Resound Design Blog

How to get Active Directory and PHP talking

(Resound Design) — Tue, 08 May 2012 00:00:00 +0100

If you're unfamiliar with Active Directory (usually referred to as AD), it is the service which Microsoft Windows networks generally use to organise, manage and authenticate network users. The protocol used to access and query AD is called Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (or LDAP if you're in a hurry).

It's possible, and very useful, to be able to integrate AD into PHP applications. This tends to be most useful for intranets and internally used web apps - allowing users to authenticate using their AD credentials (rather than having to remember another set of login details) and allowing the application to grab user data, contact details, permissions, etc.

To get PHP talking to AD we highly recommend a freely available PHP class called adLDAP. adLDAP describes itself as "a PHP class that provides LDAP authentication and integration with Active Directory".

There's lots you can do with adLDAP, but to get you started, here's how you can allow your users to log in with their AD details.

Log in users with Active Directory via PHP

First off, adLDAP required PHP's LDAP extension so check your phpInfo() to see if you have that installed. You'll also need the details of the AD you wish to connect to.
Download and install the latest version of the adLDAP class.

Configure it - open up adLDAP.php in your favourite editor. In most cases you'll simply need to find and change the following lines to match your details...

protected $accountSuffix = "@my-server.local";
protected $baseDn = "DC= my-server,DC=local"; 
protected $domainControllers = array("dc1.my-server.local");
protected $adminUsername = "jeff.jefferson";
protected $adminPassword = "jeff's-password";

Next, create your form. This simply needs to be an HTML form which receives the username and password of the user.
Now write the script. Here we assume the username and password are passed to this script as the variables $username and $password

First, connect to AD, setting up a new instance of adLDAP. Or if that fails, display an error.
```
try
{
    $adldap = new adLDAP();
}
catch(adLDAPException $e)
{
	echo $e;
	exit();   
}
```
Next, call the authenticate method of adLDAP and pass it the username and password received from the form. If the details match those in AD, then the function returns true.

Here we've set the result of the authentication into the variable $valid, you'll see why in a moment.
```
$valid = $adldap -> authenticate($username, $password);
```
Now, we can use $valid to get the script to respond appropriately. You can do what you like here - e.g. set a cookie to say they're logged in, or return a friendly error message.
```
if($valid)
{
	//authenticated successfully
}
else
{
	//authentication failed
}
```

That's just the start of what this powerful little class can do!

A quick note on security - if you are passing network credentials over the web, make sure these are encrypted with an SSL certificate!

There are plenty more examples included in adLDAP's excellent documentation.

Our first visit to the DIBI Conference

(Resound Design) — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0100

First, I thought I should answer the question everyone seems to ask. Is it worth it and would I go again? Yes, and I hope that this article will explain why.

Ok, so waking up at 5am is never any fun unless you're going on holiday but that's what we did. We headed to the train station and caught the 6.30 am train to Newcastle. Two hours and a 20 minute walk in the rain later, we arrived at The Sage Gateshead!!!

What better way to be greeted out of the rain and cold than a cup of tea... Perfect start!

As you may know, the conference is a two track day, in that in one room everyone talks about Design and the other is dedicated to Build. You can pick and choose which speakers you would like to listen to and the guys at DIBI made it very easy not to miss anything.

There were some fantastic speeches specifically from Paul Boag, Dan Rubin, Cameron Moll and Seb Lee-Delisle. All of which I am really glad I chose to listen to. Altogether they were thought provoking, encouraging, impressive, amusing, motivating, engaging, inspiring and much more.

Seb Lee-Delisle impressed me with his live programming and enthusiasm for learning something new. If you are a designer, try and code something and vice versa. There are not enough hybrids out there and good things can come out of trying something new.

Paul Boag's speech on "Client Centric Web Design" encouraged me to see things from a different perspective. He gave some good real life examples of how we can work well with clients and controversially stated that Web Design is about the client first and the user second!

Dan Rubin and Cameron Moll were both thought provoking and inspiring. Dan Rubin, mainly pointing out that we do not do enough! As developers and designers we need to push ourselves and strive to be better. Interestingly he spoke about how thought and language affect how we work and how we live. The words we use and the way we perceive a certain situation affects how we react to it.

Cameron Moll spoke about "The Burden of Being Creative" and the conclusion manifested an impressive equation which, he feels, can define creativity.

We came out of each speech with notes on recommended readings, new ideas, important facts and how to generally strive for better and push ourselves as developers and designers.

They allowed time, mostly, for people to ask questions using the "Question Ball" and gave random giveaways in between speeches, when time permitted.

Not only did we learn a lot and listen to some amazing people, but the food was great!... very important :)

We were served lunch in chinese takeaway boxes, with chopsticks, with a choice of two mains, with drinks and even a dessert. We also had sweet snacks and fruit in the afternoon and as much tea and coffee as we wanted.

Overall, a good day out of the office and I walked away inspired by people who choose to push the boundaries in their work and personal lives.

Image courtesy of adactio

Tracking small business success

(Resound Design) — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0100

It can be tricky to succeed in running a small business - it can even be tricky knowing whether or not you are succeeding! We've come up with a few tips to help you see how your business is going...

Simply, you need to start by deciding where you're going. This can be as simple as a quick mission statement that sums you up.

Once you know what makes you tick - you need to translate that into something you can measure. What's success to you? Having a high turnover? Taking on new clients? Doing lots of billable hours? Great customer service? Projects delivered quickly?

The possibilities go on. Choose the indicators which are most important to you and your mission - and get tracking them!

Knowing how your business is progressing is really important. Now you know what to look at, there are different ways of tracking your business health. You might just want to keep it in a spreadsheet, jot it on a piece of paper, or a whiteboard for everyone to see.

Or even better, you might want to consider our handy free web-based KPI tracking system, Success Desk. We love helping businesses reach their goals and this a great way to keep an eye on your aims...

Using Success Desk to track your KPIs has a number of benefits...

You can set up multiple users - so your whole team can log in and see the stats
It helps you keep the stats up-to-date - if you forget you'll get reminded by email!
Automatically takes your stats and makes them into handy graphs
Throw your most important KPIs onto your dashboard - you can then see your business health at a quick glance, spot warning signs and celebrate successes!

Aim high! Knowing where you stand can help you push to meet your aims, or motivate you knowing you've smashed your targets!

Success Desk is still in beta, so please do sign up and get involved - we'd love to hear your feedback on how we can make it better and more useful to your business.

Success Desk is currently a contender for Heart Internet's website of the month competition! If you like it we'd be grateful if you voted for Success Desk...

A Helpful List of UK Conferences

(Resound Design) — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0100

Web design and development conferences are currently at the forefront of our minds. We have been searching for conferences happening around the UK this year and I have been slightly surprised not to find a full list somewhere to help. So here is one I made earlier!

The list below is of all the web related conferences that I thought were most interesting and most relevant. If you know of any which are not listed below, please feel free to contribute via the comments box below.

I know it is nearly April, however, I thought it would be useful to start from the beginning of the year, to show what we have missed and what we hope will be back soon.

UK Web Conferences 2012

Date	Conference	Location
January 18th-19th	New Adventures in Web Design	Nottingham
February 10th	jQuery Conference	Oxford
February 24th-25th	PHP Conference	London
March 19th-23rd	The Usability Week 2012 Conference	Edinburgh
April 18th-20th	UX London	London
April 16th-17th	Design It. Build It.	Newcastle
May 14th-16th	Future Of Web Design	London
May 24th-27th	@media	London
June 15th	Ampersand	Brighton
September 7th	dConstruct	Brighton
October	Future Of Web Apps	London
October	Future of Mobile	London
November	Heart and sole	Portsmouth

Nominated for website of the month again

(Resound Design) — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Our friend Matt Lollar's website has made it through to the final round of Heart Internet's website of the month awards for March 2012.

This is the second month in a row we've had a website nominated for an award, with Make Your City Shine winning special recognition with second place last month.

We originally designed Matt's site back in 2009, and have been supporting and helping Matt make the best of it since then. Matt Lollar Photography offers fantastic wedding and portrait photography services, as well as one-on-one tuition. We really love Matt's photography and did our best to make this center stage on his site, as it really does speak for itself. We hope you like it too!

The final round is all down to public vote, so please do vote for us!

Is Pinterest of any interest?

(Resound Design) — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Pinterest, a virtual, social pinboard, has recently gained a lot of attention and popularity, but what's it all about?

So what is it?

Essentially, Pinterest is an online pinboard, to which anyone can pin anything to, you can curate your own lists, and browse others too.

You categorise you pins into boards - popular examples include - Products I Love, Places to Visit, Craft Ideas and more than often Cute Kittens!

You can spend your days following your friends' boards and pins, browsing through popular pins or categories, and even set up collaborative pinboards.

If you see a 'pin' you like, you can always choose to 'like' or even repin it to one of your own boards.

How is it different?

We've seen sites gain hype like this in the past, some stick around but some don't. What makes Pinterest different?

Firstly, Pinterest is really visual. If your content can't be summed up in a single image, it won't work here. This makes Pinterest really suited to more visual genres such as home decor and again, kittens.

Additionally, it's been said that it gives a better, or at least more exciting, picture of yourself. Perhaps due to the fact it reflects aspirations (such as hobbies, your dream home, or cute kittens).

Finally, Pintereset is really nicely designed. It feels to me that they've put effort into planning and creating a beautiful looking site which is a pleasure to use.

What do I care?

As with all hyped social network sites, I imagine you're wondering how it could benefit you, or your business.

It's always important to consider your particular industry before jumping on the bandwagon. If you're a plumber or a lawyer it's probably not a brilliant idea, but if you're a photographer, or someone who makes awesome looking cakes, then there could be something in it for you.

I've already seen sites pick up some significant traffic from Pinterest, so get it right and maybe it could work for you?

Get in on the action

To start out on Pinterest you need to 'Request an invite', but don't worry that usually comes through within a day or so.

Then get following some great people!

The Dreaded IE6

(Resound Design) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Even though, here at Resound, we have not been building websites for IE6 for a long while now, we thought we should make it official and post it here on our blog.

We still here about people using IE6 and it makes us sad. Using IE6 in 2012, is like watching TV in black and white... in fact, it's worse. You don’t get the full experience and not only that but the security has gone through some dramatic changes over the years. It’s time to say goodbye.

We would like to encourage all IE6 users out there to upgrade. Please consider the following IE6 countdown. Currently at 7.7% worldwide, this is a great improvement to previous years however, it is still 7.7% too many.

If you are worried about upgrading then please read the following page on why to upgrade and how and to help you say goodbye properly here is a link to the funeral of IE6, which took place on the 1st of March 2010.

Make Your City Shine nominated for award

(Resound Design) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

This month one of our recent website projects has made it through to the final round of Heart Internet's Website of the Month competition.

What's Make Your City Shine all about?

Make Your City Shine is a project aiming to make the world a better place, starting with the city of Sheffield.

The site aims to turn the tide on anti-social behaviour, negativity and hopelessness many experience today by encouraging people to get involved in making a difference to someone's world - simply by showing kindness, and using little acts of kindness to transform their community.

You can sign up to the site in order to tell your story - how someone's act of kindness made your day, or how you got involved and helped make your city shine.

So, if you like the sound of that, why not get involved with the project?

Show your support with a vote

If you like the site, we'd love for you to head on over to Heart Internet's website, and vote for Make Your City Shine by rating it out of 5. You have until the end of the month to do so, and the winner will be announced at the beginning of March. Your vote would be greatly appreciated!

Our MD in The Star Business Monthly

(Resound Design) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Our managing director, Andrew Seaton, also managing director for Resolve IT Solutions, was in The Star Business Montly (page 15) yesterday, the 1st of February 2012. He was recently interviewed for the Business Monthly Q&A and answered some interesting questions including "What was your best decision in business?" and "What's the best piece of advice you have ever received".

Head over to The Star Business Monthly website to read the full Q&A.

Photo courtesy of Jodi Hinds.

Look what 2012 has in store for us and the web

(Resound Design) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 +0000

In my last post I wrote about what we've learnt over the last year. This time I thought I'd look ahead at what 2012 has in store for our little web design company, as well as for the bigger picture of web design.

1) Always Improve

We're getting better at what we do. We're now taking time regularly to invest into our skills. We’ve been racking up badges on the fantastic resouce that is Treehouse, as well as growing a number of other more specific skills via a few other resources.

And we’re improving by reviewing the way we code, and working towards a more organised and efficient code base, and the possibility of taking advantage of a framework - ultimately producing a groundbreaking next generation of the Resound CMS by the end of the year.

2) We want to grow

We're growing in number already, and we're looking forward to taking on bigger projects. We're currently in the midst of recruiting an extra developer to a our little team. It’ll be exciting to see how our ‘meet the team’ page has changed come 2013!

3) One size fits all

I think we’ll see responsive design take off for the little guys this year - it’s been big talk in the web design industry for a long while now, and really has emerged as the best solution for adapting a site to work on handheld devices such as the iPhone and iPad.

We think it’s about time this became a standard, and hope we get to see this advancement filter through to the likes of small business websites.

4) Get the full benefit of the web

We’ve already seen the rise of the web app. I currently use web-based apps for my email client, calendar, time tracking, task list and keeping an eye on social media, and I’m sure many of you are starting to do similarly.

Twin this with the realisation that your website is way more than a sales tool - but can revolutionise the way you run your business and organise your time - and you can start to see the real advantages custom web apps can have to a small business.

In conclusion...

So there’s a snapshot of what we think 2012 will look like from where we’re sat. I’m sure the year will throw some curveballs, but I’m excited to see how it turns out!

Image courtesy of notionscapital

Resound Design are a Recommended Agency!

(Resound Design) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Happy New Year everyone! We hope you had a wonderful Christmas and you are filled with new energy and excitement for the year ahead.

The new year brings new exciting times for Resound and there is one particular development which we can't wait to share. We are so pleased to say that we are now a Recommended Agency on RAR+.

What is RAR+?

The Recommended Agency Register has been gathering client feedback and recommendations since 2004 in order to identify the best agencies to work with. They now have a bespoke online tool to show which companies have been recommended and for what. Resound Design being a Recommended Agency means that our clients have recommended us as a good Web Design Agency.

This is brilliant! What more do we need to motivate us to be creative in design and development. Knowing that are clients are happy and achieving this status makes all the hard work worth it and we can't wait to do more.

Thank you so much to our clients who recommended us!

4 things our little web design company learnt in 2011

(Resound Design) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

It's been a great year for us, and both the web and our little web design company have really grown throughout 2011. Here's 4 things our web design crew have learned this year...

1) @font-face is awesome

In the past year use of techniques like @font-face have really taken off - it seems we're finally reaching the tipping point where most web browsers support such features. We like @font-face so much we blogged about it back in May.

@font-face allows us to choose from among thousands of different typefaces when designing websites. This along with CSS3 has vastly expanded the possibilities and removed the limitations on how beautiful the web can look.

2) Don't be afraid of frameworks & libraries

Early this year we expanded our toolkit to include jQuery, moving beyond basic Javascript, to include some more advanced and asynchronous interaction, as well as display and animation techniques.

jQuery has enabled us to do some pretty nifty things really quickly. I fondly remember the eureka moment when I realised the convoluted 10 to 20 lines of code used to make an AJAX call could be done in one line with jQuery (and it was a short line!).

3) Project process is important

I’d say this is the most important thing we’ve learnt as a business - having a firm idea of your standard process, and how your project should progress. We blogged about our process back in June, and since then we’ve seen a large number of benefits from having a standard process...

It helps us give good customer service - it sets the expectations of clients, keeps the number of changes under control, and allows us to set more definite deadlines, and meet them too!
It aids teamwork - it’s helped us know what we each need to do and to focus on our specific parts of a project.
It’s shown me that design is important - our process has helped us focus on the design stage of projects and get things looking spot on
Having a standard process means we can change it! It’s helped us see where bottlenecks are and ultimately helps us work more efficiently.

4) Think about hosting

And be prepared to grow too! We’ve seen a number of projects take off in a big way this year, outgrowing shared and even dedicated server hosting.

We’ve also worked with a number of projects requiring us to work with some very specific hosting setups to achieve some clever things for our clients, for example, getting Active Directory talking to PHP hosted on an IIS server.

Even if you have the most beautiful, professional, effective website - if the speed of the website is lacking, or the hosting space or specs are inadequate, then you’ll be missing out!

So, what about next year?

At Resound, we’re really looking forward to what 2012 holds, and we’re sure there’ll be plenty to learn!

To mention but a few, we’re looking forward to responsive design really taking off, HTML5 being taken up even more, experimenting with more frameworks to help us provide a more efficient service, and continuing to grow our little company in number, knowledge and experience!

URL Rewriting

(Resound Design) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

URL rewriting has been around for some time now and has become standard practice when building a new website. Do you know if your website is rewriting your URLs? Let's first clarify what this means.

What is URL rewriting?

No matter how simple your website is in terms of content and functionality, it should be built around a database and a Content Management System. This means that you are able to add, edit or delete any content yourself, keeping your website up to date without having to give your web developers a call and more money. If this is so then it is possible that you would end up with URLs looking like the one below:

www.yourdomain.co.uk/section.php?id=8

If this looks familiar, then we may safely say that your website is not rewriting your URLs. The aim of URL rewriting is to turn the above into something more meaningful. From looking at the above URL, no one can tell what the page is about. However, if we rewrite this into something like the following, we instantly know that this page is about your portfolio.

www.yourdomain.co.uk/our-portfolio

This is so much more welcoming, useful and interesting, and it becomes even more so when we are talking about e-commerce websites, categories and products. Imagine the following:

www.yourdomain.co.uk/products.php?cat_id=3&id=10

The above URL does not tell us much about the product apart from that it is a product. It would be much better to have something like this:

www.yourdomain.co.uk/books/url-rewriting

Why should we bother?

This is all great, but why should we bother? There are a few reason why this makes a massive difference and why it should be standard practice.

1. Readability
First and foremost, we are building websites that we want everyone to be able to read. Making our URLs more meaningful means that it will improve the experience for those using assistive technologies such as screen readers. Having URLs filled with random letters and numbers will not mean anything to those who cannot see the actual page. However, if the URL describes what is on the page then the visitor will know from early on whether this page will interest them or not. Help your visitors out and give them as much readable content and as you can.

2. Hide Web Technologies
Another very important reason to rewrite your URLs is to make it harder for malicious users to execute an SQL injection. You can tell a malicious user a lot by presenting them with a URL full of numbers and letters. We are in no way saying that by rewriting your URLs, you will prevent them from trying or even from succeeding however we want to deter them as much as we can.

3. Improved SEO
By rewriting your URLs there is a better chance that your website/page will be ranked higher than those who have not. Giving search engines a URL that means something and that is relevant to the content on the page, encourages them to think that your page is more relevant to the search term than a webpage with a URL which does not say much.

Are you getting the best out of your website?

Some of our favourite tweets

(Resound Design) — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Like most techies, we've often got one ear to the twittersphere. We thought we'd share a few of our favourite tweets, and tweeters, with you...

Boagworld is a fantastic resource and community for web designers and developers, headed up by a nice chap called Paul Boag. We tend to agree with this quote!

Tea Box are a Sheffield-based purveyor of yummy teas. We love tea and we like quotes, so this one ticks all the boxes!

Peter Serafinowicz is a funny man who was responsible for the BBC's Look Around You comedy series, and quite oddly also voiced Darth Maul in the Phantom Menace. We definitely like humour and word play at Resound.

Resolve IT are our friends, and if you didn't notice their new website (lovingly created by us) has been live for a month or two now - we've even managed to iron out some of the imperfections now!

Resound Design are a fantastic little web design company from Sheffield... Ok, it's us! Follow us on twitter to see what we're up to, and as you can see, right now there's still chance to come join us!

Come and work with us!

(Resound Design) — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

This is us! We are friendly, hard working and love food and, of course, the web. We are hoping to find some one to add to our team who will fit in well with how we work.

A typical day. Arrive between 8.30-9:00am and make a good hot cup of tea to warm the belly and prepare for the work ahead. Spend some time reading through twitter updates and emails, aiming to learn something new and be aware of any urgent client work.

Plan the day ahead and work hard, usually working on 2-3 projects a day, this helps to make sure the projects are always on the move and in time for their deadlines. 11:00am is banana time, a slow release energy fruit that will keep me focused until lunch.

Try to spend an hour away from the screen for lunch to rest the eyes and stay fresh (this does not always work). Check emails 2-3 times a day, trying not to be too distracted by them but to always be around to answer any urgent client queries. Finish at 5.30pm.

Hot Drinks: 3-4 cups of tea and maybe a coffee
Cold Drinks: 2 glasses of water
Pieces Fruit: At least 2
Sweet: Most of the time there is cake, biscuits or some kind of temptation that I cannot resist

Does this sound like you? We would love to find someone to join our team who is like us. We are looking for a Web Designer and Developer to help us out with our ever-growing list of projects.

Have a read through our job description and apply online. We are really looking forward to meeting our new team member!

How to make your site behave for everyone - Part 1

(Resound Design) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0100

There are many, many web browsers out there, and I mean a lot - from the Microsoft's Internet Explorer (and it's many version numbers) to Apple's Safari (both Mac and Windows versions) to Firefox, Chrome, Opera and more (not to mention mobile browsers such as Safari Mobile, Android Chrome and Opera Mini).

So, when building a website, you just have to build it and it will appear to work the same regardless of the browser your using, right? Sadly not. As you can see in the following image, which shows the acid test (which was created to test web standards across browsers), the same code produces violently different results between Internet Explorer 7 (on the left) and Safari 5 for Windows (on the right).

Why does this problem exist?

A nice bunch of people called the Worldwide Web Consortium (or W3C for short) decide standards for the web. These help browsers to know how to interpret the code that makes up a website. While without their guidance the web would be a very incoherent mess, you can see that it's not all plain sailing!

Even with these standards, the web moves fast - leaving leeway in how these rules should be interpreted. Newer sites adopt features not supported by older browsers, and too many end users don't update their browser for one reason or another, while some browsers just plain ignore parts of the standards. All of which results in a fine mess.

I'm glad that's all the problems we have!

Oh, but that's not the only thing we have to deal with when building and testing a site. Although we'll mostly be focussing on cross browser specifics here, there other such overlapping factors which we need to bear in mind...

Device capabilities - e.g. will your menu work on a touch screen tablet?
Screen size - is the user on a tiny mobile phone screen, or a 32" widescreen monitor?
Accessibility - e.g. is the user browsing using an audio assisted browser? What if a colour blind user views your site?

As you can see there are big challenges ahead when developing a website for today's web - especially if you want your site to behave for everyone. You'll be glad to hear there are a number of techniques and suggestions that go towards solving these cross browser woes - many of which we'll be outlining and exploring in the next article of this series.

Stay tuned!

Discoveries Part 5 - Obsessed with tea

(Resound Design) — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0100

You may already know but Resound Design loves tea!! We try our best to keep ourselves hydrated and thus keep our creative and technical juices flowing with a freshly brewed, warm cup of tea as often as we can. We like all sorts of tea and always like to try new flavours (hint! hint! If you are a tea based company, we would be happy to sample some of your new teas)

Why am I telling you this? Firstly because it means you know a little bit more about us than you may have known before and secondly so you can see the hidden meaning behind my discovery this week. Whilst having my usual browse through Site Inspire , I came across a gorgeous website based around tea. So I stopped, to have a proper look round.

The website is thisisleaf.co.uk and I am glad I took the time to have a browse through. Not only is it about something we really enjoy but the website is smooth, welcoming and easy to use and read. The photography is great and really welcomes you into their world of tea and good quality food and drink. The jQuery transitions between background images, pages and menus are just right for setting the mood and give the website an overall good vibe. All in all, a great web experience.

Shame there isn't a Leaf in Sheffield!

Know of any other tea based websites worth experiencing? Post your favourites below, we would love to see more.

How to make favicons and why they're my favourite!

(Resound Design) — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0100

So, what is a favicon?

Favicon, short for 'favourites icon', is the little icon you see next to a website's URL at the top of your browser, or when you bookmark a website. Here's a few examples to set the scene...
It's a really little ouch, but for 16 pixels square, we think it really helps bring a level of quality to a site. Here’s how to go about making an effective little icon...

How to make a favicon

First of all choose an appropriate image. Remember this has to work at really small sizes, so it may be best to use an emblem, initial or part of your logo.

Take a look at our logo below - the full thing scaled down to 16 pixels just looks a mess! Take the ‘R’ emblem and scale it down and it works a treat - still reflecting the brand and looking lovely too.
Once you’ve got your image - make sure you have a copy as big as 256 pixels square - this because an icon (.ico) file can actually contain multiple sizes. You can also make use of transparency in your icon - so you’re best saving this image as a PNG-24 graphic with transparency.
You’re not done just yet. You need to turn your icon into the right format. Some say you can simply take your file and rename it to favicon.ico, but for many reasons that’s not a good idea! It must be a .ico file through and through!

We use a tool called IcoFX for this.
Take your pre-prepared PNG file and open it up in IcoFX. Choose ‘True Color + Alpha Channel (32 Bits)’ and ‘256 x 256’. Hit ‘okay’ until you end up on the main editing page.
Now right-click in the left-hand pane under the thumbnail of your icon and hit ‘New Image’. Now click ‘48 x 48’ and ‘OK’. Then repeat for ‘32 x 32’ and again all the way down to ‘16 x 16’. This means your icon file now contains several sizes of your icon!
All that’s left to do is ‘File’ and ‘Save as’ to create your .ico file.
Now, upload the favicon.ico file to your web server. Crack open your HTML and throw this into the tags...

And that’s it! Just a note to say it doesn’t always show up straight away in Internet Explorer - hit that F5 key lots!

Bonus tip!

If you also save your icon as a PNG file 114px square, and add the additional HTML into the tag, your icon will also come up on shortcuts on Apple iPhones, iPads and Android devices too!

Swap apple-touch-icon-precomposed for apple-touch-icon and Apple devices will automatically add their default shininess!

HTML Emails for Mobile Web

(Resound Design) — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0100

Mobile vs Desktop
We recently spent some time looking through the global statistics shared by StatCounter and they provide interesting results on browser versions, screen resolutions and social media. The one we are most interested in, however, is mobile versus desktop users.

We are all aware that the number of mobile users is increasing, but by how much? We hear that mobile will outdo desktop soon and the future of the web will be just mobile, but how realistic is this and how soon? The global statistics show that the increase is not as rapid as we may first assume. Looking at the table of statistics on StatsCounter we can see that the number of mobile users from August 2009 to August 2011 has increased by only 6.02%. This explains why the graph below seems uneventful. Having said that, these statistics are important and the fact that the graph is uneventful does not mean we should discard it and think about it later.

Source: StatCounter Global Stats - Mobile vs. Desktop Market Share

There is one area of mobile web which has drawn us to look into these statistics and that is the development of email campaigns. Email campaigns are a really effective tool if they are done well and making sure that the future of the web includes them is important.

Mobile Email

The above statistics show the number of desktop users versus mobile users, but where do they check their email? Since 2009 Campaign Monitor has been tracking these exact statistics for the emails sent out via their service. The market share for June 2011 shows that mobile devices are second in the list, overtaking Hotmail, Gmail and Thunderbird.

Are your email campaigns developed with mobiles in mind? If not, then they should be, according to the above stats. This is not all bad news - it doesn't just mean changing the way you develop your email campaigns, it also means you can start developing better emails. A large amount of users read their emails on an iOS operating system which means they can render CSS3 animations and more. We think this is great as it's giving email campaigns a push into the future and, fingers crossed, other mobile and desktop email clients will follow suit.

Images and stats courtesy of StatCounter and CampaignMonitor

'Meet the Team' Pages

(Resound Design) — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 00:00:00 +0100

An increasing number of websites, especially in creative industries, feature a ‘meet the team’ page of some sort. We’ve seen these done well, and we’ve seen them done not so well - I thought it was about time we took a look at reasons for having a ‘meet the team’, a few examples, and few lessons to learn!

So, why have a ‘meet the team’ page?

A ‘meet the team’ page can help you by...

Demystifying your company, showing the world that you’re real and approachable.
It adds an in invaluable human touch, showing that you’re not just corporate robots, and you’re not going to rip them off - it improves trust.
Helping clients put names to faces and know who they’re really talking to!
Adding a personal as well as a human touch, helps clients identify with you and get to know you better, you may even find you have some shared interests!
Communicating who does what and who they’ll need to talk to in certain circumstances.
Sharing your unique flare - done well this can communicate your unique selling points and your individual brand very successfully.
Showing off your numbers, whether you’re big or small - you can use it to show off your 500-strong workforce, or you’re a small but effective 2 person team!

Some ‘meet the team’ pages that we like

Amazee Labs shows a colourful and characterful round-up of their staff, complete with contact and social media details.

Arc90 shows a quick overview page of their crew, along with an individual profile for each. I really like the way they've split theirs up by department, and enjoyed the quirky little image changes that occur when you hover of a photo.

And, if we can blow our own trumpet for a second, I quite like our meet the team pages! We encorporated our team into our 'about us' page - this is likely to change as the team grows though! This then links off to an individual page for each of us, with a quick burst of information and fun facts about us all.

What are your favourite 'meet the team' pages or conventions?

Discoveries Part 4 - Andrew Zuckermans Bird Book

(Resound Design) — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 00:00:00 +0100

Andrew Zuckerman, an American film maker and photographer, has put together a fantastic portfolio of birds. Once on the website, we were hooked for some time. As humans, we are naturally intrigued by other creatures and for this reason we browsed for quite a while however it is not just about the creatures. Attracting people to your website and having them stick around is also down to how your content is presented.

Andrew Zuckerman, being a skilled photograpger, captures great detail; this plus the design of the website encourages visitors to keep looking. The website is clean, simple and easy to use and the main content is the photography which makes Andrews creativity stand out. There is no fuss and the website does not try too hard to impress, it does not need to.

See more of Andrews work at www.creaturebook.com.

Have you discovered any brilliant websites recently? We would love to hear about them.

How to clear Internet Explorer's Temporary Internet Files

(Resound Design) — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 00:00:00 +0100

To make browsing the web a little faster, web browsers like Internet Explorer (IE) often use what's known as a cache or ‘temporary internet files’.

The browser stores a temporary copy of any websites you visit frequently on your computer, so it doesn’t have to download the files every time you want them - making it a little quicker for you.

We often have problems such as clients not being able to see changes we’ve made to their site, the answer to which is quite often that they’re still viewing a cached version of the website in question.

With this being such a common task, we thought it’d be useful to outline how to empty the cache of the most common browser - Microsoft Internet Explorer.

In IE click 'Tools' and then select 'Internet Options'
In the box that opens up select the 'General' tab
Under the 'Browsing History' heading click the 'Delete...' button (or 'Delete Files...' in older versions)
In the box that opens make sure that 'Temporary Internet files' is ticked, then click the Delete button (You may not get this option in older versions)

IE's cache is now emptied, and you should be able to see any changes afresh!

And here's a bonus tip which might save you some time - if you press Ctrl and F5 then this will refresh the page regardless of any cached version on your computer!

Image courtesy of volantra

Is article writing really that easy?

(Resound Design) — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 00:00:00 +0100

It can be deceiving. There are so many blogs and articles on the web today that it seems like anyone can do it. So you set up your blog, easy enough, and sit down to write; it's not long before you decide that you've got writer's block. Anyone can do it; There is a rational thinking process behind the whole thing that can help you write new content for your site without copywriting experience. Why, What, When, How...

Why
First you need to identify why you have the blog in the first place. What is the aim of having your blog? Do you want to tell the world something in particular? Are you aiming to drive people to your new fab site? Is it just to remind people that you still exist? To show off your thorough knowledge of a specific subject? Or all of the above? Define a list of reasons for it and what you hope to achieve from having this new blog. If you're not scribbling down some notes already, then really, you shouldn't have one.

What
Once you have defined your reasons and your ideal results, the next step is to consider your topics. I know this is the hard part, but having finished the 'Why', you are now more prepared to come up with the 'What'. The subject largely depends on the reason for it being there in the first place. If you have a specific subject which you need to base it on, then you have a good head start. Either way, you need to think about what people look for in an article.

What do we hope to gain from reading articles? Don't forget to look at it from the receivers point of view; use your experience to help you out. What were you searching for? Did you find what you wanted, if not why? Generally, we hope to gain knowledge from articles, we don't want to spend ages reading them, but pick up ideas/answers/reasons quickly.

When
Another major factor to consider is the 'When'. Not so much the when to write it or even when to publish it but how up-to-date the topic is. Does your chosen topic need to be current? If you are trying to draw people into your site then this is an important aspect. The more current your topic the more likely that people are searching for new found knowledge on the subject, answers or ideas.

How
Don't forget the structure of the article. You could have chosen the best topic in the world but no one is going to read it if it is hard to read. Be sure to break it down into easy to read paragraphs and include keywords. Be aware that most people are likely to skim through paragraphs looking for relevant words. Bullet points are a great way to keep it simple but effective.

Good luck!

3 of our favourite web apps for small businesses

(Resound Design) — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 00:00:00 +0100

In recent years, the world of the web has been the rise of the web app - a piece of software built using web-based technologies. And although they haven’t been around that long, it’s difficult to see how we could live without them now!

We thought we’d share a few apps that we find useful here at Resound. We hope other small businesses come to find them indispensable too!

We use Toggl to track the time we spend on projects and other day-to-day tasks. Toggl is really easy to use, simply based around a start/stop button.

Toggl boasts a desktop version, mobile web version (which works fantastically), a mobile app (although the Android version is a bit iffy), and offers plenty of useful reports too. Plus it’s free for basic use.

To call Google Docs a web-based version of Microsoft Office would be to undersell it. In my opinion Google Docs is superior to Office for a number of reasons...

You can access your documents from anywhere at any time.
You can easily collaborate and share with others
It’s free!

That said, it isn’t as familiar or as fully-featured as Microsoft Office... yet!.

Wufoo is an incredibly easy-to-use and generally very well made app for building web forms and collecting data. Wufoo are so good that they were bought for $35 million earlier this year! We use Wufoo for a number of things, collecting requirements for projects, getting feedback from clients and has even been a key part of our recruitment process.

I hope you find those as useful as we do. Are there any web-based tools that you couldn’t live without?

Discoveries Part 3

(Resound Design) — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 00:00:00 +0100

A Flash Discovery

Yes, that's right, Flash is still being used as a web development tool and flash developers still exist but it's not all bad. Google has been improving their indexing for flash files since 2008 and it is this that has saved the Flash loving community.

We have to admit that there are some pretty good flash websites around and we have come across some really good examples.

4 Great Flash Websites

Grip Limited
Grip Limited are an advertising agency aiming to do things a little differently to everyone else. The site has been created in such a way to fit a lot of information in to a limited amount of space. The column layout combined with the easy navigation system is brilliant.

Work Life Balance Centre
A simple, unobtrusive flash website which incorporates a few warming animations that make you feel welcome and that keep you browsing the site. The information is easy to get to and the text is easy to read. Perfect for the services they offer.

Antony Gormley
The online portfolio of Antony Gormley; this website is so minimalist that all the users' attention is concentrated on the artists work. Exactly what you would want for an artists online portfolio.

Bloed Oranje Gallery
We know it's not a recent addition to the www but it is worth showing in our list of Flash Discoveries. The Momkai team have worked well to create a friendly yet professional website for Nike's Bloed Oranje campaign which supported the Dutch team at the World Cup in 2010.

As we know, the way we develop for web is constantly changing and changing fast. As web developers we need to keep on top of new ways to build stunning websites and there is one major addition to web development we cannot ignore when discussing the use of Flash; and that is jQuery.

jQuery v Flash

jQuery brings so much more to web development; the jQuery library offers an endless amount of effects and there is also a long list of plugins which can bring all kinds of animation and creativity to a website, it makes you wonder why anyone would use flash at all.

Although the examples above are great looking websites, a lot of the reasons/advantages to using flash have now been eliminated because of jQuery. Lets take for example worklifebalancecentre.org; The welcome screen begins with the title fading in and out which can now be developed using the jQuery effects .fadeIn() and .fadeOut(). Once you enter the site, the "Hello" title with its accompanying text slides in from the right hand side. This can now be replaced with the jQuery .animate() effect, and the list goes on.

Here at Resound Design, although we can appreciate the creativity of websites developed using Flash, we are big fans of jQuery and what it can bring to the websites we develop. Give us your opinion, we would love to hear your views on jQuery v Flash development.

Our web design project process, in 5 easy steps

(Resound Design) — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 00:00:00 +0100

Back in July 2010 we wrote about our 8 step approach to logo design - which, of course, ended up being referenced in an article entitled 'Are you offering your customers the whole egg?' in a Canadian newspaper!

In recent months we've been working on a similar project process for our mainstay, designing and developing websites. The aim is to help us provide a clear and professional service to our clients, plan ahead and make deadlines.

So, without further ado, here's our web design process in all its glory. This is excerpted from a document we hand out to all our clients when embarking on a web design project.

1. Plan

Once you've given us the thumbs up, we start by planning the project. The planning stage begins with us chatting with you, understanding your needs, and ends with a nice set of documents.

These documents include a sitemap (a rationalised list of all the pages on your site) and also a content delivery plan (a list of what text, images, etc we need from you and when).

There are also a few bits of housekeeping at this stage; some admin like contracts and deposits, plus some geeky behind-the-scenes tasks to help get your project underway.
2. Design

Our designer then takes all this planning into account and begins sketching some concept designs for your website.

We'll begin by mocking up the design for the front page of your site and, once it's looking good, we'll review this design with you and revise the design taking into account your feedback.

We then round the design stage off by mocking up all the other important pages your site will need, and after some more reviewing and amending, when you're happy, we'll sign off the design.
3. Build

Once the content for your website is ready (like we planned in stage one), our developers can go to work taking the mock designs and making them into the real thing!

We'll also build your content management system here, as well as making sure all code is as valid as possible, and testing your site in all the major browsers, so we know the site is ship-shape and Bristol fashion.

Once again, we'll review the site with you at this stage and make any amendments necessary.
4. Launch

Once the site's ready we'll ask you to give us the final sign-off.

We'll then make sure a few technical things are in order, such as your domains, hosting and email, and if all is okay, we'll make the site live for you!
5. And Beyond

Wait, the story's not over just yet. We pride ourselves on sticking around and helping businesses in the long run, there are a number of ways we do this.

Firstly, we start off by giving you 30 days of free support from the day your site's launched. Beyond that, we offer a number of support plans for your website. And if you need training to get the best out of your web solution, we can offer that too.

Don't forget to stay in touch! If you need us, we're just a phone call, email, or tweet away.

Do Adwords Really Work?

(Resound Design) — Mon, 23 May 2011 00:00:00 +0100

We all love Google, they bring us so much and have changed the web with their search algorithms. Google search has maintained its success over Yahoo, MSN, Ask Jeeves and others for so long and we can’t see this changing any time soon. SEO has become a top priority for most businesses and it is mostly based around Google. This has falsely made searchers believe that if you are not on the first page of Google for their chosen keyword then you’re not worth knowing. Not true but we all need to keep up with online tools and marketing to succeed.

For those businesses to whom SEO is alien, there is always Adwords. Adwords is a service that Google offers which allows businesses to display their link under specific keyword searches and pay per click. These links are positioned above all other results however it is clear that they are paid for since they are positioned in their own ‘Ads’ box. Many have tried and failed at maintaining their own Adwords account and so the question we are addressing here is “Do Adwords work?” Success or failure largley depends on one major factor, keywords.

Keywords

Keywords are the search words/phrases you would like your business to be found under. For example, if your business is Plumbing and you are based in Sheffield, one of your chosen keywords may be Sheffield Plumbing. Having said this, the keywords you choose will determine your success or failure with both Adwords and natural listings and so need more analysis then just writing out a list of words you think fit your business.

Find out what the competition is; The more competition you have for those keywords, the more you will pay per click. Are your keywords too vague or too specific? This leads us on to the next point...

Negative Keywords

As well as determining the keywords you would like to be found under, you must also establish the keywords you do not want to be found under. Are searchers clicking on your link when they have searched for unrelated words and thus not finding their solution on your website? You could be losing money. This is a vital part of Adwords success, be sure you are appearing where you plan to appear and therefore to the right target audience.

Ongoing Battle

The final thing to remember is that this is an ongoing battle with other competitors. You must keep on top of your Adwords, analyse and improve them as much as you can to make sure you are getting the best out of it. There is a lot of money to be had via advertising on Google however there can also be a lot of money to lose if it is not given the right attention.

Conclusion

So in conclusion, adwords can be a good way to boost sales for those companies who do not have a lot of competition and who are willing to give it the time and effort needed. Remember, the more competition, the more you will pay per click; the better/more targeted your keywords are the more you will increase your conversions.

In your @font-face!

(Resound Design) — Tue, 10 May 2011 00:00:00 +0100

The problem

For years the fonts we can use on the web have been limited to a handful of typefaces - these ‘web safe’ fonts are so-called as they were the only typefaces that we could be fairly sure pretty much everyone has. These oh so familiar fonts included Arial, Trebuchet MS, Verdana, Comic Sans MS, Times New Roman, Georgia and Courier New, to name a few of the classics.

While sticking to these few has been best practice until now, it has unfortunately been a big restriction to web designs, and has meant that much of the web has ended up looking a wee bit samey.

The solutions of the past

There have been a few attempts to solve this over the years, with a number of Javascript and Flash-based solutions. But these solutions have never been very robust or effective. The other classic workaround is to simply have a nice image instead of the text, however, this is very poor practice when it comes to accessibility, usability and it’s not too good for SEO either. If that's not enough to put you off, it’s not easy to dynamically generate these mongrel text-images either.

@font-face to the rescue

@font-face is part of the CSS3 standard. Put simply, @font-face lets you use a font that lives on the web - meaning everyone has access to it, hoorah! Ergo you can now use these fancy fonts to style your web pages.

We’ve used this in a number of projects recently and it’s really added an extra flare to the design. We recently helped Matt Lollar Photography liven up their site and display some character (no pun intended) by utilising @font-face to display a custom typeface rather than boring old Verdana. We also used @font-face for the Global Manufacturing Festival website, bringing a real consistency with the Sheffield brand.

Where can I get some?

Convinced that @font-face could bring your website back to life? Raring to get that fancy font for your site? There are numerous resources for @font-face compatible typefaces, here are a couple of our favourites.

Font Squirrel

Free and easy to use fonts at www.fontsquirrel.com

Fontspring

Commercial fonts, most of which are available with an @font-face license at www.fontspring.com

A few things worth noting...

Beware of licenses, only use a typeface if its accompanying license allows you to do so. Be good! If you’re using a reputable site like Fontspring or FontSquirrel this shouldn’t be a problem.

It's also worth noting that the way browsers render fonts isn't quite perfect just yet - we have experienced some minor problems when rendering @font-face typefaces at smaller sizes - they can appear jaunty or pixelated.

Surprisingly Microsoft Internet Explorer isn’t a problem when it comes to @font-face, they’ve supported it for a good while. The only caveat when it comes to browser support is Firefox which has only supported @font-face since version 3.5, that said, Firefox users are keen updaters so this isn’t a major problem.

So why wait, could you spruce your site up with some @font-face magic?

Discoveries Part 2

(Resound Design) — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 00:00:00 +0100

jQuery has changed the web; Websites are more interesting, more interactive and overall make the whole web experience a lot better.

Recently we have found some really nice sites that feature a bit of jQuery brilliance and you know us, we like to share.

The SAGA inc website is using one of our favourite plugins at the moment; the vGrid layout plugin. It is very similar to the Masonry plugin but with an extra feature which, in our opinion, makes all the difference. The vGrid dynamically re-orders the layout, which makes it much sleeker. Evidently, it entices the visitor to hang around and look through the site a bit more just to watch it move.

http://www.sagainc.co.jp

New browsers for 2011: Firefox 4 vs Internet Explorer 9

(Resound Design) — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 00:00:00 +0100

March 2011 saw the major releases of the two biggest web browsers out there; Mozilla Firefox 4 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 9. We thought we’d quickly share our take on these browsers.

What’s new in Firefox 4?

It’s faster, according to Mozilla it’s more than 6 times faster than the last version in some instances. And in the few weeks we’ve been using it, it definitely seems much speedier.

Tabs have now been moved up top, which I did find annoying at first, but after a while this starts to make a lot of sense. Having that extra bit of space free on the screen is useful!

Other improvements to tabbed browsing include ‘tab groups’, which are useful for keeping a group of web pages up and running in the background while you work away on another set of sites.

Also new into the tabs arene are ‘app tabs’. A really simple, but really useful innovation. These are few tiny icon-only tabs which stay open all the time - fantastic for keeping your most used web app sites (e.g. email, calendar, CRM) open without cluttering the place up!

Firefox 4 also renders sites really well, everything looks a little nicer than it used to! Another nice touch that sets Firefox apart is that the sometimes tacky OS dialogue boxes we’re so used to have been replaced with much clearer and simpler dialogue boxes.

As we’ve come to expect from Firefox it’s just about up to scratch with all new technologies like HTML5 and CSS3 too.

What’s new in Internet Explorer 9?

First off it seems like the usual upgrade from Microsoft. Same old product, it just looks a little shinier!

The first thing you’ll notice is that the browser interface is much simpler, and just like the latest release of Firefox, they’ve attempted to make better use of space, making the web itself the main feature. The toolbar has been refined down to 3 tiny icons - home, favourites, tools. Along with the simplification of the toolbar, the forward and back buttons, address bar and tabs all appear on the same row.

While this is a great step forward for IE, I feel a bit restricted by the tiny space left for the address bar, typing or viewing a long address just ends up being a bit fiddly.

IE9 also introduces a ‘Your most popular sites’ page, which looks and works very similar to Google Chrome’s.

IE is finally up to speed with tabbed browsing, with features like reopening a closed tab. It also introduces tab groups just like Firefox. I’m sure this is a great addition, but they are not at all as intuitive as Firefox’s.

Microsoft also counts among IE’s new features ‘search via address bar’ and a ‘download manager’. Nice one Microsoft, finally catching up with the rest!

And finally, the usual gripe that web designers and developers have with IE; does it support web standards, or will it have its own unique problems? Well, IE9 finally includes support for HTML5 and CSS3 - a major step towards us being able to use these properly on the web, and according to quirksmode.org it’s just about as compatible as Firefox 4.

Good work IE, you’re finally catching up!

Should I upgrade?

If you’re a fan of IE, this is the best version so far, so we’d definitely suggest it. That said, Firefox still wins, and the new version is definitely a step forward.

Get the latest version of Internet Explorer

Get the latest version of Firefox

Firefox is still our favourite and definitely offers a better browsing experience, but IE really is catching up, although it still feels like Microsoft still have a bad reputation to shake off; will they continue keeping IE up to date? Will the age old compatibility problems keep cropping up? Will IE users upgrade? Only time will tell.

Discoveries Part 1

(Resound Design) — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 00:00:00 +0100

Every now and then, we come across websites that leave an impression. We thought it would be nice to share our discoveries with you when this happens. Today we found ourselves on such a website; the impression is lasting and is a good one to start off our discovery blogs. www.saltfilms.com.sg

Good or bad, we’re not so sure just yet but there are definitely pros and cons to a website like this.

Pros

1.    The first time you visit, you are immediately interested and hang around.
2.    It stands out from the rest.
3.    You will probably remember the site.

Cons

1.    Once the novelty has worn off, you probably leave the site without reading the content. The fact that it is different, interests you more than what the site is about.
2.    Branching off from the above, you probably won’t remember what it was about but just that it was yellow and featured a salt shaker.
3.    At points it was not clear what to do and where to go.

As a result, we think it is probably not such a great idea for an ecommerce website but ok for a company like Salt Films who simply want to display information about themselves and embed their videos.

Have you come across any interesting websites recently? Send us a tweet with your discovery.

2 pesky SVN problems fixed

(Resound Design) — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 00:00:00 +0000

For those not familiar with SVN (it's short for subversion), SVN is a system we use to track each version of a web app or website while we develop it.

We recently had a few problems getting SVN to work on one of our Windows 7 machines, and it seems that many others have been having similar problems too, so since we like helping people, I thought I'd share how we fixed our SVN woes.

We were using Tortoise SVN, but by the sounds of it, these problems could affect any SVN client.

SVN Problem #1 "Resource out of date; try updating"

Our problem was as follows, when trying to commit changes to an SVN repository, we got the rather unhelpful error message...

"Commit failed. Resource out of date; try updating"

For those who are familiar with SVN, you'll understand how irritating that message is. It's basically saying "No, you can't save the changes you made, because they need to be overwritten with some older stuff."

The first answer to our SVN woes was found in the form of a post at the bealtech.com blog. To sum up the fix they outlined...

Rename the directory on your PC which contains the changes you're trying to commit
Create a new directory - calling it the name of the original directory (it will eventually replace the old one)
Use your SVN client to checkout the latest version of the code to the new directory, this means you'll have the updated version of each file (so there'll be no need to 'try updating'!)
Going back to the old directory which you renamed, copy any files which you have changed (and are causing the 'out of date' error) and paste them into the appropriate place in the new directory.
You should now be able to successfully commit.

SVN Problem #2 Windows Search Indexing

The second problem can manifest itself in various ways - SVN transactions fail telling you that a file or directory is corrupt, unreadable, or can't be found - or sometimes some more bizarre messages about incorrect chunk sizes.

After a session of Googling we found out that this was due to Windows 7's search indexing. To offer quick search results, Windows basically crawls through every file on your computer and indexes it. While it does this Windows locks the files it's indexing, meaning that the SVN client can't access it freely.

The only way we found to remedy this was to disable Windows search indexing entirely. Note that doing so means that Windows search features will not work correctly, if at all. If you do want to proceed, here's how you disable search...

Load up Computer Management
Services and applications
Find 'Windows Search'
Right click - properties. Set Startup type to disabled, click Stop, then OK

Windows search is disabled, and you should be able to use SVN without any problems. That said, I have heard rumours that this problem is fixed in the recently released Windows 7 Service Pack 1 - if anyone can confirm that do drop us an email or a tweet to let us know.

Sites Go Live!

(Resound Design) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 00:00:00 +0000

We’ve been working hard here at Resound and here are three CMS websites that have gone live recently as a result.

Chrysalis TEC

Chrysalis TEC are a Sheffield based centre who dedicates their time to educating and supporting children with complex trauma and attachment difficulties. A great group of people to work with and we are pleased that we can be of service to such a fantastic organisation.

Check out their new website www.chrysalistec.org

We have also been working very closely with Square5 to produce both their own website and a separate development for the Global Manufacturing Festival of which they are helping to organise.

Global Manufacturing Festival

The Global Manufacturing Festival began on the 1st of March 2011 and will span the whole month, featuring a variety of events held in various venues around Sheffield.

Have a snoop around the new website to see what else is going on. www.globalmanufacturingfestival.com

Square5

With the festival coming up, they wanted a new look and feel for their own website too. We designed and developed a bespoke website for them based around the colours of their logo and the services they offer. They now have a new website that they can easily update themselves with new content and images and which compliments all the good work they do.

Take a look www.square5.co.uk

Fancy something similar or want to update your own site? Just get in touch and we will be happy to help!

5 mobile-optimised sites reviewed

(Resound Design) — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 00:00:00 +0000

The past few years have seen the mobile web change dramatically. Not so long ago the best a mobile could do was display some awkwardly formatted text - now most phones render sites better than most computers.

The past year has seen mobile-optimised sites move from the realms of web designers experimenting and showing off, and a brave few others having a stab, to many mainstream sites finally getting involved, a trend which we think will continue.

We’ve taken a look at 5 of our favourite mobile optimised sites and shared our thoughts on what makes them good, and how they could do better.

nclud

nclud.com
The guys at nclud have done a fantastic job of replicating the content and feel of their desktop site at such a small resolution.

By making compromises like using a small version of their logo and cutting any waffle, they have created a quality and to the point site catered for users who’s screen space and time is at a premium. Most pages fit nicely within a standard mobile screen size.

Also worth noting is their use of big touchable links - remember that rather than a pixel-precise mouse pointer, mobile users will be using their fingers to get around. nclud are also one of the few that have used tel: links - meaning that clicking their ‘Call us’ link automatically loads up your dialer and drops their number in for you.

Relevant Magazine

m.relevantmagazine.com
While Relevant Magazine’s mobile site does a great job at saving space - you do miss out on a lot of the media and interactivity of the full site - the mobile site only offering the blog content.

Again, great structuring means they’ve distilled their navigation into 3 succinct links, plus a cleverly space saving search box (it looks like a search box but links through to a dedicated search page).

While Relevant doesn’t fit within the bounds of the mobile screen, a long scrolling list actually feels and works quite well for blog site, and having a big image and only little text for each summary maximises the touchable link area and adds a bit of character.

One downside with Relevant is that they link prominently to the latest issue of their print magazine, which is displayed using the isuu service. While this is an important part of Relevant, approaching it this way is a little slow and a whole magazine isn’t particularly nice to use on a tiny device.

asos

m.asos.com
asos’s mobile site is a great example of a retail site for mobiles. Confronting the user straight away with simple navigation, the site is well-structured and easy for users to acheive their objectives.

Again, very good use of space - everything you’d see on the desktop site is optimised well for the smaller screen. Tabs and lists used well to hide secondary information and avoid pages becoming overloaded.

asos also repeats the main navigation at the bottom of the page, which is a great addition for long pages of products, as the user doesn’t have to drag all the way back to the top if they wish to go elsewhere on the site.

A List Apart

m.alistapart.com
Web-based web development magazine, A List Apart, has an exemplary mobile site which matches their desktop offering well.

Again, use of a smaller logo and very succinct navigation means the user is not overloaded and the header doesn’t get in the way of the site’s content. That said, the front page does appear to be a little bland and would benefit from some of the great illustrations that give ALA articles their unique flavour.

Another friendly feature that ALA demonstrates is a link to switch to the standard version of the site - for users that want the full site experience on their phone.

coosh

coosh.com/iphone
coosh is a mixed bag of brilliance and fail.

One of the most important aspects of a good mobile site is the browser detection - i.e. if it’s a mobile browser then show the mobile site straight away. Viewing via Android’s browser, coosh awkwardly displays the desktop site by default. To get to their mobile site I had to use some initiative and navigate to coosh.com/iphone, which brings me on to my second rant.

Mobile sites still suffer from what I call the “iPhone syndrome”. I have nothing against the iPhone, it handles the web incredibly well, but so many mobile-optimised sites brand themselves as iPhone optimised sites, excluding a diverse array of smart phones such as Android. There is also a tendency of many mobile sites to mimic the iOs menu style a bit too closely.

It’s not all bad though - the coosh site is aestethically brilliant, and uses navigation well, with especially good use of large touchable areas and illustrative icons.

What’s still missing?

Very few sites make use of gestures available with touchscreen phones. There is some great potential here, for example, using your finger to swipe through a slideshow of photos or articles.

Technologies like HTML5 and CSS3 work vastly better on mobile devices than on desktops - it would be great to see these used more creatively on the mobile web.

I hope that in coming years even more mainstream sites will take to the mobile web, and even small businesses will start to take hold of the opportunities that it presents.

Screenshots taken on Android 2.2 using the Android SDK.

HTML5 - What are the benefits?

(Resound Design) — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 00:00:00 +0000

HTML5 is a fairly new development in terms of markup and I wanted to give you a brief overview of what we think are the benefits and why it is important to start using it.

It is quite easy to get confused between all the different HTML syntaxes and I guess the important thing to remember is that we can ultimately develop our websites in the syntax we prefer. However at Resound we like to keep up to date with new technologies to develop ourselves and the service that we offer.

So why HTML5? There is a risk here of going through all the different features HTML5 has to offer to prove the benefits however I just want to go through a few points which make HTML5 stand out for us and what we think will change the web.

It’s Clean and Concise

One of the biggest changes we have noticed is the standardisation of common attributes. HTML5 has taken many common attributes and made them a HTML5 standard, making the markup more concise. For example all doctypes have been changed to one standard doctype; a great way to get developers to write more accurately without realising. We like a clean WWW!

Improves accessibility

Lets be honest here, there are a lot of websites out there that are not as accessible as they would like to be. This needs to change if we want to improve the web; if we want to build websites which can be read by all different kinds of people. New semantic elements help us to do just that. Each section of the website can be defined by its tag which does great things for screen readers. With a semantic website, screen readers are able to jump from one section of the website to another, making the whole experience much easier. Big thumbs up!

The Web is ready

Whoever out there is ready to start building in HTML5, the web is waiting! Including HTML5 into our web development does not have to be a big change. Most browsers out there support some features of HTML5 and Internet Explorer will soon be catching up with IE9. So we can get started as soon as we like.

Having said that, we cannot ignore the fact that the majority of users out there still browse the web using older browsers like IE6, a big shame. So evidently some will not see the benefits of the HTML5 features on your website. As long as we keep this in mind during development and be sure to provide for the past and the future we are doing a brilliant job!

Some interesting HTML5 finds

developed by Alexander Chen

developed by Hakim El Hattab

4 great ways that twitter can help your business

(Resound Design) — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 00:00:00 +0000

1 You’re not a robot

Do your clients know that? When dealing with clients from day to day, it’s very easy to get bogged down in business and things can get very impersonal. It’s great to remind people that you are a human being - people like to know people, people buy from people - a tweet could be the start of a great business relationship.

As well as reminding them that you’re a friendly human being - it reminds clients and potential clients that you think too. Tweeting about a project you’re working on or a new development in your industry is a great way to tell the world that you know your stuff.

2 You’re on the scene

Tweeting is another great way to stay in touch with clients, or at very least to remind them that you’re there and keep you in the back of their minds.

Following, conversing with and retweeting the right people can be a great way to get known and raise your profile in a specific area. For example, you could discuss events with others in your industry, or simply retweet news from your local area - both let people know what you’re about and that you’re on the scene.

3 Google likes it

Twitter can be a great help in getting you listed highly on search engines like Google. Google likes it when other sites link through to yours - so sharing content from your website on twitter can be a great way to generate more traffic to your website.

Google also values social media such as twitter and now includes it as part of their realtime search results.

And of course, if you’re tweeting quality content then people will share it with others - another way to generate traffic and get some search engine love.

4 Inspiration

Finally, I’ve found that twitter is a brilliant way to stay inspired. Follow the right people and you’ll be able to stay up to date on your industry, think of new ideas, and get some great inspiration from others.

Artwork by Pete Simon

Our 8-step logo design process

(Resound Design) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Every designer has their own process when designing a logo, and it can even vary from project to project. Here’s a rough idea of the process we’ll generally go through.

We start by getting your requirements. This is usually done by sitting down and talking to you, sending you a standard questionnaire to fill in, or a combination of those.

We’ll ask you information about your organisation or project, as well as information about your brand and your logo requirements.
Having researched your requirements we’ll sit down and start sketching. Many designers believe that you should always start any design on paper - we tend to agree. So we start with some very rough sketches and brainstorm layouts, wording, and imagery for your logo.

Most of this isn’t seen by the client - instead we chew the ideas over and pick the ones we think will work well, and carry those to the next step.
We continue by making our scribbly sketches into neater and shinier digital files. It’s also worth noting that for most of the logo design process we’ll actually be working in black and white - that means we’re not producing every potential logo in every colour of the rainbow!
Now it’s the client’s turn - we show the customer 1 to 4, sometimes more, of the most suitable logo concepts.
We then take into account the client’s preferences and feedack and work it into the logo design. Once tweaked we’ll converse with the client again - and continue to tweak if necessary.
Once we’ve tweaked to perfection, and the client is happy with and has chosen one concept - we’ll take that and apply any finishing touches.
Now’s the time for colour - we’ll develop a number of colour variations - and consult with the client to choose the best one - again consulting with the client, and tweaking until they’re happy.
Great! The logo design is ready to go! We provide the client with the final lovely logo design in a number of file formats and sizes ready for them to use as they wish.

That’s our logo design process in a nutshell. As I said, sometimes we’ll take diversions from the normal process, and it’s just the way we do it. The process can often change, for example, if we’re considering your whole brand, rather than just focusing on the logo.

We offer a professional logo design service to clients big and small - if we can help you have an awesome logo that reflects you and your brand just let us know.

What web designers like to know

(Resound Design) — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Every web designer is different - but I thought it’d be helpful to tell you what we like to have in our hands before we begin a web design project for a client.

All about you

First thing we like to know is who you are, what your company or organisation does, and really get a feel for the brand and the ethos of the client. This really helps us make sure the website does what it set out to, and really helps us reflect the brand through the visuals, and the general tone of the final product.

What the project is all about

The most important questions as always is ‘why?’. What do you want the web project to do, what are your final aims, and how can we measure them? The aims can be varied - from a potential customer making contact, to a file downloaded, to a product purchased.

Structure

The structure - pages on your site and the order and position you'd like them to appear in - is an often underestimated aspect, it can have a big effect on how usable your site is and how successful it is in the long run.

The structure can be as simple as a short list of the pages on your site (Home, Our Services, About Us, Contact Us) or a gargantuan bulleted list on multiple levels.

Content is King

Content - the text and images to go on your website - are important too. The site would be empty without them!

Content is nearly always the one thing that delays projects, so it’s important to have a strategy for this. We always ask for all the content up front, meaning we avoid any long delays in the project. We love to have it in a digital format like a Word document too - we can’t always ready your lovely handwriting!

In conclusion

As I said at the start - this is what we like to have and a lot of designers will differ.

It’s also worth noting that all of this can and should be reviewed later in the project, it doesn’t have to be the finished product from the day 1, that wouldn’t make sense!

Hopefully knowing what your web designer needs to know will help speed your projects along to success.

A quick look at the iPad as a web browser

(Resound Design) — Fri, 28 May 2010 00:00:00 +0100

We recently got the chance to play with an iPad, which launches in the UK today.

I thought I’d share my thoughts on how it works with the web, and how this will effect the way we design, and how we browse the web. There are already a few good reviews of the iPad as a web browser that are worth reading - take a look at iPad review and the impact on web design and iPad – First Thoughts.

The Keyboard

The between mobile and laptop size of the iPad I don’t think is great for a keyboard. I found it difficult to hold in your hands and use your thumbs, and a bit precarious to hold with one hand and type with the other. Typing in web addresses, commenting on life, and sending emails are all really important parts of the browsing experience, and I feel the iPad, and to be fair most touch devices, fall short here.

As touch browsing grows in popularity, we need to develop solutions which minimise typing. That can mean using checkboxes and dropdowns in clever ways, auto-complete, live search results, and other tricks.

Screen

The screen is amazing - it’s incredibly clear, a pleasure to look at.

Changing orientation works really smoothly, the majority of websites work well in landscape and portrait mode. There was some fear that we’d need to develop variations of sites for both orientations, but I think that’ll only be the case for very rare and specific applications.

The iPad offers a resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels. While this is amazing for a handheld device, this has become a minimum limit which the iPad may prolong the life of.

Browser

As with other Apple devices, the iPad uses a variation of the Safari browser - which is a fantastic web browser.

Safari on the iPad really makes great use of the screen space. The lack of scrollbars is surprisingly liberating - this coupled with awesome screen really makes it feel like you’re holding the website in your hands.

Lack of Flash support was a controversial move by Apple, and we’ll have to see how that pans out, but I think it was justified.

I found support for upcoming web technologies CSS3 and HTML5 a little mixed. CSS3 - which adds extra visual effects to website - looks great and is supported really well.

HTML5 is less well supported - although hopes are that subsequent updates will remedy this. HTML5 will be really important if Apple wish to do away with Flash for good.

What does all this mean?

The iPad is lovely piece of kit, but I don’t think will have an astronomical effect on the way websites are designed. Although I love that it

promotes good design, progressive web technologies, and touch browsing.

The portability of the iPad is great - but for business uses like emailing - I don’t think it’s as good as a laptop, nor is it as easy an smartphone. I think the main use of the iPad will be as a convenient device for quick tasks and casual browsing (something Apple have made referenced to with imagery in their adverts).

In conclusion - the screen is fantastic, the browser is brilliant, the keyboard lets it down - but no more so than other touch devices, and it'll make a great toy for your lounge, but is unlikely to revolutionise the way you run your business. These are just my thoughts, if you disagree, or just want to say hello let me know - hello@resounddesign.co.uk

Does your website need some serious attention?

(Resound Design) — Thu, 13 May 2010 00:00:00 +0100

There are many reasons that websites can become neglected - being too busy, not valuing it enough, it not being any one person's job, or even plain old forgetfulness can leave you with a stale website.

Here's two major signs that your website is in need of some serious attention, maybe even a completely fresh start.

Do you know when your site was last updated? If there's been no changes at all to your site in 6 months then you're way out of date!
What's the solution? We'd recommend having some content you can update regularly, quickly, and easily - that could be a newsletter, a blog, photos, or even your twitter status.
Are you getting enough visitors? Do you even know?
If your website is failing to attract attention then it's not achieving what it was created for and needs some attention. We'd suggest reviewing your site completely and taking a look at ways in which it can be marketed.
If you don't even know how many visits you get - you need to start tracking that as soon as you can, otherwise you're missing the point a bit!

If your site is in dire need of some love we're always happy to help you. We can provide a professional web solution that's easy-to-update, looks great and attracts business.

If you have any questions, or if you need some help reviewing and reviving your website, then we'd love to hear from you. Drop us an email at hello@resounddesign.co.uk.

Goodbye websites, hello web strategy

(Resound Design) — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:00:00 +0000

It's no surprise that the web and the way we use it is always changing.

How the web has changed

The web isn't new any more, it's been around a while, and it's boomed. Your website is now just one website out of hundreds of millions. How can you stand out from the crowd? A website alone may not be enough.

It's social. The web is no longer a one way street of users looking at your information. Social networks and social bookmarking sites (like Facebook, Twitter, Delicious, Digg, LinkedIn, and so many more) are changing the way the web works.

This presents us with a fantastic opportunity to converse, build relationships, and listen to web users, as well as an opportunity to reach people where they're at.

What that means

A website alone just won't cut it anymore. We need to start thinking about the bigger picture, and how it all fits together.

Consider your presence on the web, not just your website, but your presence across the whole of the web. Think about it, and sketch it out.

How does it look for you? How could it look? Are there opportunities you're missing. Everyone's strategy doodle will be different, and should be different.

It's amazing how your much of your web presence actually goes on outside your website. A website should not stand alone, it should support the strategy as a whole, acting as a hub. In the ever changing world of the web and social media, your website should be the constant core that ties it all together.

How the web might change

It's anyone's guess as to how the web could change in years to come, but there are a few things to keep an eye on - the mobile web, location-based services, development of the social web, and touch screen computing. Try your best to keep a finger on the pulse of the web.

Watch how your web strategy unfolds - what works for you? What doesn't? Don't be afraid to drop something that's not working, and be sure to focus on the bits that do. Keep your web strategy fresh.

Exemplary business card designs

(Resound Design) — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 00:00:00 +0000

We thought we'd share a few exciting business card designs to give you an insight into our likes and dislikes, inspire you, and show some love for other designers out there.

As mentioned none of these designs are by us, full credit is given with each. Thanks to each of the designers for letting us use them and for the great design!

Daniel V. J. Sweeney by Total Brand

We love the way these business cards show off the photographer's work.

Get Nished by Jason Cornish

The simple colours, and simple, strong message make for a great business card.

Mogibo by Ivan Turcin

I love the clever format used here - it folds into a little guy - need I say more!

Chuck Tingley by Royal Graphics

These cards look great and communicate the brand and service through the design.

Eden Design by Dumitru Iovu

Finally, these cards communicate the brand and the service through text in an informative explanatory tone.

Could you take the principles that make these cards great and make your business card more effective?

5 tips for getting more traffic to your website

(Resound Design) — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Is it enough to just have a good website if no one's visiting it?

Here are 5 basic tips for increasing traffic to your website, making sure you make the most of the time and money you've already put into making it good.

1) Optimise for search engines

There are some simple steps (as well as more advanced undertakings) you can follow to optimise your website to attract search engine traffic. This is known as Search Engine Optimisation or SEO.

As a general rule most website traffic comes from search engines (like Google, Yahoo or Bing), as opposed to links from other sites, or visitors who type the address in.

Act with caution here though, it's easy to go over the top and end up looking spammy.

2) Advertise it

Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC) is a form of advertising your website or service online using a service such as Google Adwords.

Although results here are not as long lasting as SEO, PPC can be good for a quick boost, or a specific campaign.

3) Publish good, creative content

Perhaps the most important tip here - if you have good content people will see it, find it useful, enjoy it and with some luck they'll share it and come back again.

Google favours good content - getting this right gives you a leg up on the search engines.

4) Get social & get sharing

If you're not part of, then you will have at least heard of social network sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Delicious, Digg, the list goes on.

These can be a great way of publicising your site for free, and building relationships with your target audience.

Social networking lets you connect with real people, lets you tell the world what you're up to, allows you and others to share your creative content, is a great way to get feedback and even generates inbound links which are great for SEO.

5) Make the most of every opportunity

Make sure you take advantage of every opportunity on and offline to plug your website.

You can include your web address, as a hyperlink where possible, on...

Your email signature
Letterhead
Business cards
Signage
Press releases
Merchandise
The list goes on...

Your website should be a keystone of your brand - feature it on everything!

In conclusion...

Remember that there are no quick fixes - it's unlikely you'll see a massive increase in traffic over night, let alone quality traffic.
Not all these options will suit you or the way you do business - pick the ones that will work best for you.
Make sure you have a way of measuring traffic to your website.

I hope you've found this brief overview useful - we should be covering some of these topics in more depth in future months, plus how to convert visits into paying customers.

Resound Design Blog

How to get Active Directory and PHP talking

Log in users with Active Directory via PHP

Our first visit to the DIBI Conference

Tracking small business success

A Helpful List of UK Conferences

UK Web Conferences 2012

Date

Conference

Location

Nominated for website of the month again

Is Pinterest of any interest?

So what is it?

How is it different?

What do I care?

Get in on the action

The Dreaded IE6

Make Your City Shine nominated for award

What's Make Your City Shine all about?

Show your support with a vote

Our MD in The Star Business Monthly

Look what 2012 has in store for us and the web

1) Always Improve

2) We want to grow

3) One size fits all

4) Get the full benefit of the web

In conclusion...

Resound Design are a Recommended Agency!

What is RAR+?

4 things our little web design company learnt in 2011

1) @font-face is awesome

2) Don't be afraid of frameworks & libraries

3) Project process is important

4) Think about hosting

So, what about next year?

URL Rewriting

What is URL rewriting?

Why should we bother?

Some of our favourite tweets

Come and work with us!

How to make your site behave for everyone - Part 1

Why does this problem exist?

I'm glad that's all the problems we have!

Discoveries Part 5 - Obsessed with tea

How to make favicons and why they're my favourite!

So, what is a favicon?

How to make a favicon

Bonus tip!

HTML Emails for Mobile Web

'Meet the Team' Pages

So, why have a ‘meet the team’ page?

Some ‘meet the team’ pages that we like

Discoveries Part 4 - Andrew Zuckermans Bird Book

How to clear Internet Explorer's Temporary Internet Files

Is article writing really that easy?

3 of our favourite web apps for small businesses

Discoveries Part 3

A Flash Discovery

4 Great Flash Websites

jQuery v Flash

Our web design project process, in 5 easy steps

1. Plan

2. Design

3. Build

4. Launch

5. And Beyond

Do Adwords Really Work?

Keywords

Negative Keywords

Ongoing Battle

Conclusion

In your @font-face!

The problem

The solutions of the past

@font-face to the rescue

Where can I get some?

Font Squirrel

Fontspring

A few things worth noting...

Discoveries Part 2