First off before any CSS is implemented, we must first figure out how to ‘create’ the navigation images. At first it’s going to sound weird, but there is a purpose for this madness! The examples I’m going to use will be from this blog to make this simple. First off, you want to create the navigation button. Your going to put the ‘regular’ button look on the left, and then duplicate it and place a copy of it exactly to the right of the regular button. Do whatever you want to the button on the right hand side because this is going to be your ‘rollover’ button. That’s right, we’ve made this regular, and rollover navigation button out of 1 image! Here is an example of my homepage regular/rollover button. Keep in mind the width of the full button, because later on we’ll need to know that for the CSS.  This will basically make loading times negligible and it will act as if it is a javascript branded rollover button. Still wondering how we are going to accomplish this? Here comes the CSS part.

The CSS is actually quite basic here. First ill show the CSS, and then I will show how it works inside the XHTML code of the buttons. I’m sure there are a ton of ways to implement this next task I am about to show, but after you are familiar with it spice it up some and make it however you need. Ok, so you will need a little bit of CSS knowledge to understand this. What I do is create classes for my “a-href” tags. That way I can create a navigation button link and slap that class on it so it knows what to do. So as using my example above with the homepage, here is the CSS that is used to accomplish it. Ill break down each line so we know what its doing.

a.nav-homepage {    float: left;    width: 72px;    height: 43px;    background: url('../images/nav-home.jpg') no-repeat;    text-decoration: none;    margin-right: 20px;}a:hover.nav-homepage { background-position: -72px 0; text-decoration: none; }

Float: left;// This is just used to fit into my navigation layout. Not really needed to make this technique work.

Width: 72px;// This is important. The width is going to be HALF of actual button. So as we can see the full button is 144px. This means it will start out only showing the first 72px of the image. ( the left side )

Height: 43px;// Nothing tricky about this. Just the height of the button your using.

Background: url(‘../images/nav-home.jpg’) no-repeat;// This is just the link to where the FULL background image Is located. Nothing tricky here either. It must have the “no-repeat” attribute though. That is important because we don’t want to see multiple nav images floating around!

Text-decoration: none;// This is another attribute you don’t REALLY need. More so just to fit my css/layout styles.

Margin-right: 20px;    // Again, not important. You don’t need this for the technique to work.

// And this is where the magic starts! When the image is HOVERED over (a:hover), then do this set of instructions!

Background-position: -72px 0;// So when its hovered, this move the image to the left 72 px! This does exactly what you think – shows the “rolled” over image that you created earlier. So in theory, it is basically ‘shifting’ the image to the right and left when its hovered over and left alone.

Text-decoration: none;// Lastly, this may or may not be needed in your design to make it work. Most likely not, but once your familiar with this CSS, play with it and see what you get!

So you’ve got your CSS all laid out and ready to implement the XHTML side of it? Good, because this is the easiest part. I usually place my navigations in whats called ‘unordered’ lists tags. So basically all you must do is this.

 <ul><li><a href="/" class="nav-homepage"></a></li></ul>

Just fill in the link that you want the button to go to and voila! The part in red, ‘nav-homepage’ is essential, otherwise nothing will work. You must set class=”your button classes”, whatever they may be. Feel free to make as many as you need. Just duplicate the CSS code, make your images, and then add the XHTML code. This is exactly how I do it with all of my navigation buttons above. Please feel free to contact me with any questions/comments regarding this topic and I will be glad to give my help/feedback.

Well, first off, I did not write this code from scratch. This code was hard to find and edit, so therefore that is why I am posting it here so may be other people will not have trouble finding it. Again, this code allows the user to "click" on the form element and it "highlights all" of the text. This allows for easy copy and pasting!

This javascript goes at the top, preferably inside the tags. Although this javascript code can be placed pretty much anywhere in the code. It must go before the form field you are trying to use it with though. (Common sense tells us this)

Then, for each form field that you want to "select all" when you click on it, just add this attribute to the form field:

Thats pretty much it. If anyone has any problems with getting this to work, i'll be more than happy to help. Any questions or comments, let me know and ill address them.

Well for starters, I always check my comments to see who is around and about my blog and commenting and one day I saw 18 comments on my first blog post. Well at first I was thinking, "WOW did everyone just read that or what am I missing here". So all excited, I went to go read them and quickly got sad. What is the reason for this you ask?!? Well besides the 2 or 3 faithful and true comments, there were about 15-16 blog robot comments! Well this pissed me off and because it has happened before but not in this much bulk (last time was like 2 or 3 comments). So what I decided to do about this was add a field to the comments form that asks the user if they are a robot or not. As long as the user inputs "no" "No" or "NO" then there comment will be posted. Anything otherwise, and it will not post the comment. This is sort of a pain in the butt and im sorry, but this is my attempt to stop blog robot spam. HA

Today I was bored, and was looking at past paychecks from my jobs that I have had in the past years. I was trying to calculate what tax was taken from each and how they differed. Well in doing this I decided to make my own small, and simple script to decide the amount you will get paid, incase you want to know before your pay stub comes in, or before you check your accounts. This script is more based on MY job, and therefore I didn't make it very modular for other taxes that may be used that I don't know about. It is just a simple script that takes hours worked and hourly rate, and decides what your pay will be depending on the taxes you place on it. Once again this script is geared towards Me and my current work situation and is open for anyone to take and use for their own use.

Here is the script.

Im sure there are plenty of shortcuts which could be used to program this and make it more efficient but this is just something i did on the spur of the moment. This is nothing drastic or special but just something I thought I'd share with everyone else!

Go test it out by clicking here! Any comments or suggestions let me know.

In the days leading up to the election there were so called "gallop" polls that stated the current election status of each candidate for example Obama 53% to McCain's 47%. These polls are clearly just a spark to give the press and American citizens something to gossip about and go by. In my opinion we could do without these polls but the press needs something to feed off of right? My reason for this is these polls may not be accurate at all. For example when you get the call at home and they ask you who you are going to vote for, some people that aren't even going to vote may say Obama or McCain just to get the gallop polls to stop calling. On the contrary people who just don't feel like dealing with them, but still are going to vote, may just hang up. Either way, in my opinion, gallop polls are no good and just an extra way to "get the crowd going".

Another issue that every citizen got to vote for was being able to vote early. As early as too weeks. This issue seems to be a great alternative to those who may not be able to attend their polling place that certain day (due to vacation, business, etc). The idea of being able to vote early could potentially grab many more voters and increase the chances of people voting. Voting two weeks ahead of time could also drag things out and make the process more complicated. This means there is more time to lose voting data or more time for error to take place in that two week span. Either way, its up to the voters to decide this one so i'll leave it at that.

As for this subject I am sort of concerned that this election was racially determined. Yes Obama is a great speaker, very charismatic, and seems to have all the answers to everyones solutions. We all know he can't make everyone happy and people will disagree with some things he does but this is normal. But the fact that over two million black voters voted for the first time in this election, 95% of which voted for Obama is a little odd. (Source: CNN News) Call me crazy and may be it is just a coincidence but why did this all of the sudden happen? Did these black voters vote for Obama just to "make history" by putting a black man in the whitehouse? Do they even know his policies or what he wants to do? These questions are out there but I myself am just curious. I am not saying that blacks didn't vote for McCain, (he did get 5% of black votes), but it just seems a little racially biased and that people may be voting for the wrong reasons.

Well, I think i've laid out some things I had liked to address. Just to set things straight, I am not a racist, nor do I intend anything I said to be racist. I just hope that we have elected the right guy for the right reasons. I guess we'll see how much change we will be getting within the next 4 years at least. For now, thats it for me!

Before i get started on the intricate details of this phone I want to first say I got most of my information from PhoneArena. They are up to date with the newest phones for every provider out there. Should check them out if your into up to date details on phones.  Anyways, so this phone sports a 3.2" display screen, 3.2MP camera, html browser, etc. It is .5" in thickness and can operate on both Verizon and GSM networks. This phone also supports just about all the bells and whistles except for wifi. This is disappointing to me but in reality if i really needed it I would just use the 3G capability and get a data plan. Although we are talking about verizon here...ugh. 

Ever been driving in unknown territory and completely miss a turn? It is frustrating because now you are off course and have not a clue how to get back on route. The iPhone sports a GPS which is ever life saving. (Friend of mine helps me with his all the time) Well fear not anymore, for this phone has GPS too! May be I won't need to borrow my friends iPhone anymore or depend on him being there. May be I will? Not much has been said about the GPS on this phone, but assuming anything, it most likely rivals the iPhone best as it can. This of course, may be wishful thinking... But wishful thinkin never hurt anyone did it?

First off I would like to thank whoever took this picture, and whoever wrote this on their vehicle. I give all rights to them and this picture. I am just advertising it more as it should be because this is the way most all verizon customers who give a crap think. The picture states "Verizon Sucks. Can You Hear Me Now?". I could rant about Verizon all day long with things I don't like, but in the readers interest i'll leave it at that.

Well we all know that Verizon is very good at taking great phones and distorting them and making them a little better than crap. Is the trend going to continue? Are they going to strip this phone down to its boxers and socks? Lets hope they at least let it keep its dignity and hold a few good features. After all, it seems Verizon doesn't like giving customers what they want, and that is why the rejected the iPhone in the first place right? (I understand there were other reasons, lol)

So, is this phone potentially an iPhone killer?? It's specs might match up but does it have the capability? I mean, it does bear the infamous "blackberry" trademark that doesn't get much love, but can it pull out of slavery and start a revolution? Ok, that was a little history oriented and im sorry. This is a vast topic and I could expand more and more but for now ill leave things as they are. As a Verizon customer I am looking into getting this phone so any serious opinions on it would be nice. Until next time, thats all for me, Brandon out.

Well to add to the change of things recently, I acquired a part time job at a Software Company called Nsite, LLC. At this company I have learned many new things and had to change my current programming habits. For the most part I do PHP/MySQL development for my projects and sites that I've made. The simple reason is because its free, and easy to implement onto servers (most servers come with it already installed). Having said that, I had to completely change every habit of web development that I was accustomed to (not a bad thing), and jump into the ColdFusion/SQL array of development for Nsite. Learning the language of ColdFusion wasn't really the challenge, but instead understanding the process of pushing into development and editing code that someone else has written. I am continuously learning more and more about ColdFusion development and how vast and deep it can ultimately be. There is much to be learned so therefore expect some of my future blog posts to be ColdFusion/SQL related as I will be wanting to discuss it more and more.

Upon joining Nsite, I was also welcomed into the Adobe Eastern Shore of Maryland Users Group where they hold one meeting every month to showcase new Adobe software and any questions you may have about them. The first night I came I received tons of cool free stuff so thats an incentive to join us right there! The user group is always looking for more members, which means Adobe will give more free stuff! So come join us at the next user group meeting Friday, September 26, 2008 at 7 p.m. at the ZoobieSoft Office. Scheduled speaker is Yancy Wharton, Owner of ZoobieSoft. Currently the location is being discussed and may be moved to the Salisbury University College in the near future. More details about that to come later. If you have more questions about the User Group email me, or go to the website!

Well, college has started back up full-time for me and I am taking 16 credits this semester so I will try my best to keep blog posts frequent, even if they may be short. If anyone has expertise in Philosophy, or World Literature feel free to contact me or find me on twitter because most likely I will have questions regarding these topics in the near future. Well I believe thats all for me so any questions or comments you know how to get in touch!

Well, recently i bought an iPod Touch 16 GB off of eBay for a fairly good price even though it was refurbished. I have since then had mixed thoughts about the iPod Touch (or as it is also called the iTouch). It has its up's and down's (mostly up's). Where to begin.. We'll start with the good aspects of this genious Mp3 design.

I'm sure everyone has seen and heard the hype about the iPhone and all that it is doing. Well I have verizon and they denied apple's iphone (which thoroughly pisses me off) so i'm stuck with getting the 2nd best thing which is the iTouch. The iTouch, like the iPhone, has pretty much the same interface but there are a few functionality differences. They should be obvious but the iTouch can't call or take pictures. There may be more but that is basically the only big differences i've noticed. Being as i dont have an iPhone, that is all just from research. 

The iPod touch design is pure genious with the all touch screen commands and the easy access on/off and standby buttons. When you first turn on your iTouch, the apps seem to be the perfect size for most fingers, not to small, not to large and make the touch screen as easy as ever. Once you touch an app, it glides onto the screen and now you've got new commands to tap, or if all else fails just press the friendly home button (which is not touch sensored) and it will take u back to the home screen. The fact that the touch screen is so very user friendly makes it the best touch screen mp3 player out there. With all the extra goodies that are yet to come, this touch wont be going anywhere soon.

This may be the deciding feature that sets the iTouch apart from any other mp3. It sort of puts it on its 'own level' if you will. The fact that you can open up an internet browser on the iTouch and browse google for that certain answer that has been bugging you is just amazing. As long as your near a wireless router you can pick up a connection to the internet. Other handy apps including stocks, email, weather, maps, etc all add up to make this PDA like mp3 player one phenomenal investment. To top all of that, if you upgrade to the latest version (2.0.x), you will get another add-on called the "app store" where you can buy or even download for free some of your favorite apps! The possibilites are endless and that's why Apple is on top.

Now that we have gone through some of the good things about the iTouch, lets touch on some of the not so good things about it. For starters, and the most annoying problem is its connection to itunes from your computer. On a good day, it will let users upgrade and restore, but other times it will continually give certain errors saying "Unable to restore error code (1604) " yadda yadda. Apple NEEDS to fix this. I understand mine is refurbished and could have a potential problem but this same error is happening to many new iTouch's also. That is the biggest problem i have had with my iTouch is just getting it to update/restore when needs be. Another smaller and yet personal problem is when i'm typing on the keypad that is offered, sometimes I hit the wrong letters only because the keys are sort of small. I realize if you turn the iTouch sideways the keys get bigger, but its still a small problem that happens.

Well all in all, the iTouch is an amazing mp3/wifi player and I would 100% recommend it to anyone who was in the market for a new mp3 player. Apple still has a few kinks to work out which is equally the same for every company but once those kinks are worked out, Apple will have nothing stopping them from taking over the cell phone market (with the iPhone), the mp3 player market (with the iTouch), and the computer market (with the MacBook's and Apple Desktops). Some can argue that this has already been done but Apple still has a ways to go before they are king of the market. So yea, the iTouch recieves an A from me.

Year 1: Beginning of Design, The Age of FrontPageYear 1.5: HTML Table Layouts, FrontPage 2003 Is like GoldYear 2: CSS Emerges, Revolution in DesignYear 2.5: CSS div based layouts, Mark of a New Standard in DesignYear 3: CSS is Widely understood, d3vious Blog Appears!

Side-note: Yet through all of this Internet Explorer has yet to adapt or change to meet standards. HA

Things have come a long way from being breastfed by FrontPage, to now coding and programming CSS like it’s a habit. Either way things are in the right direction and standards are becoming increasingly important. Anyway that topic is for another day, but if you want to learn more about me or my company visit the about page and indulge yourself!

Because everyone blogs! Nah, but I am blogging because I believe that there are many subjects on programming and design languages that need exploring and I want to hear other’s opinions. A wider range of subjects will be discussed as I go back to college and get deeper into my computer science major. For now, the blog posts will mainly consist of web design, development, and things internet related.

There are many ways to get involved with my posts. Leave me comments, tell me what you think, subscribe to my RSS feed , even email me on the contact page if you would like to discuss something. If you disagree with something or think something should be changed, let me know and we can talk about it! Any type of feedback is welcomed and encouraged!