studiowhiz ramblings

Any web developer will tell you setting up email for a client can be the bane of their life. I know when I ran my own company and was providing all hosting services, 90% of the support queries we took were in regards to email.

In the last 2 years I’ve moved completely away from this aspect of business, however because I work in the online industry, everyone asks me for advice. Now I simply say “Google Apps” and point them at this fantastic solution. I’m going to guess that almost 60% of businesses could get away with using Google Apps for their entire online presence. Here in NZ almost 65% of businesses don’t even have a website - Google Apps could solve that.
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Getting a website or online business online is not the easiest thing, especially if you are not a coder. Trying to find out what CSS, PHP, ASP and other terms mean is hard. When you start looking at off the shelf products it makes it even more confusing.

I’ve just been asked by a friend if he can mix and match a PHP application with a website built in ASP. Strangely enough he’s the 3rd person to ask me this in the last 7 days.

Well the short answer is no, you can not install a PHP application on an ASP server. (By the way, ASP & PHP are coding languages used to build web applications - look for more explanation in my upcoming Jargon Explained series). Trying to install PHP on an ASP server is like trying to put Diesel in your Petrol car.

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Remember the Milk is a great online service that helps you remember things. Think of it as your digital to-do-list. When I started using this service, it was simply a website that you could email tasks too. Now, well it’s so much more.

Today they have announced full integration with GMail which brings your list into you mail, allows you to link tasks with email or calendar events. You can then receive alerts (reminders) to your email or your mobile phone. They have a great video you can watch that shows you how Remember the Milk works with your GMail account.

I also noticed today (and they may have had this for a while) that there is an interface for mobile phones. You can use Remember the Milk on both Windows Mobile & Apple iPhone, and sync your tasks over the air. Fantastic, I must get back into using this. With the integration, the mobile solution and the ability to share tasks, I’m sure it’d make life easier around my house. (Yes dear, I’ll get milk on the way home)

» Remember the Milk
» RTM & Gmail integration video
» RTM & Windows Mobile
» RTM & Apple iPhone

Firefox 3 is getting closer to full release with each new day. It’s great to see today that the 2nd beta version is now available for download, as announced by Mozilla

For those of you new to software you don’t have to purchase, many companies now include the wider internet community in the testing process. Firefox for example was first released as ‘alpha’ software. This means it’s sort of usable, prone to crash but gives cutting edge people a chance to help shape the future of the product.

When a product goes into ‘beta’ it means its almost ready to go, but might still have a few things to work out. Firefox for example is now very close to production ready, with small (mainly visual) things to tweak. By allowing more and more people to download and use the beta, the Mozilla team have more chance of having bugs reported before the software goes into release candidate.
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CSS (cascading style sheets) is the defining layer of any website. For those not sure, CSS is the bit of a web page, that tells your browser where to put things when rendering (drawing) the page.

CSS is fantastic, however with little to no Web Standards between the many browsers out there you can’t be gauranteed that your layout will always work. For example a default paragraph may have more margins in one browser over another.

Darren Wood is someone I would class as a CSS Guru (although I’m not sure he’ll agree with that). He spoke at the recent BarCamp mini-conference in Auckland specifically about this. He has some tricks to help level the playing feild & he’s kind enough to share his files for you to learn and work from.

I’m adding this to my ‘Must Recommend’ list for any web designer, hobbiest or professional. Starting your web project with Darrens framework, means you will have less headaches.

» Darren Wood » DIY CSS Frameworks

Tags: CSS, frameworks, develpment, web, barcamp

I’ve been a Firefox fan for .. well for as long as it’s been out. Firefox is a web browser for those of you wondering about that.

The main reasons for using Firefox have been

• more secure than Internet Explorer
• better CSS & web2.0 support than Internet Explorer
• not developed by Microsoft
• use extensions to expand Firefox
• and many more

However those of you using an Apple computer will tell you that Firefox is not as lovely on OSX as, well as Safari (Apple’s web browser). Firefox is plagued with memory leaks, meaning from time to time it just eats up your memory, crashes and well is a pain in the butt for someone, like me, who spends easily 8+ hours a day working in a browser.
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So you want some inspiration? You really can’t go past Design Inspiration Gallery - FAVEUP probably the best resource for fantastic & inspirational design, web, CSS, Flash and logos.

Brilliant resource!

» Design Inspiration Gallery - FAVEUP

Tags: flash, css, web, inspiration, design, logos