNATIVES?
On the other way, the use of sIFR (In-line Flash & Javascript text replacement) was the only other reliable way I know around this, It allows you to embed your font on any browser that supports Flash and Javascript. Beside the fact that it prevent stealing, It is easy, reliable, and it validates.

Using @font-face property

SYNTAX:
@font-face {
font-family: your-font-family-name;
src: url-to-the-font-file;
}

EXAMPLE USAGE:
@font-face{
font-family:'Myriad Pro';
src: url('http://web-site.com/MyriadPro.otf') format('opentype');
}
h2{
font-family:'Myriad Pro', georgia;
}

HTML code:
<body>
<h2>This is Myriad Pro font Example.</h2>
</body>

powered by: http://groups.adobe.com/posts/2b5397b1d0

CSS Image Preloader

ralimadhu@yahoo.com (Madhu) — Wed, 13 May 2009 09:08:00 +0000

A low-tech but useful technique that uses only CSS. After placing the css in your stylesheet, insert this just below the body tag of your page: "". Whenever the images are referenced throughout your pages they will now be loaded from cache.

#preloadedImages {
width: 0px;
height: 0px;
display: inline;
background-image: url(path/to/image1.png);
background-image: url(path/to/image2.png);
background-image: url(path/to/image3.png);
background-image: url(path/to/image4.png);
background-image: url();
}

powered by:http://snipplr.com/