Maxvoltar

¶ Sunday afternoon inbox

Tim Van Damme — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 14:34:35 GMT

Best part of all? I’m going to respond to every question.

¶ A conversation with my iPhone

Tim Van Damme — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 11:28:02 GMT

Having some fun with Voice Control on the iPhone. It’s quite clear we aren’t made for each other.

Me: “Play Silversun Pickups"
iPhone: “Playing songs by Big Dumb Face"
Me: “Call Gwenny"
iPhone: “Calling Nik Fletcher"
Me: “Get bent”
iPhone: “Playing Genius playlist based on Riders On The Storm by The Doors”

Marco Arment on Firefox 3.5

Tim Van Damme — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:53:34 GMT

They keep making things Awesome™ for the fringe of uber-power-users instead of fixing the common issues that frustrate everyone else and drive average users away from Firefox every day.

Interviewing Mark Jardine

Tim Van Damme — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:31:55 GMT

I’m the Mario in the Super Mario Bros. world. I’m not great at one thing, but average at a lot.

Rogie King interviews Mark Jardine, designer at Tapbots.

Tasty Little Cupcakes

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 14:10:36 GMT

Every iteration in a project must deliver value, both to the customer and to the business. There is no value in icing, or a cake base as a standalone product.

Are you ready to freelance?

Tim Van Damme — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 09:40:40 GMT

Great list of tips on freelancing from Cindy Li.

Thinking Small

Tim Van Damme — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 09:27:58 GMT

Jeremy Keith’s transcription of Jason Santa Maria’s talk at An Event Apart in Boston.

¶ Sneak peek

Tim Van Damme — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 19:07:46 GMT

I’m currently working at multiple projects at the same time (yeah I know, apparently, that’s not done), and just wanted to show a preview/sneak peek/teaser of one of them:

Coming soon!

Update: Adii just posted a more detailed preview on the WooThemes blog.

What is a Browser?

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 16:20:48 GMT

What is a browser? was the question we (Google) asked over 50 passersby of different ages and backgrounds in the Times Square in New York. Watch the many responses people came up with.

When I’m talking to non-technical people, I just tell them to “open their internet”. (via)

¶ Experiences that make us who we are today

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:49:03 GMT

I don’t keep it a secret that I’ve been bullied around quite a lot when I went to school. You had the typical group of bullies existing out of 1 “leader”, and a couple of brainless followers looking for a place to fit in.

Last week I was catching up with an old friend, and he send me a link to a self help group for people who lost one of their relatives. It was a forum thread started by the sister of the “leader”. He killed himself last year.

If you read something like this, a lot of feelings and emotions run through you at once. I felt confused, felt bad for his sister, parents and friends, but I did not feel glad or happy or relieved at all, although I had all the reasons for it.

What he put me through might have left some scars on me (took me a couple of years before I regained my self-confidence), but it also made me who I am today.

Emotionally, it made me very strong. I learned how to take a lot of criticism, how to stand up for my opinion and for the opinion of others, and how to think twice before forming a preconception about someone or something.

Professionally, well, let’s just say that I had a lot of spare time after school, and not a lot of people to spend it with. I spend hours and hours at night learning about things called “HTML” and “CSS” (after someone told me Frontpage was a no-go if you wanted to create decent websites).

My point here is that everything what happened in your life before today, no matter how negative they are, made you into who you are.

smd_canonical

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 10:12:26 GMT

Wonderful little Textpattern plugin that allows you to easily implement canonical URL’s to your site by just adding <txp:smd_canonical /> in the <head> of your site. Example.

Fearful

Tim Van Damme — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 22:11:44 GMT

Smashing Magazine published an excellent primer for CSS3 properties by Inayaili de Leon today which referenced a little of my work. I was pleased, but as today as gone on and I’ve watched the comments roll, my heart started to sink.

(I don’t want to brag, but 2 websites made by me are also in that article ;)

Dog and Pony Show Design

Tim Van Damme — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 08:43:13 GMT

As the professional, you have an obligation to define the project process. In this effort there is no substitute for directness and clarity.

Andy Rutledge on why 1 design comp is better than 4. Completely agree.

Uniform

Tim Van Damme — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 20:36:45 GMT

Introducing Uniform, a plugin for jQuery that lets you style select, radio, and checkboxes however you desire.

Cool little plugin by Josh Pyles!

Safari 4 CSS Video Effects

Tim Van Damme — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 18:47:06 GMT

Wouldn’t it be something if there was only one browser in the world.

Mind = blown. (via)

Instapaper Restyled

Tim Van Damme — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 22:27:16 GMT

“Instapaper restyled” is a userscript that applies a new interface to the Instapaper service. It was inspired by Helvetireader and Instapaper Fluid.

Instantaneous Inspiration

Tim Van Damme — Fri, 29 May 2009 14:30:50 GMT

Fact of the matter is, if I did not come into the office right now to record this episode about instantaneous inspiration, I would not only be hypocrite, but I would not be as fired up as I am right now.

Great little video of Adii talking about how inspiration can suddenly hit you. Act first, clean up later.

Burnout

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 27 May 2009 10:01:02 GMT

Web professionals are often expected to be “always on”—always working, absorbing information, and honing new skills.

Great article. They should’ve named it “Make your life last longer”.

Universal Internet Explorer 6 CSS

Tim Van Damme — Thu, 21 May 2009 10:23:12 GMT

When I asked myself why people visit my sites, and the ones that I make for other people, the answer was always “for the content”. Content that is almost always written words and that means type.

Andy Clarke on why you should serve a basic typographic CSS-file instead of fixing all kinds of layout bugs in Internet Explorer 6.

¶ Why you can’t teach webdesign

Tim Van Damme — Wed, 20 May 2009 00:16:41 GMT

I often get emails from people asking me how they can learn webdesign. Which books they should read, which studies they should choose or even which schools they should attend. I honestly have no idea what they should do.

With “webdesign”, I mean the ability to design a website with the drawing tool of your choice, and then slice it up and write the HTML and CSS yourself. Basically: Design + front-end coding.

I used to think that it should be all self-study, as the techniques and tricks change so fast. That it’s impossible for teachers to keep their curriculum up to date with what’s moving in the online world.

The advice I would give was: Quit school and go work at a company for a couple of years. Work hard, don’t expect to do A+ projects, and ask a lot of questions.

I was wrong, but not completely. There is a better way.

How many books have you read on the subject of webdesign? Wild guess: 3 or more. And you’ve probable read one or more of these (my favorites, preferable in this order):

Web Standards Solutions by Dan Cederholm
Bulletproof Web Design also by Dan Cederholm
CSS Mastery by Andy Budd, Cameron Moll and Simon Collison
CSS Artistry by Andy Clarke

Although not recent (Web Standards Solutions was first available in 2004), these books still provide an invaluable foundation and support in learning webdesign.

So that got me thinking: What if teachers could educate what is inside these books, and after they’ve covered the basics (although CSS Mastery already is pretty advanced), let their students decide what to specialize in?

It’s like parents raising kids (not that I know anything of that, just that my parents did a wonderful job). They can teach them a lot, but at a certain age, they need to let the kids go and learn on their own. The only thing parents can do from there on is supporting the kids, and guiding them through life.

Same goes for the teachers. The curriculum only gets you halfway. The only way you can learn the other half, is by learning it yourself. By guiding their students, teachers themselves will also stay on top of all the latest. It’s basically a win-win.

I know the subject of education in webdesign is a bit like a can of worms. Feel free to comment here, or write your own blogpost about it (I’ll link to it here).

Would love to know your opinions!