Since I’ve got a few minutes to kill and especially since no one asked, here are my top photos on flickr based on:
(with 12,585!)
(with 927 views)
(just 5 :()
and with that I say, “hell yeah.”
Dear Internet, anyone out there have any experience with lightweight web servers that they’d like to share?
We’re (meaning Cramah!) looking to set up an asset server to serve static assets like css, javascript, images, flash (destined for progressive downloads) and mp3s. We want to offload that kind of stuff from app servers as a general architecture approach going forward (my obsession with performance is spreading 
) Since it’s (at some level) my baby and is something I’m generally interested in, I’ve taken a little time and starting looking into what the set-up should entail. I’ve done a little bit of research and it looks like the names I already know are the names that people are using:
Based on what I knew when I started, what I’ve read since, and a recommendation from a co-worker, lighttpd seems to be the way to go. Thing is, I don’t want to jump into anything before asking you, the Internet, if there’s anything I should know about it (or the other two) before heading down that path.
So… anyone out there using this stuff and feel like sharing an anecdote or two? Is there some other candidate I’m missing?
All comments are welcome
For real! I ran through all of the primordial webmonkey tutorials* when I was starting out building sites (10-11 years ago now!) and if the newly relaunched site is half as helpful it will be a great boon to the community. Great info and a friendly, funny attitude made it the place for me to learn about the web thing back in the last century. Honestly, I owe a lot to the usefulness of those early tutorials. Looking back on it I realize that Webmonkey, coupled with the community that sprang up around Dreamweaver at the time**, was a great forge upon which to build up my web chops.
We’re Back! Webmonkey Relaunches, Rejoins Wired
The original web developer’s resource has returned. Webmonkey has been completely redesigned, and we’re ready to rock once more. Also, our entire content library is now hosted on a wiki, so every tutorial, reference page and code example is open for editing. Come on in and show us what you’ve got!
Webmonkey: the Web Developers Resource
*Some still exist: like Thau’s JavaScript Tutorial, which is over ten years old now.
**I’ve been a Dreamweaver user since Version 1.2.
Google Doctype, as introduced by Mark Pilgrim:
The open web is the web built on open standards: HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and more. The open web is a beautiful soup of barely compatible clients and servers. It comprises billions of pages, millions of users, and thousands of browser-based applications. You can access the open web with open source and proprietary browsers, on open source and proprietary operating systems, on open source and proprietary hardware.
Google has built its business here, on the open web, and we want to help you build here too. To that end, we are happy to announce the formation of an encyclopedia for web developers, by web developers: Google Doctype.
Google Code Blog: Introducing Google Doctype
Personally, I’m excited by this development (both practically and philosophically) and will likely contribute wherever it makes sense for me to lend a hand. Looking at it quickly some of the HOWTO information is already very useful (the web security information especially) and it will only improve with time as more and more dedicated people get involved with the project.
It was really pretty easy. I submitted it. Lord knows if they’ll accept it, but even if they don’t it won’t stop me from doing another one
Interested in doing one yourself? Google has an excellent developer’s guide.
I made the image in my gallery pages “hot” today. Each gallery image now points to the next image in the gallery flow. It’ll be interesting to see if that increases the average number of page views per user. I’m thinking it will as a lot of people use that technique so I’ll hopefully be leveraging that learned behavior. Logically it just makes sense as those back, home and next buttons are way too small. I’ll report the results in a couple of weeks…
I’m actually in the process of recoding all the gallery pages (with the exception of the alphabet I posted yesterday, which was built that way from the beginning) to have an actual anchor tag wrapped around the image. For now I’m doing it with a little bit of JavaScript:
var imgs = $("artimg").getElementsByTagName("img");
for (var i=0; i< imgs.length; i++) {
imgs[0].onclick= function() {
document.location.href=$("next").href;
}
}
where “next” is the existing ID applied to the next link in gallery pages. I love being able to use such simple JavaScript to enhance the user experience in such a (potentially) large way.
I really like the idea, especially for “skinnable” apps and sites. We have a few ongoing concerns here that would immediately benefit from an @variables declaration after the reset section. Coding certain large changes, of course, would also be greatly simplified. Count me as a +1.
Initially, I do wonder about rendering performance since there are issues with IE’s CSS Expressions and this seems like it could run into similar issues- then again I’m not a browser developer, so what the hell do I know?
Since the release of CSS Level 2 Recommendation ten years ago in may 1998, the Web authors’ community has been requesting a way of defining variables in CSS. Variables allow to define stylesheet-wide values identified by a token and usable in all CSS declarations. If a value is often used in a stylesheet - a common example is the value of the color or background-color properties - it’s then easy to update the whole stylesheet statically or dynamically modifying just one variable instead of modifying all style rules applying the property/value pair. We expect CSS Variables to receive a very positive feedback from both the Web authors’ community and browser vendors.
Being the cycling nerd that I am I added the Lance Armstrong one, but there are a ton of great new themes.
Here’s the Livestrong one in action:
Some on-topic options:
Os Gemeos:
Shepard Fairey:
Check out the whole list:
Check it out.
Invesra | Invest in your Future
The company is called Invesra. It’s a financial services startup with backing from Village Ventures. I did a quick site for them to get their new brand* out the door for the FinovateStartup even in San Francisco this week. They’ve got a great team** and an interesting product so it’s been a pleasure helping them out during a crunch period. As it always does, working with a startup makes me miss those startup days myself.
Then I think back to what working for two at once was like (Boston’s Weekly Dig and Advisortech) and I like the agency life just that little bit more
**My lovely and talented girlfriend is Director of User Experience
I’ve been trying to figure out who the Web 2.0 bubble’s Henry Blodget is* over the past few days and then along comes Fake Steve Jobs to remind me that Blodget himself has a chance to keep the crown. The following quote is brilliant stuff:
Folks, if you’re working at any of these “digital startups” you really don’t need Henry Blodget’s Silicon Alley Insider index to tell you what your options are worth right now. I’ll tell you the answer right now. They’re worth nothing. That’s for most of you anyway. Because one day very soon this whole crazy mess is going to blow up and you’ll be looking for work at Starbucks again, just like you were after the last bubble burst.
My advice? Print out this crazy list and pin it to your wall and wait for the crash. Then you’ll have a wonderful keepsake by which to remember Bubble 2.0.
Because if there’s any sure sign that the end is near, it’s the fact that Henry Blodget is publishing an index with ridiculously high valuations for companies that don’t actually make products and don’t have revenues. What drives this ridiculous man? Why the obsessive need to hype and tout? Is he not satisfied to have played a starring role in the greatest financial mess of our lifetime? Now he needs to do it again? It’s like a real-life version of Groundhog Day. Or one of those rings of hell in Dante’s Inferno where people are condemned to keep performing the same sinful acts over and over again into eternity.
Read the rest:
The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs: Alley Insider creates Bubble 2.0 keepsake
*since we’ve clearly transitioned into a world that parallels the “irrational exuberance” of the late 90s. I knew something bizarre was afoot when Facebook’s “$15,000,000″ valuation was actually swallowed wholesale by people who should know better. That feeling has been furthered by the idea that it’s a good thing for apps like Twitter just grow and grow and grow only to “figure out how to make money later.” I like Twitter a lot and am impressed by Facebook’s core application and API, but I look at these and other services and just don’t see big $$. At the end of the day, real money (cash flow) is what’s going to keep this euphoric wave going. Without some real cash for some of these services, things have the potential to go south in a big way and if they do people are going to be hurting again. We went through that once already and I’d like to see this valley be a little less painful than the last time we were in a downturn. I survived the early part of this decade and came out stronger (unlike many people I was able to stay in the industry during that period,) but that doesn’t mean I want to go through that again any time soon.