Well I missed the deadline, due to a number of reason, but today is the day that I finally completed the puzzle and I am so happy about it

To see more pictures I created a set on my Flickr account which can be found here.

I have never completed a puzzle before and I know its only a small thing but I have to say that I feel quite proud of myself. It has given my more energy to get more of my Projects that I wanted to get done this year

Every time this question is asked it just opens up the floodgates to the fanboys of a particular CMS to hype up their choice whether that be WordPress, Drupal, Joomla etc.

The correct question to ask in the first place I think is: Does my website need a CMS?   Some websites just don’t need a CMS as they are not updated often enough or they are only up for a short amount of time.  If you website does need a CMS then the next question I think you need to ask is: Which CMS will meet my needs?

What I mean by this is that if you are building a simple blog site with a few static pages, Then WordPress would be an excellent choice as this is what this CMS is made for.  But if you are going to build an ecommerce store then WordPress probably is not the best solution,  Magento in this case could be a better solution or even building a custom system could be the way to go.

There is no one CMS that fits everyone needs,  Different CMS platforms will appeal to different people, which is a good thing.  But it means that we have to think about what CMS to use a lot more.

There are a few other aspects to think about when looking for a CMS for your project.  Once you have figured out what your website will do, blogging or e commerce etc.  Then you can start to narrow down which CMS you want.

A major point I think you have to look for is what community there is around the CMS you are looking at.  For example WordPress has a massive community that has built up around it so if you have a question or an issue when developing on the platform you can normally find an answer to your question with just a quick search on Google.

If you start to use a CMS with a small community or a private company it may take you longer to get the answers you want which could add to your development time.

While looking at a CMS it is important to look at the development of the CMS, How many times has it been update? When was it last updated? is there active development?  Its important not to pick a CMS that has no development being done to it as the CMS is probably dead and not going to be improved over time.

Another thing to consider is the end user, The person that will be using the CMS.  Is the CMS easy to use?  To answer this you may have to ask your client if they have used any other CMS platforms in the past as they may prefer a system like that.

On a side note and thinking about the end user.  It is important to provide proper training to the end user when you finally hand over the website to the client.  This can be in the form of documentation or videos.

So not that there are is already lots to consider when picking a CMS for your website, A point that I have not seen raised too many times and its a point that in the current economic situation I feel is an important is budget.

An example of this is if you have a choice of using an open source platform like WordPress or building your own custom system.  If the end client does not have the budget then WordPress is the option to go for.  But if the client as the budget then they may feel that going custom would be the way to go.  The whole budget point also affects the developer / agency working out if they can afford to build the site custom with the price that they have quoted.

This post is not about saying this CMS is the best, it is just to highlight all the points to consider, and I am sure there are some points that I have not touched on in this post.  When picking the CMS to use with your project.

1. John O’Callaghan – Find Yourself
2. Armin Van Buuren Ft Jan Vayne – Serenity (Sensation 2005 Theme)
3. Gabriel & Dresden – Tracking Treasure Down
4. Paul Van Dyk – For An Angel
5. Conjure One – Tears From The Moon (Tiesto Remix)
6. Ridgewalkers Feat El – Find (Andy Moor Remix)
7. Cygnus X – The Orange Theme
8. BBE – Seven Days & One Week
9. Nu NRG – Dreamland
10. Lightforce – Join Me (Club Mix)
11. Solarstone – Seven Cities
12. Vincent De Moor – Fly Away
13. Paul Oakenfold – Southern Sun (Tiesto Remix)
14. Armin Van Burren – In and Out of Love

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This website is an open source project in which Microsoft, Google, Mozilla and others have brought all there documentation together so you can find out about technologies all in one place.

Now the site is in beta but if we all help out then this website as the potential to become the number 1 resource for information when you need to reference for example a new CSS3 property that you have not used or very rarely use.

I will be keeping an eye on this site and where I can try and add to the project and I hope you guys can as well.

Now Google have given Google reader users a couple of months to move all your feeds but I thought I would get on with it and move my feeds today and start using a new service straight away.

I should also say about now that with Google reader shutting down, there are a few other RSS service shutting down as well, Feeddemon being the biggest which I know of.

There are certain features that I am looking for when looking for a replacement for Google reader, its needs to be free, it needs to be cloud based so I can access it from everywhere, it also means that it can be backed up as well.

Browsing the internet there were a few services that stood out that I should try, these where:

• The old Reader – http://theoldreader.com
• Netvibes – http://www.netvibes.com
• Newsblur – http://www.newsblur.com

I went on a mission to have a look at these services and quickly found that Newsblur, even though has all the components I need, has stopped sign ups to its free accounts at the moment so this was a big no no straight away.

The old reader looks like it will be really good as its based on the old Google reader but for me its still in beta and I just did not want to take the risk.

The option I went for is Netvibes, Now I should say that I used to be a customer of Netvibes about 4 years ago. But they offer a free version, and you can get netvibes on mobile devices which all appeals to me.

I resigned up to Netvibes and the good guys at Netvibes have written a blog post about how to import your feeds from Google Reader. The steps are as follows:

1. Log in to Google Takout
2. Click on “Create archive” to export your subscriptions as a ZIP file
3. Unzip the saved file to your desktop
4. Go to Netvibes, click on “Add content” then “OPML: Import”, “Choose File” and select the “subscriptions.XML” file you just unzipped
5. Click on “Import”

This worked like a charm, The only thing that you will have to do is that when Netvibes imports your feeds, its does not know the feeds you have read. So you will have to have Google reader in a browser window next to the Netvibes browser windows and go through and click read on all the ones you have read and unread all the ones which you still want to read.

If you can’t be bothered to do thi then the best way it to check all the feeds and click “Mark as read” for all of them and start again.

This is the solution that I came up with to meet my needs your needs may be different and if I change I will post and update here.

Game consoles have evolved over the years from just playing games to nowadays being sold as complete media solutions for the living room. The problem at the moment is that the current consoles that are around at the moment, Xbox360 and Playstation 3 have been around now for more then 6 years have only just got browsers on them which means at the moment they are not very good, but first let me have a lot at some stats as to why this as caught my attention

In Ann’s talk some stats where given about who uses consoles and hand held games and these where:

Age of people who own TV game consoles:

• 12-17: 80%
• 18-29: 59%
• 30-49: 51%
• 50-64: 20%
• 65+: 4%

Age of people who own portable game consoles:

• 12-17: 51%
• 18-29: 22%
• 30-49: 30%
• 50-64: 9%
• 65+: 1%

From these states we can see that there are a lot of kids that use game consoles and even though some will have mobile devices if your own the games console why should you not be able to browser the web on it instead of picking up another device, there is also the point to be made that kids under a certain age will not have mobile phones as they are to expensive.

With this in mind it got me thinking that in 2013 there will be a new xbox and new playstation and with the Wii U already having a good browser on it, it really is worth considering having designing for a TV console, While thinking about the future there is also the case that the kids that are in the 12-17 bracket in the stats are going to grow up and continue to want to browse sites on the console when they are using that device.

To get our sites to work on console browsers at the moment and in the future then we can use responsive design to help us out. f we use responsive design for this then I think designing for a mobile touch device could work really well on console browser.

The reason why I think this is because there is a massive range of input devices from the xbox connect to the stylus used on the Nintendo DS, there is also a massive range of screen resolutions to think about as well.

From Ann’s testing which can be found here using web browsers on consoles at the moment is very fiddle and they don’t really work well. So having big buttons and large text could really improve the easy of use of websites when viewing sites on game consoles.

The thought of mobile first can also be applied to this as well, as because console browsers are not easy to use, finding information on your site if you have a lot of information can be painful. If we think mobile first then the important information will be easy to find.

While this is a good way to go i think, In Anna’s talk she mentioned the Vimeo website and the fact there is button on the site called couch mode which when clicked will change the view completely to make it easy to scroll though the site. This gave me an idea that could there be another way? Could we have a button like that for games consoles that changes the lay if you wish. Now a lot of standards based developers will be screaming at me but as we look into the future I will be hoping that browsers will be getting better and they will be able to show websites how they are meant to look, but if you the user wanted to he/she could change the look of the site on a click of a button to make it simpler if they wish. This though is just a thought tho.

At the moment there are no real debugging tool to use on these devices so its kind of going old skool coding and trying something out and then testing on the device, I am hoping this will get better in the mean time. But there are some tools to help you out, Depth.js, Kintic.js ands Wii.js are all jquery frameworks to help you. Google also some great documentation about designing for Google TV

From Anna’s talk I really want to take a site we have produced at Langarth and see how we can use responsive design to get the site to work on console browsers better.

Annas Website – http://www.maban.co.uk/
Annas Twitter – https://twitter.com/anna_debenham
Exploring the game console browser landscape – http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lGWyXVyCZhs#!

The thought I have been having in the last few months is that when it comes time to upgrade my iMac, I would in fact just by a 15inch Macbook pro, providing they are still around. I would also buy a 27inch external monitor and just run the macbook pro in clamshell mode.

My main reasons for this are, The Macbook Pro is just as powerful as a desktop computer and also has just as much storage as a desktop. It also means I only have to buy one computer and then when I want to go away I just unplug my computer and I still have all my files and programs from where I left off. Sounds easy doesn’t it, Well not quite.

I run a NAS drive at home in order to access that I will have to create a VPN on the mac mini at home that I use as a media server, From what I can see on the internet this is not a massive problem, will just take some time to set up, I don’t want to pay for a service if I can help it as I am to cheap for that hehe.

With all this set up then I think I can simplify my computing hard wear set up, But coming back round to the start of this post. Apples announcement of a 128GB iPad started me thinking about how long it would be infill I could replace my macbook pro connected to an external monitor set, with an iPad connected to an external monitor and then when I got away I just take the iPad.

Now I know people will go “NO WAY”, If you an Apple hater then you could add your favourite tablet providing its powerful enough. But lets just think about it for a second. A lot of people nowadays are leaving the laptop at home and taking there iPads out because with 3G connectivity and even 4G coming this year (in the UK anyway) the iPad is fast replacing the laptop.

I think def within the next five years this could happen, also when you take in to the account the economics of it I don’t Apple will want you to do as it means them selling you less products, but as with anything when theres a will there is away.

This was only just a thought but one its a thought that I can see myself coming true because I think I could work like that. The iPad just needs to improve in performance and more storage and the programs also written for the iPad that I use on the desktop and I think we are away.

This book is short and straight to the point which is the kind of book I like as I have such a short attention span. The book also contains lots of facts that we could use to help explain to your clients why designing for mobile first is the best way to go.

The first thing to learn about mobile first is that there are three types of user:

1. Look/Find (Urgent Info)
2. Explore / Play (Board)
3. Edit / Create (Urgent Change / Micro-tasking)

With an understand of what type of user is looking at your site on a mobile device you can design your UI to meed the needs. This is a good time to link to the UI Guide lines for IOS and Android:

• Android UI Guidelines: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/overview.html
• IOS UI Guidelines: http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/MobileHIG/UEBestPractices/UEBestPractices.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40006556-CH20-SW1

The basics of the UI for a mobile device is that the navigation and any buttons have to be big enough for finger tips (44px x 44px) and also have enough spacing between the elements so buttons are not pressed by mistake.

This is important but the main importance that comes from designing your website with mobile first in mind is content. Content is king as the old saying goes and with mobile that is true, From the book I have been convinced that you have to really be strict about what content is shown. If its not needed, don’t show it. Remember people on mobile devices want to get to your content quickly and in as few clicks as possible. By designing for mobile first it forces you to focus on what content is important, this will also help in the desktop versions of the site as well.

Another point from the book that really caught my attention is that we could get really creative with our mobile websites if we learn mobile gestures, a guide can be downloaded from here: http://www.lukew.com/ff/entry.asp?1071 with this knowledge you can design interesting and engaging experiences.

For my new design on my personal website I have found this book helpful and once I have sorted my colour pallet out and the information I want to put on my site I will start with my mobile design first and see where it take me.

I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for facts and insight in to designing for mobile first.

1. Benjamin Leung & Jim Neild feat Andy Haldane – Time To Go
2. Daniel Ascot – Free Your Mind (Cameron Last Remix)
3. Andain – Turn Up The Sound (Gabriel & Dresden Remix)
4. Morfex – Moonshine (Miami 2 Vegas Remix)
5. Paul Van Dyk feat Adam Young – Eternity (PVD & Alex M.O.R.P.H Club Mix)
6. Arie Brun – Undertow (Andrew Bayer Remix)
7. Kirsty – Free Of War (Original Club Mix)
8. Loverush UK vs Maria Nayler – One & One (Clokx Remix)
9. Mathieu Bouthier ft Sophie Ellis-Bextor – Beautiful (Club Mix)
10. Pierce Fulton – Mr Mime
11. Paul Van Dyk ft Arty – The Ocean (Album Mix)
12. DJ Fresh feat RaVaughn – The Feeling (Utah Saints Remix)

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@font-face {
font-family: 'SerifaBold';
src: url('/css/serifbol-webfont.eot');
src: url('/css/serifbol-webfont.eot?#iefix') format('embedded-opentype'),
url('/css/serifbol-webfont.woff') format('woff'),
url('/css/serifbol-webfont.ttf') format('truetype'),
url('/css/serifbol-webfont.svg#SerifaBold') format('svg');
font-weight: 100;
font-style: normal;

}

I then declare all my H1, H2, H3, H4 tags and start building my site. Now the headings look fine in Chrome, but once I start browser testing, I get to Firefox and discover that my H1 heading where I am using the custom font is bolder then normal.

I find this strange as I have declared that I want the font weight to be normal. After some looking round on the inter webs I discover that you have to also declare font-weight: Normal on the H1 as well or it will default to the browser default styling which will bold the H1 tag.

I find this to be a bug in @font-face as to me it means I am declaring that I want the font weight normal twice, which seems to be a waste of time.

So this post is short and sweet and offers a warning that if your using custom fonts you have to declare your font weight on the tag as well.