Boagworld

News and events

Pagination 101

I came across a great post this week that provides a solid introduction to producing pagination. If you haven’t come across the term pagination before it refers to the navigational elements that allow you to move through multiple pages of results. They often include links marked previous and next or numbers to allow you quickly to jump to a specific page of results.

We use pagination all of the time and most websites seem to have them. However, they are an overlooked function that doesn’t get the attention they deserve. The post I found this week, entitled pagination 101, explains to the reader through examples what make pagination work. Although I am not convinced I agree with everything written here it generally provides some very sound advice.

Personally I love posts like this that cover very basic stuff. It helps remind us not to get so caught up in the cool stuff that we neglect the fundamentals.

Free CSS based design course

John Allsopp and Maxine Sherrin have released a free online course that introduces people to CSS based design. If you are still to make the switch from table based design or are finding the change challenging then I would highly recommend this course.

We are not talking about a short introduction here. Rather, this is an in-depth course that builds up over a series of weeks into a comprehensive guide to building with standards. Not only does the course tell you how to build with standards it also explains why which in my opinion is just as important.

Zeldman says no to Maybe

I wanted to quickly mention a post I saw from Jeffrey Zeldman this week. Its not exactly earth shattering stuff but it caught my eye nevertheless. Zeldman, suggests that it is probably a mistake to use 5 star ratings on websites or indeed any other option which allows a neutral answer. The problem is that if you allow people to rate something between 1 and 5 they will often rate it as a 3 because 3 is the most neutral response.

As Zeldman points out this problem is a lot broader than just 5 star ratings. It also applies to any response that allows for people to be uncommitted. Given a choice people will normally take a neutral stance.

As I said, this wasn’t an earth shattering post. But, what it did drive home is that web design is as much about understanding your users psychology as it is about good design or clean code.

IE Net render

I came across a site this week called IE Net Render that takes free instant screengrabs of your site displayed on IE 7, 6 or 5.5. This is a great way to see how your site is rendering on IE 6 or 5.5 once you have upgraded to 7. Its also damn useful if you are a mac or Linux user.

Of course, there are similar services out there but most of them charge and those that don’t are incredibly slow. What impressed me about IE Net Render was the speed with which it returned results. The only draw back is that it does not return content below its artificial fold.

Paul’s corner: Design testing

Headscape has always used design testing as part of its development process and yet we seem to be in the minority. We are often met with a lot of skepticism about the benefits of putting a design concept in front of real users as well as questions about how the process works. As I have received two emails on the subject over the last week I thought it was about time I explained the idea properly.

I have blogged about design testing. How we do it and why we think it works?

Marcus’ bit: Growing a web design buisness

Got this question from Andrew:

Last year I started my web design business from a back bedroom with very little experience and an old copy of Dreamweaver! I’m pleased to say I’m still here and the business is growing steadily. Your forum and podcasts have been invaluable and offered loads of great advice and support and no doubt helped many others in my position so thank you!
My question for you both is have you any advice on managing the growth and development of a web design business? As a one man band, when is a good time to take someone on, or could I realistically work with freelancers all the time? It seems that to take someone on is very costly (not just in terms of skills) but if I want to expand the business and our services for clients I can’t do it alone. Should I hire someone who can do everything, or someone who can sell leaving me to do design and development work? What are the pitfalls that I should look out for?

Any thoughts or insight into your experiences would be really helpful.

Interesting question, and one we have a lot of experience of but… one I feel I need to add a caveat to. What I am about to say is my personal opinion and does not constitute legal advice!

Ok, the easy bit first:

Sales people

Bless ‘em… we had enough bad experiences of sales people during our tenure at our previous company to know that the only people who reliably sell the services of a web design company are the people that own it.

I’m not saying there aren’t any good sales people out there, just that selling quite highly priced solution based work does not fit well with the standard sales ethos. Sales people like products. They like products with set prices (that they can cut). They like having demonstrable ROI.

Design, in particular, is very hard to put figures to. I can’t tell a company that redesigning their site will boost sales by X or Y percentage. I can talk about brand values and the importance of conveying quality online but I can’t put hard figures to it.

Most web design sales involve responding to a tender with a lengthy proposal and subsequent pitch that is tailored for that particular prospective client. It usually draws from all aspects of the business – design, technical, consultancy – and therefore needs someone with a good understanding of the business to put it together. I.e. the company owner/director.

Who to employ

Headscape currently includes the following general production roles:

Designer
Developer
Project manager
Information architect
Testing facilitator

Again, the directors tend to share IA and testing with the project managers. Project managers are invaluable members of any team but if you are looking to employ your first member of staff you need to get a designer or developer on board first.

Look at your own skills and see where you’re lacking. Maybe filling the gaps is the right way forward. However, that may only be appropriate if you’re looking to take on more complex work and simply doubling up on what you already have may be the most prudent move. Often, a new project win will point towards who the right person is.

When we started we had Paul doing design and some technical work, Chris doing project management and me doing sales. At the time, we had a great client that kept firing Flash work at us. We outsourced a couple of times but eventually ended offering a permanent position to one of these guys (he is still with us, as is the other guy who we outsourced to then!).
You mentioned hiring someone who can do everything – Chris, who was the first guy to join us, is a bit of a jack-of-all-trades so was perfect for us at the time. As we have grown though, we have looked for more and more specialist people.

Permanent or freelancer

Taking on freelancers can often mean the difference between being able to deliver a job or not. However, they are expensive and will badly erode your bottom line if you do it all the time. So, ask yourself – if I had an employee instead of a freelancer over the past X months, how much would I have saved?

Employees are a responsibility though and need looking after . One thing we have learned over the years is that happy staff make for more productive and more effective staff. As we have mentioned recently, Headscape has started encouraging everyone to spend a few hours each Friday afternoon working on anything they like. We get together monthly to present our ideas to each other – best idea wins something cool.

But sometimes you have to have to be prepared to make some very tough decisions. The bottom line is that the company always comes first. One final point though – and in the words of the late, great Douglas Adams – don’t panic! It is very easy to see things as much worse than they actually are.

Ask the expert: Mark Buckingham on SEO

This week we have Mark Buckingham on the show from netseek.co.uk to introduce us to the world of search engine optimization.

Mark helps dispels some myths surround SEO. He discusses best practice and talks about specific techniques such as keyword density and link popularity.

To be honest I felt like we only just scratched the surface of the subject of search engine optimization and would be keen to speak with Mark again. Its such a massive area that it is hard to know where to begin. So, if you have any specific questions you would like answered on SEO then drop me a line at [email protected] and I will get Mark back on soon.

Book recommendations

Finally, I just wanted to let you know that I have finally sorted my act out in regards to my reading list. One of the most common emails I receive asks me if I can recommend a book or what I am currently reading.

Now, I posted a list of recommended books ages ago but I never got around to updating it. Well I have finally done so and also gone a step further by creating an RSS feed of any books I read (be warned these will not all be web design related).

I promise to keep both the post and RSS feed up to date from now on!

My journey with books

Posted in Reviews on June 24, 2007 by Paul Boag

For me that is the key. Whether I am reading a work book, a novel or a christian book, I always look for something that will inspire and spark my imagination..

Its funny how I have begun to see patterns emerge in the types of emails I receive. One of the most common is an interest in what I read. I am not sure whether people mean just in terms of web design or generally speaking, but I thought I would share my somewhat erratic relationship with the written word.

I used to hate reading. As a child I had serious reading difficulties and to this day I am a painfully slow reader. I occasionally listen to audiobooks but somehow that doesn’t compete with the pleasure of turning a page.

I have a very mixed feeling about printed books. On one hand I hate them because you cannot search them or copy and paste particularly inspiring segments, but on the other hand nothing beats sitting in bed late at night winding down with a decent book.

In answer to the constant trickle of emails about my reading habits, I read four types of books…

Web design related books
Work related inspiration
Novels
Christian Books

Web design related

I have posted before my recommendations on web design related books, but if I had to pick a single title I would go with Steve Krug’s “Don’t Make Me Think!: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability”. User centric design should be the core of all websites whether they are developed in tables, css or even flash. Its a great book, written in plain english that really engages with the reader.

Work related inspiration

These books are not exactly web design related but have an effect on how I work day to day. Again, were I to make a single choice in this category it would be “Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-free Productivity” by David Allen. I have spoken about this enough in the past, so I won’t bother repeating the impact this has had on the way I work.

Novels

I have to confess that most of the novels I read are trash. They are how I wind down. Most of them are scifi/fantasy related, such as “Wintersmith” by Terry Pratchett. However, other genres do occasionally creep in. One of my favourite authors is Douglas Coupland, a superb writer who has written some amazingly insightful observations about Generation X. His titles include “Microserfs”, “JPod” and my all time favourite “Life After God”. Coupland has always had a disturbing ability to describe my life, from the wall of coke cans in Microserfs to this amazingly powerful quote from Life After God…

My secret is that I need God – that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem to be capable of giving; to help me be kind , as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love, as I seem beyond being able to love.

which brings us nicely on to…

Christian books

If you read this blog regularly you will have gathered by now that I am a Christian. However, outside of the Bible, I never used to read Christian books. Nevertheless, recently that habit has changed following somebody giving me the very powerful and provocative book “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” by Philip Yancey. This book is a no holds bar commentary on the failure of the church especially within the US (although most of his points apply in the UK too). This book not only made me seriously reconsider how I express my faith but also has spurred me on to search out other Christian titles.

Currently I am reading “Mere Christianity” by C.S. Lewis. Until I read this book I don’t think I fully grasped what an astounding thinker Lewis really was. This book is without a doubt the best defense of the Christian faith I have yet encountered.

Ultimate favourite

Its strange though, because where I to pick a single book out of everything I have read as a personal favourite, it would be none of the above. Instead it would be Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings”, not because it is the best written or most powerful book I have ever encountered but simply because it was the first book I ever read for pleasure.

Before Lord of the Rings I only read when forced at school. I hated books and found them nothing but boring. It was a school teacher friend of my parents that realized I needed a book to capture my imagination, something that would make me read for pleasure and not out of obligation. Even though I read at a snails pace and struggled to read more than a few pages at a time, she decided to give me a massive tome of a book, simply because she knew it would light my imagination. I will always be grateful to her for that realization on her part.

For me that is the key. Whether I am reading a work book, a novel or a christian book, I always look for something that will inspire and spark my imagination.

It is strange that I have gone from hating books to the point now where it is looking very likely I will end up writing one. Hopefully I will be able to spark the imagination of my readers in the same way that the authors above have done for me.

Show 83: iphone bollocks

Posted in Classic shows on June 19, 2007 by Paul Boag

On this week’s show: Paul talks about the importance of undo, Marcus explains the benefits of stakeholder interviews and Struan Robertson highlights some legal deathtraps waiting for us online.

Podcast: Download (19.3MB)

News and events

Safari for Windows

Probably the most talked about story of the last week is the fact that Apple have released Safari for windows. To be honest I am a little surprised just how much has been written about this considering I don’t think the impact is going to be that significant. Will Safari cut into Internet Explorers market share? Probably not. Will it undermine the market share Firefox has developed? Almost certainly.

If safari under windows rendered exactly the same as under OSX then there maybe some benefit to windows based web developers. At the moment it is impossible for them to test on Safari without buying a mac. This has the potential of changing that. However, in all likelihood differences will emerge and if they do then this is just another browser that we have to test against.

We will see.

Applications for the iphone

At the same time Steve Jobs announced Safari for windows he also talked about the iphone. The biggest criticism of the iphone to date has been the fact that it is locked down so third parties cannot develop applications for it. Apparently Apple have been thinking long and hard about the problem and have come up with a solution. They are going to allow developers to build web 2.0 applications that can be accessed by iphone users using the built in Safari browser.

What a load of bollocks. They are telling us something we already knew. As soon as Steve Jobs announced that the iphone carried a full safari browser we knew that web applications would be developed for it. Sure, they are now saying that methods are going to be provided to automatically access iphone features such as dialing and google maps but very little detail was given. As far as I can see Apple is not giving people anything more than they already had.

Jason at 37 Signals is excited about what this means for web apps. He says…

This is the coming out party for web apps. We are very excited about this. These are exciting times.

…and he is right. It is exciting for us web developers. However, I am not convinced the user will see it that way. David Shea mirrored my own reaction at this news when he simply posted a graph showing the astronomical cost of data calls on mobile carriers. Web applications are great for web designers but for users of mobile devices like the iphone they could quickly be prohibitively expensive.

Web Design-isms: 7 Surefire Styles that Work

I found a great article on Think Vitamin this week that talks about design trends on the web. One of the things you learn early on as a designer is that despite your desire to produce something completely original you never will. Everything has been done before and in this article Larissa Meek takes us through 7 styles of design that appear again and again on the web.

The article very much reminded me of design meltdown, an excellent site that showcases different approaches to design. However, what I particularly liked about this post is that the author showed examples of how these styles occur in art as well as online. This is nice because it encourages us as web designers to look beyond the web for inspiration, a subject I have spoken about before.

CSS frameworks

The final story caught my eye because it is an extension of something we have been doing for a while. A while back I talked on the show about the fact that Headscape work with standard XHTML templates. We use these templates as a starting point for development. They allow you to jump start the build process as well as ensure consist naming conventions across the entire design team.

In a new post on the List Apart website Jeff Croft proposes a similar approach for CSS, based on the concept of Frameworks. Jeff argues that certain aspects of CSS development are often repeated across multiple projects. From browser reset styles to creating horizontal menus and standard grid layouts, it seems absurd that we generate these from scratch each time. Jeff proposes that instead we create a series of CSS files that we can be reuse again.

Its a great idea and one definitely worth exploring if you work on lots of similar projects or are part of a large team where you are looking for consistency.

Agony uncle: The importance of undo

A couple of weeks back I received this email from Tom in Texas:

I am a designer currently working on developing a web 2.0 app. The developer is doing some really cool AJAX stuff but unfortunately most of it breaks the back button in the browser. He is arguing that it doesn’t really matter as there are lots of other ways of going back. What is your opinion on the subject?

Once I had recovered from the naivety of the developers comment and finished counting slowly to 10, I started to think through the role of undo. In the end this very simple question from Tom evolved into a blog post on the importance of undo. It is this subject I am looking at in todays show.

Client corner: Stakeholder interviews

Got this question from Dusted.

I’m about to begin a project to help an organization evaluate its current web site and web site management. I’m also going to perform some research and planning to help them start developing a new web site.

The organization is quite complex with a lot of different departments – marketing/events, sales, information/press, youth and more. Each person responsible for each department will be interviewed and I need some advice about what questions to ask them.

Starting off with a few…

Describe your department’s needs of the web site.

What can be done in a better way?

The results of the interviews will be used when I present my evaluation (and research/planning) to the board.

Any advice, links to articles, books… help of any kind would be deeply appreciated.

We have done quite a lot of stakeholder interviews over the years so this question seemed like one I could help with.

Stakeholder interviews can often be confused with user interviews, as they can often happen during the same process. I tend to differentiate the 2 by calling them internal and external stakeholders. These groups will always require a very different set of questions.

This piece refers to internal stakeholders only; those people that:

Will be paying for the project!
Are content owners
- Some won’t know or want to be content owners – “that’s X’s job”
- Some will consider their content considerably more important than everyone elses – “there should be a tab called ‘Corporate Accountancy’ and a big ad on the homepage”!
Will be users e.g. sales

There are a number of good reasons for talking to stakeholders, as follows:

Politics

Most organisations involve some sort of tension between departments/stakeholders/teams/whatever. Giving representatives from each of these groups (make sure you don’t leave anyone out!) provides everyone with a voice. It ensures that everyone has said their piece and it’s down in writing. Ultimately, it gets buy in on the project from all parties thereby creating a better end product.

Education

This applies from both sides. The interviewer is looking to be educated regarding the various points and specialisms that the interviewee has (that’s the point of the interview!). However, the interviewer also has an opportunity to educate a whole raft of internal staff about the web. A good example would be why it’s not a good idea to name site sections after departmental structure. In fact, teaching users to think of their end users early in the interview will probably affect what they have to say.

Verification

Talking to internal stakeholders can often highlight the need to develop certain functionality/facilities/micro-sites/etc that web managers only thought might be useful. Interviews can also be used as a test bed for ideas as well as feedback.

Semi-structured

Following on form the last point, make a point of telling interviewees that they can go off track. The questions are useful as guides but don’t stop writing down what someone is saying if it doesn’t fit with the script.

So, finally on to some good questions to ask&#…;

Questions will, of course, vary depending on the organisation, end user requirements etc, but looking back through a number of scripts, these seem to crop up regularly:

What does your department do?
What are your ‘processes’?
Who is your client and what do they want?
How do you think the web can help you deliver?
What is your role?
What is the biggest pain about your job? What takes the most time?
Describe your Internet understanding/usage?
Describe your software understanding/usage?
Name applications that you are a confident user of.
Do you store any information in databases? What?
The current website – what’s good and bad about it, what’s bad about it?
Are you tasked with providing content for part of the website? If not, do you want to be?

Ask the expert: Struan Robertson on Legal Issues

Today’s guest expert on Boagworld is Struan Robertson a corporate lawyer who specializes in IT law. I first met him on the .net podcast and thought it would be great to get him on the show to give us a small taster of the kinds of legal issues encountered by web professionals. In the show he answers three questions on particular scenarios to give you a taster of the kind of issues that can arise. These include:

What are the dangers of working on websites for illegal companies
Some of the issues surrounding using images when you aren’t sure about the licensing
Storing private data

Although the particular scenarios are quite specific hopefully they communicate some underlying messages and encourage you to take your legal obligations seriously. If you are interested in learning more about the legal issues surrounding web design and IT in general then check out Outlaw.com where Struan provides a lot more advice. Also Struan writes a column in the .net magazine where he covers different legal issues each month.

Show 79: Despise the listener

Posted in Classic shows on May 15, 2007 by Paul Boag

A great line up this week with Paul, Marcus and Andy Clarke.

Podcast: Download (21.4MB)

We have a great lineup this week: Paul talks about getting things done in web design and an alternative approach to your reading list. Marcus explains the exciting area of insurance for web designers and we have Andy Clarke on the show to give us an update on CSS 3.

News and events

Google Analytics gets interface upgrade

Like so many who join Google, Jeff Veen has been forced to be somewhat tight lipped about what he has been working on. However in the last week we have finally been able to see the fruits of his labors with the relaunch of a new and improved Google Analytics. You would be forgiven for thinking that a load of new functionality has been added to the service. In fact that is not the case. The only changes have been to the user interface. The difference is that you can now find everything quickly and easily.

If like me you found the old Analytics service confusing and difficult to use then you might want to take a look at the new revised version. It is a definite improvement.

Great new articles on A List Apart

For a while I have been a little disappointed with the articles coming out of A List Apart. Perhaps they were simply too “high brow” for the likes of me but they lacked any practical application. However this issue is different. It has two great articles about handling clients.

The first entitled “Stand and Deliver” provides some superb advice on presenting your designs to a client. The second called “Educate Your Stakeholders!” talks (unsurprisingly) about educating the decision makers in a web project so they make more informed choices.

Both are really superb articles and I would definitely recommend you check them out.

Teaching the traditional web

We are all acutely aware that the web is changing at a rapid rate. At the moment the focus is very much on web applications however we cannot afford to ignore the massive number of page based sites that still need to adapt to the changing way people are interacting online. In a post called Teaching the traditional web, Keith Robinson discusses how we need to alter our approach to page based websites based on deep linking, RSS feeds and mobile access. A very enlightening read.

Baselines and vertical rhythm

Having Richard Rutter on the show a few weeks back made me acutely aware of my shortcomings when it came to web typography. Although I promised myself I would look into the subject in more depth I was a bit vague as to where I should start. Fortunately Richard has given me a starting point with a list of resources on his site that look at the subject of baselines.

I know that many people find web typography an uninspiring subject but good typography can have such a profound impact on how people perceive design that it really is worth your attention.

Client corner: Getting things done in web design

I have just finished reading “Getting Things Done” by David Allen. Not only has it seriously helped me to get control of my workload but its also made me rethink how I approach web design projects with clients. In this week’s client corner I suggest some techniques that designers and clients should use when a new project is starting.

As seems to be the default approach these days I blogged on this earlier in the week so if you want more information on what I said in the show then be sure to check out that post.

Ask the expert: Andy Clarke on CSS 3

Following Andy Budd’s recent criticism of the W3C CSS Working group it seemed appropriate to have Andy Clarke on the show to talk about the progress of CSS 3. Andy is an invited expert on the CSS working group so has the inside track on what is really happening. In the show Andy talks about…

Some of the cool layout features available in CSS 3.
The modular nature of CSS3.
The slow progress made by the group.
And the need for the web design community to contribute in the process.

Agony uncle: Insurance for web designers

We received the following question from Brian last week:

As an avid listener to your podcast – and having spent the day catching up on them while travelling! – I was very interested in a particular segment where your good self and that Lillington chap mentioned your Terms and Conditions and having, ‘…all the right insurances in place…’, with regard to setting up a business.

I’ve recently done some work with a mate – a few hopefully not-too-shabby websites – and although we think we are getting the hang of sorting out contracts now, we have never been able to settle on what to put in our Terms and Conditions. Every time I start to do it I either glaze over or start putting stupid things in due basically to boredom!

As for insurance we never assumed that we would need any for web design. Its not like we’re making nitroglycerine or heart bypass machines… so we assumed the basic rules of common sense prevailed.

To this end, if you have any advice on what insurances might apply or what sort of thing should be covering in T&C’s?

Firstly I’ll cover the terms and conditions issue, much as I don’t want to appear protective over our ts & cs, we have reached the conclusion that by providing them we are in effect providing legal advice.

This is not what we do and it’s not a path we wish to tread!

We suggest speaking to your lawyer or maybe a local chamber of commerce who could provide a standard terms and conditions contract template. I also droned on about the different aspects of terms and conditions in episode 65.

Insurance, however, is another matter. Though, again, I am concerned about making stuff up here (as is often the case!) so the majority of the following content is from Business Link. This is what we currently pay good money for:

Professional Indemnity

If you are in the business of selling your knowledge or skills, you may want to consider taking out professional indemnity insurance.

This protects your business against compensation sought by a client if you have made mistakes or are found to have been negligent in some or all of the services that you provide for them. Professional indemnity insurance will also cover any legal costs.

Public Liability

If members of the public or customers come to your premises or you go to theirs, you should think about taking out public liability insurance. This type of insurance covers any awards of damages given to a member of the public because of an injury or damage to their property caused by you or your business.

Product Liability

In product liability insurance (PLI) terms, a product is any physical item that is sold or given away.

Products must be “fit for purpose”. Under the Consumer Protection Act 1987, you’re legally responsible for any damage or injury that a product you supply may cause. PLI covers you against compensation awarded as a result of damage to property or personal injury caused by your product.

Employers Liability

Employers’ liability compulsory insurance (ELCI) enables businesses to meet the costs of compensation and legal fees for employees who are injured or made ill at work through the fault of the employer.

Key Man Insurance

Key man insurance is designed to cover you for the financial costs of losing key personnel. We still have this for Paul….goodness knows why! ;-)

Review: Looking beyond web design books

This weeks review section isn’t so much a review as a recommendation. At SXSW you are really spoilt for choice as to what to attend. In fact there is so much choice it is overwhelming. After much consideration I decided to take an interesting approach. I decided to mainly attend panels on subjects I knew nothing, or little about. Instead of going to panels on CSS or design I went to sessions on marketing and strategy. The result was an incredibly enjoyable and enlightening week.

On my return to the UK I decided to take a similar approach in my reading. Prior to this the majority of books I read where either on CSS or Javascript. However I am now trying to broaden out the range of books I read to encompass other subjects like productivity, business process, and even some sociology. As with SXSW it has been an incredibly rewarding experience and something I would encourage others to do. I have been amazed at just how much of what I have read has related in someway to my job and I believe it has genuinely improved the quality of my work.

I would really encourage others to try the same thing and would like to suggest three books to break you in gradually. Although none of these books are directly to do with web design they all include valuable lessons that you can apply to your work on a daily basis…

Show 77: A dream?

Posted in Classic shows on April 30, 2007 by Paul Boag

On this week’s show: Paul talks about how a client’s work is never done, Marcus looks at dealing with scope creep and we review Dreamweaver CS3 (is it really worth upgrading?).

Podcast: Download (20.5MB)

“Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 (PC)” on Amazon

News and events

The web design survey

A List Apart are trying to build up a picture of the web design community by launching their web design survey. In my opinion this is an incredibly valuable project because there is so little statistical data on our profession. We have next to no information on salary levels, job titles, location, type of work done or even educational background. Its a strange situation for what is now a mature industry. Perhaps, as Jeffrey Zeldman suggests, it is largely due to the fact that we work in a hidden profession where the practitioners have meaningless job titles that bear little resemblance to the work we do.

Coding for content

If you listened to the SXSW special we did a while back you may remember me interviewing Garrett Dimon about the recent redesign of his blog. In that interview he talked a lot about his desire to focus on content and that the design should exist only to support that. The results of this effort are truly phenomenal and he has produced one of the most refreshing sites I have seen in ages. It is clean, easy to use and really succeeds in bringing the content to the fore. Well, this week he wrote an article that follows up on previous comments he made about his design approach by talking about how he coded the site. Its a great article and really shows off the fact that an attention to detail and methodical thought process can really generate some amazing results.

Don’t be a hero: Giving up is good

How often have you heard me drone on about return on investment? Well, now you can hear the guys at 37 Signals talk about the same thing but from a slightly different angle. In their post “Don’t be a hero: Giving up is good” they talk about the fact that developers don’t like to be beaten and will continue grappling with a problem long after it ceased to be profitable. The article argues that it is important to know when you cut your loses and drop functionality if it is simply taking too long to implement.

Working with tables and CSS

It’s amazing how many problems you have with tables even after you have moved across to CSS based design. One common problem I see a lot is the data in tables pushing out the tables width which in turn often breaks the design (see an example). Fortunately this week I found a post that seemed to solve the problem. It uses the table-layout property in CSS along with overflow:hidden. Its a useful little technique that is definitely work checking out.

Client corner: A client’s work is never done

In last week’s client corner section I talked about the role of the client and how in many cases it is very poorly defined. This started me thinking in more depth about how clients perceive web projects and how they often fail to grasp the enormity of the undertaking. In this weeks show I explore the ongoing commitment that clients have to make to their websites and look at what exactly they will find themselves doing on a day-to-day basis. As with last week’s client corner, this is a subject I have recently blogged about and so if you want to refresh your memory on what I said in the show check out my blog post on the subject.

Agony uncle: Dealing with scope creep

This week we will be reviewing a question from Bob in Iceland – “How should I deal with clients that keep changing the spec throughout a project?”

I guess the first thing to say is that the spec will change, they always do. Often it is perfectly understandable because people see a new design or piece of functionality and think ‘hey, we could do X or Y as well’.

But… and I have been as guilty of this as anyone… often the scope will creep as the client learns about the web development process as the project goes along. This is avoidable. It can often be seen as pedantic, or possibly even negative, to spell out exactly what a client is getting. For example, design iterations or template styles. Ask yourself when writing the spec – would a layman understand this? If not, then add notes to explain.

So, what to do when the first request outside scope comes in? As with most things, use your brain regarding how to respond!

If it is a 5 minute job then just do it, but make sure that client is aware that it is outside scope so a) you can earn some points with them and b) let them know that you are keeping a tight eye on the scope of the project.

Anything over that, you need to respond in writing (email is fine) stating that the work is outside scope and you estimate it will take X hours to complete… please confirm that you wish us to go ahead with the work. This puts the onus back on the client and makes them think about whether they really do want the work done.

It is good practice to have a change control procedure written into any statement of work. These can sometimes be over the top, demanding contract extensions in writing and the like (which probably is appropriate for a large new piece of work) but usually something like –

As and when issues arise, it is the project manager’s responsibility to raise these with the client and agree any actions to be taken.

If any rescheduling is required, the project manager will be responsible for ensuring that acceptable changes to the schedule are agreed with the client and documented.
The project manager will maintain an issue log and ensure that issues are either closed following discussion with the client or result in an agreed change to the project plan, with associated change documentation including price change where required.

Basically, this is saying ‘use your head’ and make sure you write down whatever is agreed.

Sometimes, however, it is wise to carry out additional work as a gesture of good will. This is usually appropriate if you ‘owe’ the client a ‘favour’ of some sort, for example if you had charged 5 days to produce a design and it took 1 because they signed it off immediately. You don’t necessarily actually owe them anything (assuming a fixed price contract) but they will be aware that you didn’t put in as much effort and probably won’t take a kind view to your charging them for an extra half an hour’s work at the end of the project.

Review: Dreamweaver CS3

I finally got my hands on a copy of Dreamweaver CS3 this week and although I am still taking it all in I thought I would share some of initial thoughts.

I guess the question you want answer is whether it is worth upgrading or not. As normal the answer isn’t black and white. If you are a a strong standards based designer who has worked with things like DOM Scripting or AJAX then this upgrade probably isn’t for you. However if you are still finding your feet with CSS and don’t want to learn Javascript then this upgrade is definitely worth considering.

Obviously Adobe is trying to pursued us that Dreamweaver offers a huge range of reasons to upgrades such as better Photoshop integration and improved browser testing. However, when it comes down to it, I believe it only offers two killer features.

CSS Layout made easy

If you are new to CSS this feature might be useful. It basically allows you to select from a series of CSS layout templates to get you started. Now, this never replaces hand coding it from scratch, however if you are anything like me you find it easier to learn from example and this certainly helps with that.

Spry framework

If you have tried and failed to get your head around DOM Scripting and AJAX then I would suggest you start off by buying “DOM Scripting: Web Design with JavaScript and the Document Object Model” (J. Keith) or “Bulletproof Ajax (Voices That Matter)” (Jeremy Keith). However, if even that fails then you might want to take a look at the Javascript framework now built into Dreamweaver CS3. As with CSS layout I should stress this isn’t as good as hand coding because:

you are stuffed if you want to add or amend functionality not offered from within the framework.
the code is bloated in places meaning it will make the page take longer to download.

However, that said, the functionality offered in Dreamweaver is very impressive. You can achieve all of the following without touching a line of code:

Work with XML datasets (like RSS feeds)
Expand and collapse content areas
Make accordion menus
Validate forms

The code isn’t great but at least from what I have seen it degrades reasonably and isn’t too intrusive.

If you are a confident CSS and DOM Scripting coder then the upgrade offers considerably less. Personally the best thing I saw was the ability to sort my CSS files in a drag and drop approach. Beyond that and copy and paste straight from Photoshop, there really isn’t much to get excited about.

The question is; has Adobe done enough with Dreamweaver CS3 to keep themselves ahead of Microsoft’s Expression Web which reports say is very impressive. Personally the lack of mac support in Expression Web could well be the deciding factor in what otherwise are very equally matched products.

“Microsoft Expression Web (PC)” on Amazon

Show 76: Clients and Agency

Posted in Classic shows on April 24, 2007 by Paul Boag

Marcus talks about setting up a web design company while Paul talks about the role of the client and Derek Featherstone talks about making your web application accessible.

Podcast: Download (27.5MB)

News and events

Eric Meyer’s reset style

I have talked before about the idea of having a CSS file that removes all of the browsers styling in order to allow you to work from a clean slate across multiple browsers. Well, over this last week Eric Meyer has picked up on the idea and has been collaboratively developing a reset CSS file via his blog. If you do a lot of CSS work, this is definitely worth getting your hands on.

Microsoft Silverlight

Microsoft are gunning after Adobe on all fronts at the moment including a flash competitor called Silverlight. Like flash, Silverlight offers animation, interactivity and cross browser compatibility (although I don’t seem to be able to get it working on a mac). However, their real focus is on video where they trump Flash by offering high definition quality. It also appears to offer more “standards friendly” methods of inserting and manipulating movies, however as I said I have been unable to test this so far.

The biggest hurdle Microsoft faces will be take up. At the moment Flash dominates partly because in many cases it is installed almost invisibly in the background. In contrast, at the moment, Silverlight is a separate installation that takes place outside of the browser. No doubt this will change in the future.

35 Designers, 5 questions

Smashing magazine are certainly on a role at the moment, publishing a range of superb web design articles. One of the most recent is a post where they asked 35 designers (of which I was one) 5 questions about their approach to web design. The resulting article is a fascinating read and gives you a real insight into how other web designers work. The questions included:

1 aspect of design you give the highest priority to.
1 most useful CSS-technique you use very often.
1 font you use in your projects very often.
1 design-related book you highly recommend to read.
1 design magazine you read on a daily/weekly basis (online or offline).

CSS tools

Another Smashing magazine post. This one lists some very useful CSS tools including form builders, list makers, CSS layout templates and much more. If you are starting out in standards based coding some of the tools here will produce you some brilliant examples of clean code.

Client corner: The role of the client

Myself and Marcus swap roles this week and I take a look at our client corner issue; the role of the client. There is a lot written about the role of web designers but very little written about what part website owners play in the evolution of their sites. It is an area I have been thinking a lot about recently and I wanted to share a few thoughts with you. It is a subject that I have recently blogged on so if you want more information on what I consider the role of the client to be then I suggest you check that out.

Ask the expert: Derek Featherstone on ARIA

We are lucky enough to have accessibility expert Derek Featherstone on this week’s show talking about making web applications accessible. He talks about how HTML is not designed to support web applications and that the methods used to make it work are often little more than hacks. He then introduces a new standard from the W3C called ARIA and explains how this will assist in making web applications more accessible. If you want to know more about what ARIA is and how it can make your applications more accessible then Derek recommends a recent article on the List Apart website.

Agony Uncle: Setting up a web design company

Marcus takes on the lofty role of Agony Uncle this week responding to a question on the forum about setting up a web design company. The question, from Stanton, starts with him setting the scene of someone wanting to break out on their own but worrying about how they will cope without that guaranteed income.

Marcus gets all nostalgic about the early days of Headscape and then provides advice about starting up. He covers all the boring bits about incorporation, insurance, funding and documentation. He then talks about getting business in and not forgetting that someone has to be the salesman!

Show 75: Christian Bears

Posted in Classic shows on April 16, 2007 by Paul Boag

Marcus is back and talks about what to do if a client doesn’t pay. I look at clearing floats in CSS and we have Richard Rutter on the show giving us the lowdown on good web typography.

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

News and Events

Blogger’s code of conduct

This week has seen Tim O’Reilly pushing hard for a code of conduct among bloggers following the vicious online attacks against Kathy Sierra. Although, like everybody else, I was shocked by what Kathy has been through and although I respect Tim’s endeavors to change the current situation, I struggle to see what good a code of conduct will really do.

Tips for Bloggers

Tom Johnson has drawn together 20 principles for a successful blog based on feedback he has received from numerous top bloggers. If you are new to blogging or trying to revive a failing blog this article is definitely worth checking out.

120 Adobe Photoshop tips

Talking of tech tips, check out this superb document of over 100 things you never knew you could do in Photoshop. As a regular Photoshop user I was shocked by just how many of these I was unaware of. For example did you know that you could:

Straighten a crooked image using the measure tool?
Access key image function by right clicking the top bar of an image?
Modify the text on multiple text layers at the same time?

CSS Vista

The wonderful folks over at Site Vista has released a superb new tool that allows you to edit CSS files and instantly see the changes in both Firefox and Internet Explorer simultaneously. Very useful indeed although currently it is only available under windows.

Client corner: Resolving payment disputes

This week Marcus answers a question from Dan in Texas. Dan has a client who hasn’t paid and so is asking whether he should take their site down or not.

The core of Marcus’ approach is to ensure good dialogue with the client. He covers the idea that prevention is better than cure by establishing clear contracts up front but then looks at what steps can be taken if things do go wrong. We also when this happened to us at Headscape and how we resolved the dispute.

Marcus also broadens the discussion to look at it from the client’s perspective. He investigates when a client should withhold payment and how this should be discussed with the web agency.

Ask the expert: Richard Rutter on web typography

Richard Rutter is one of the three founders of Clear:Left and is passionate about typography. In fact he is so passionate that he has produced a practical guide to web typography which is freely available at webtypography.net. He therefore seemed the logical choice to introduce us to the basics of using typography on the web.

Agony Uncle: Clearing Floats

I got sent a question by Dan in Texas ages ago and I promised him we would tackle it on the show. Unfortunately I totally forgot about it until I read this recent article by Robert Nyman a couple of days back. Dan was asking about dealing with floats in CSS and how to ensure that the parent of a floated item contained it. This was exactly what Robert was talking about in his post and so I have shamelessly used his thoughts in the show to answer Dan’s question. Thanks Robert ;)

Review: Question Form

I am a great believer in giving users the chance to feedback their thoughts on a site. However its not always that easy. Online forms and email are hard to collate and all of the survey services I have found online in the past are crap. However, recently I came across a site called Question Form which really does stand head and shoulders above the competition

It is incredibly quick and easy to put a survey together
It provides a painless user experience to the user
You have complete customizable control over how your form looks
It provides excellent statistics as well as access to individual responses
It offers alerts of new responses via email, RSS and even SMS

The basic account is absolutely free and the pro accounts start from as little as $10. If you are thinking of adding a survey to your site then you should definitely check these guys out.

If you fancy trying a form out then take a second to complete the boagworld podcast survey.

Show 75 Script

In last week’s show I posted the rather muddled notes I use when recording the show. This was to make up for the less than perfect show notes I provide here. This idea seemed popular so here is my script from this week’s show.

Show 69: All alone

Posted in Classic shows on March 6, 2007 by Paul Boag

Abandoned by Marcus, Paul struggles on alone through this week’s show. Bravely he manages to cover; the cure to hiccups, how to hunt down those pesky CSS bugs and what’s new in Photoshop CS3.

Podcast: Download (19.4MB)

News and events

SWF image replacement

This week sees the launch of SWF image replacement (swfIR), not to be confused with sIFR which replaces text. swfIR combines javascript with flash to apply cool effects to imagery on the fly. swfIR can add rounded corners, drop shadows, borders and even make images scale. What is more it degrades nicely on unsupported browsers. Of course nothing is perfect and there are some known issues. However, it is certainly a good option if you have clients uploading lots of images which need styling.

Yahoo! Pipes

Yahoo! has launched something called Pipes which apparently allows you to “rewire the web” (and here was I thinking the web was made up of tubes). Basically Pipes allow you to combine and repurpose multiple RSS feeds and APIs. At its most basic level it is similar to a service like Feed Digest however it is capable of doing a whole lot more. Not the most user friendly interface in the world but definitely worth having a play with.

Ajax inspiration

I came across miniajax.com which is a nice little site that showcases the latest gadgets and gizmos in the world of AJAX and Javascript. For those of you who already code Javascript this is a great place for inspiration, for the rest of you it is “copy and paste heaven”.

Accessibility and the UK law

Struan Robertson has produced two great articles that clearly lay out your legal obligations on accessibility if you run a website in the UK. Ignore at your peril:

Client Corner: Choosing a design

With Marcus away it fell to me to tackle the client’s corner segment this week. Sticking to what I know best, I decided to discuss how to choose the right design for your site when confronted with multiple options. We look at:

How deeply a client should be involved in the design process
The dangers of design by committee
The subjective nature of design
The need to include your target audience in the decision process
The importance of brand identity
The problems with choosing a colour palette
The influence of imagery
Layout, resolution and the fold.

Ask an expert: Gary Marshall on instructional copy

Out of all of the guests to appear on the .net podcast Gary Marshall is one of my favourites. He is not a web designer but a technology journalist which means he brings a completely new perspective to the table. On this week’s show I get him in to discuss his impressions on instructional text; you know, the copy the client doesn’t write. From error messages to tooltip help, it is often down to the web designer to write instructional text and what do we know about writing!

Agony Uncle: Bug Hunting

Diagnosing and fixing problems in CSS can be a bitch. Often we resort to randomly trying different things until something works. However, there is a better way. This week we look at bug testing techniques including:

Know your bugs; sites like Position is Everything will help with that
Validate your code
Apply borders
Create a stripped down test case
Systematically remove chunks of code

Review: Photoshop CS3

This week I finally got around to installing Photoshop CS3 Beta and I have to say I really like it. I put it off for ages because normally these upgrades aren’t worth the effort but this one has made some substantial improvements. Probably the most exciting for me personal are the improvements to the interface, which now has docked palettes rather than those annoying floating ones. However, there are a lot of cool features beyond that, including:

Quick Select
Refine Edges
An improved bridge
Smart filters
Improved cloning

For a more comprehensive review check out the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (no I am not making that organisation up!)

Show 67: Marcusworld

Posted in Classic shows on February 19, 2007 by Paul Boag

This week Dan Rubin looks at the design fundamentals and Marcus continues his series on the statement of work.

Podcast: Download (22.0MB)

This week on the Boagworld Podcast, Dan Rubin looks at the design fundamentals of white space and page layout. Marcus continues his series on the statement of work, while Paul explains openID and tackles the HasLayout bug in Internet Explorer.

Download this show

News and events

Keyword forecasting

Last week saw an interesting new tool released by the Microsoft Adcenter Lab. The keyword analyser is an experimental tool which allows you to see predictions of future searches on specific keywords. You can compare the growth of multiple keywords and even get basic demographics on who is searching on these terms. I am not sure that this tool is actually that useful, however it is strangely compelling nevertheless.

Introduction to the DOM

Chris Heilmann shows us a sneak peek of his upcoming DOM scripting workshop in a 10 minute Screencast. Although not enough to get you started in DOM scripting it will certainly help you grasp the underlying principles.

Lessons in freelancing

As Cameron Moll prepares to leave the world of freelancing he shares his experiences from the last 18 months on his blog. Cameron gives a valuable insight into the lessons he has learnt and I would strongly encourage any freelancers to take a few moments to read it.

Jonathan Snook on CSS

When it comes to CSS we all work in slightly different ways, which is why it is always interesting to get an insight into somebody else’s approach. This week Jonathan Snook shares his top CSS tips and it is nice to see he has added some controversial tip bits.

Clients corner: Statement of work (technologies)

Marcus continues his series on the statement of work by discussing what needs to be said in the documentation about technologies, training and content population. He also looks at the hidden costs associated with hosting and how it should be handled in the contract.

Ask an expert: Dan Rubin on white space and layout

I remember sitting behind Dan at a conference once watching him work on a design (when he should have been listening to the speaker!). It was fascinating to see how he approached user interface work so I thought it would be great to get him on the show to talk about the fundamentals of design; white space and layout.

Agony Uncle: HasLayout

This week in the agony uncle segment we look at the HasLayout bug. In my experience this one bug creates the majority of problems that we encounter in IE. It’s an amazingly hard bug to explain and yet fortunately relatively easy to fix. I explain what it is and what problems it causes as well as looking at some possible solutions.

Review: Open ID

This week saw the announcement by Microsoft that they are going to start supporting Open ID. We take a look at what Open ID is, how it works and why you should consider implementing it on your own site. Most of what we cover is also tackled in Simon Willison’s excellent Screencast on Open ID.

Show 66: Beyond HTML

Posted in Classic shows on February 6, 2007 by Paul Boag

We have a bit of an audio and video theme to this week’s show with Ian Forrester talking about online video and Paul sharing some advice on creating a podcast. Marcus also continues his series on client contracts by looking at “the statement of work”.

Podcast: Download (26.9MB)

Download this show

News and events

Mobile internet usage increasing

This week the BBC has reported that 15.9 million handsets in the UK accessed the web in December. This is an increase on over a million on the previous month. This further underlines the fact that the mobile web is going to be the big growth area in 2007.

Headscape recruiting

Headscape is expanding yet again. We are currently looking to recruit a .net developer and an experienced css/xhtml coder. If you are interested in either position send an email to [email protected].

Great British Booze Up

If you are attending SXSW this year then come along to the Great British Booze Up. ClearLeft, Boagworld and @Media 2007 are taking over a “British themed pub” (yeah right!) to bring you an evening of traditional British entertainment.

Enhance your page performance

There are two new articles on the Think Vitamin website this week. Unfortunately Chris Heilmann’s Article is far more interesting than my own. He looks at the issue of page performance, outlining some of the common problems and how to address them. He also has an interesting discussion on page performance verses best practice.

Some handy flash tips

Robert Nyman has obviously been struggling with Flash recently as he has posted two very useful tips on dealing with that pesky plugin ;) He shows you how to embed flash without invalidating your code as well as how to place an HTML element on top of a flash movie.

Client corner: The statement of work

This week Marcus takes a look at the statement of work, which is the cornerstone of the contract between client and developer. In particular he focuses on the various stages of the development cycle and what information needs to be covered in the contract. Elements covered include:

Kick off meetings – Who will attend, what documentation will be produced?
Information Architecture – Will there be expert reviews, stakeholder interviews or card sorting? What documentation will be provided, who will do the recruiting? What about wireframe testing?
Design concepts – How many concepts will be produced? How many different pages will be demonstrated? What happens if the client doesn’t like the design?
Template development – What types of pages will need designing and building? What additional style sheets are going to be produced (print, mobile, low vision)? Will the client sign off each template?

Ask the Expert: Ian Forrester on video formats

Ian Forrester from BBC backstage and the Geek Dinners joins us to talk about online video. He talks through the different formats available (quicktime, real player, windows media and flash) as well as the different delivery mechanisms (steaming, download and progressive download).

Producing a podcast

Probably the most common question I get asked is how I go about producing Boagworld. That is why in this week’s show we combine the review and agony uncle sections to talk about the whole area of podcasting.

I share some thoughts on creating the right format as well as reviewing a range of podcasting tools including:

Show 64: Hosting

Posted in Classic shows on January 22, 2007 by Paul Boag

This week on Boagworld we explain all you need to know about hosting , look at how to interpret other people’s CSS and review an excellent HTML email testing tool. Oh yes… and Marcus drones on about client stuff.

Podcast: Download (22.3MB)

News and events

Heuristic Testing

This week seems to be the week of Heuristic usability testing. Andy Budd kicked us off with a post on how Jakob Nielsen’s classic article on heuristic testing needs updating to take into account the new generation of web applications. Lisa Herrod then followed up with an excellent article on the sitepoint website looking at how heuristic testing can be used by web development teams.

The Future of Web Design

I know that a lot of people cannot afford the time or money to go to web conferences but I thought the Future of Web Design one day conference was worth a mention as it is only £59. It has a great line up of speakers including people from 37Signals, Flickr and Adaptive Path.

Tips for better design review process

You maybe the best designer in the world but if you cannot “sell” your designs to the client then more often than not they will be rejected. Many designers hate the design sign off process and are often frustrated with the final result. Keith Robinson has written a superb article that will help you better manage the successful sign off of your designs.

Seven Accessibility Mistakes

A while back Chris Heilmann wrote two articles on typical accessibility mistakes that people should avoid at all costs. I am sure that they were great articles but I never got around to reading them. Fortunately Roger Johansson has taken the time to summarise them in a nice easy to digest format.

Client corner: Questions for designers

How do you know which is the right web design agency to go with? Proposals are important but what questions do you ask at the presentation? This week Marcus gives website owners the inside track on what to ask prospective web design agencies. Here are some of the main points he covered:

Get a detailed breakdown of rates and pricing.
Understand what happens if things go wrong.
Ask about the contractual arrangements.
Request financial information on the company.
Get detailed information on the work they have done.
Know the team who will be working on your project.
Always ask to speak to existing clients.

Agony Uncle: Understanding other people’s CSS

There is nothing worse than working on a site built by somebody else. This especially true when it comes to the CSS. What styles affect which elements? How do the styles cascade down? What is going to be effected if I make a change to a style? This week in the agony uncle corner we look at some of the tools which can help solve these issues. In particular we take a look at the Firebug Firefox extension and the CSS panel in Dreamweaver.

Ask an expert: Mark Crawley on hosting

One of the things that has been requested for the “ask an expert” section is that we try and get on some new names rather than the normal “web celebs”. With that in mind this week’s guy is an old work colleague of mine; Mark Crawley. He talks about an area we should have covered a long time ago… hosting.

Review: Testing HTML Email

Although many condemn HTML emails as truly evil, the reality is that many of us are occasionally forced by clients into producing them. Setting aside the appalling support for standards, the next biggest headache with working on HTML emails is testing. Fortunately Site Vista, a UK based company has solved the problem by producing a testing suite very similar to Browser cam but for email.

Show 63: More than iPhone

Posted in Classic shows on January 16, 2007 by Paul Boag

This week on Boagworld, Paul looks at whether it is possible to build HTML emails with CSS, Marcus discusses how to write a good brief and Christian Heilmannwades into the current Javascript library debate.

Podcast: Download (21.2MB)

News and events

Seems like there is loads going on in the world of web design this week and we struggled to narrow it down to four items. However, this is our pick of the best:

Getting a job as a developer

Christian Heilmann has written a post on his experiences of hiring developers at Yahoo! He gives some really sound advice to any developers in search of employment. Definitely worth a read if you are considering a change of job.

Talking of changing jobs, if you are a developer considering a career move then you might want to take a look at the developer position currently available within Headscape.

Global free stock imagery

Luke Sanderson (an old friend of mine) has taken the Google Coop and configured it to search all of the free image stock libraries from one place. Saves a bit of trawling around looking for that perfect (free) image.

The future of flash

Now, I don’t know much about flash but I know a man who does and he has just posted his impressions of the Flashforward keynote at MacWorld. He talks about Flash CS3, flash on alternative devices and reveals some fascinating stats on the take-up of Flash 9.

iPhone

Apples announcement of the iPhone seems to have caused a lot of excitement in all quarters not least the web design community. Brian Fling believes it could “revolutionaries the web”. Personally I find myself agreeing more with Cameron Moll who takes a more cautious view.

Agony Uncle: HTML emails built using CSS

This week has seen the discovery that Outlook 2007 uses Word to render its HTML emails rather than IE7. This severely limits what is possible when it comes to HTML emails and standards. It was therefore very topical that this week’s Agony Uncle Question is about using standards with HTML email. We look at what is possible and what is not referencing articles both on the A List Apart website and Campaign Monitor.

Ask the Expert: Javascript Libraries

The debate about the value of Javascript libraries has been raging for a while now but seems to be back with vengeance at the moment. That is why on this week’s show we have Christian Heilmann sharing his thoughts on the question, “Javascript libraries: Friend or Foe?”

Review: Pro CSS Techniques

Pro CSS Techniques is a new book by Ian Lloyd, Jeff Croft and Dan Rubin aimed at experienced CSS developers looking to take their skills on to the next level. Jonathan Snook provides an excellent review on this book that we reference in this week’s show.

Clients corner: Writing a web design brief

Writing an effective brief for web design agencies will not only make the selection process easier but helps to avoid potential miscommunications over requirements further down the line. In this week’s show Marcus looks at the issue of invitations to tender and how to go about writing an effective brief that will help your project run smoothly

Oh yes… don’t forget the boagworld meetup

Podcast 61: Christmas Special

Posted in Classic shows on December 11, 2006 by Paul Boag

In our Christmas Podcast Special; Skype murders Marcus rendition of Silent Night, Paul shares his list to Santa and they both look at the successes and failures of the web over the last year.

Podcast: Download (24.1MB)

I know what you’re thinking; “not the most riveting subject”. However, don’t let that put you off. Although return on investment might not float your boat, it is still extremely important and you should take the time to listen to this show.

So another year is done and boagworld finishes for its Christmas break. We will be back in January but until then you can enjoy this extra special episode of the show.

It’s been a real pleasure working on the show over the last year. We really want to thank you all for listening. We never anticipated that the show would prove such a success and hopefully we can continue to keep it fresh and exciting in the New Year with our new format.

This year’s Christmas special is slightly more structured than last year’s so I figured a few notes on what we covered maybe appropriate. Enjoy!

Special offers to boagworld listeners

A couple of companies that listen to boagworld wanted to give something back to the boagworld community. Although I haven’t purchased from either site yet myself, I thought it was nice they were enthusiastic to share a small token with you all.

Houlton Wines will give you a 10% discount if you quote the coupon code “boagworld” when ordering. Equally Seams will offer 25% off any tshirt if you quote to code “boagworld001” when you checkout with paypal.

News

I tried to give the news a Christmas theme this week by ensuring all the stories had a Christmas slant. Guess which one fails to meet the criteria!

Biggest Tech Mistakes of 2006

Thank you to everybody who nominated a tech mistake of 2006. Below is the shortlist. You will have to listen to the show to hear who Marcus announced as the winner.

Best web applications of 2006

Also in the show we look at the best web sites and applications of the year. Nominations include:

Dear Santa

I thought it might be fun to share some of the gadgets I will be asking Christmas for this year. Of course if you want to buy me any of them I am sure Santa won’t mind!

Finally, we do a quick review of the services offered the Shaw Trust. If you haven’t come across these guys before then definitely check them out. They offer some very interesting web accessibility services which is ideal if you want to test your site with real disabled users.

Thanks for listening, and we will speak to you all in the New Year. Happy Christmas!

Talk business not technology

Posted in Web strategy on December 6, 2006 by Paul Boag

Nothing is ever new. Here I was thinking I was the only one talking about return on investment and that “good practice doesn’t always make good business”. In actual factor both Vincent Flanders and Jared Spool are saying it as well.

In a recent post Vincent Flanders wrote this:

There seems to be a cargo cult belief that if we use Web Standards, Usability, and tableless CSS, our web sites will make money, we’ll be famous (or at least cool), and 0ur sites will look great. If only it were that easy.

He then went on to quote Jared Spool:

I learned quickly that business executives didn’t care about usability testing or information design. Explaining the importance of these areas didn’t get us any more work. Instead, when we’re in front of executives, we quickly learned to talk about only five things:

How do we increase revenue?

How do we reduce expenses?

How do we bring in more customers?

How do we get more business out of each existing customer?

How do we increase shareholder value?

Notice that the words ‘design’, ‘usability’, or ‘navigation’ never appear in these questions. We found, early on, that the less we talked about usability or design, the bigger our projects got.

This has certainly been born out in our experiences too. We need to change the way we speak to clients.

Podcast 57: Afraid of Standards?

Posted in Classic shows on November 6, 2006 by Paul Boag

This week Paul and Marcus are joined by Ben Henick author of an excellent article about standards found on the List Apart website. Together they have a frank and open discussion about the downsides of designing with standards.

Podcast: Download (28.4MB)

Check out Vanilla for yourself

First of all let me apologise to those of you who were expecting this week’s show to be about online communities. Due to sickness and too much work I didn’t have time to prepare everything I wanted to cover. So instead of giving you second best I thought I would bring forward my interview with Ben.

I know a number of you are sick of me talking about standards but I am sure that this week’s show will be a pleasant change. Instead of me waffling on about the benefits of standards we take a look at the problems faced by web designers when moving across to tableless design.

The show is largely based on the article Ben wrote for A List Apart so I would highly recommend you check that out too.

You might also want to check out Ben’s personal site, his business site or learn more about his involvement in the Web Standards Project.

Also in this week’s show…

We discuss various problems in the new generation of browsers including IE7 zoom and Firefox 2 access keys. We look at the concept of website constitutions, review the definitive article on HTML and I share my trepidation at the upcoming Refresh 06 conference.

Finally we take another look at David McFarland’s book CSS: The Missing Manual following his interview on Inside the Net.

Standards: Work still to do

Posted in Web strategy on October 13, 2006 by Paul Boag

Apparently the battle over web standards has ended; it is certainly true that 68% of web designers seem to favour it. But do clients understand the benefits?

As I have posted recently, apparently the “web standards war is won”. Indeed a recent survey on sitepoint.com seems to indicate that 68% of web designers who responded use web standards “most of the time”. Of course that still leaves over 30% who don’t. A recent thread on my forum drove home the point that many designers are still struggling with the subject. One poster wrote:

Paul keeps talking about how the new method separates content from design this is to my mind a delusion and incorrect. Most true CSS designs are very much a compromise in this fundamental area. The only designs that truly manage to do this are in CSS text books like Andy Budd’s CSS Mastery or Rachel Andrew’s Standards compliant Web site using Dreamweaver 8

However, convincing designers is not the whole battle. We also need to persuade clients of the benefits as well. Admittedly in many cases clients are led by us as designers. However, there are also a large number that want to maintain their site themselves and may not yet have been exposed to standards.

Let’s be honest here. Standards are not easy. Working with tables is often the much simpler option and in many cases clients will be resistant to the change. However, it is the overwhelming business benefits that make it the right decision. The problem is that we often fail to communicate those benefits clearly.

There is no shortage of articles and tutorials aimed at designers, helping them make the transition. However, there is very little aimed at business owners.

In an attempt to help correct this balance I am making next week’s show entirely focused on the business benefits of standards. It will be aimed completely at web site owners and will hopefully put forward a convincing argument for the need to change. My hope is that those listening to the show, and indeed reading this blog, will distribute the presentation and make sure as many website owners as possible see it.

A web design forum for everyone

Posted in News on October 1, 2006 by Paul Boag

I have been threatening to do it for ages, but finally it has happened: we have launched the boagworld forum. The place where no question is too stupid! ;)

The problem has been that I don’t like a lot of the forums out there. Most of them are unnecessarily complex, have terrible underlying code (being largely table based) and aren’t very easy to customise.

However, relatively recently I came across Vanilla. For fear of being flamed this really is forum 2.0! It has pretty good code, can be customised beyond belief and can be as simple or complex as you want. It also makes nice subtle use of AJAX and yet degrades nicely ensuring it remains accessible. All in all I love it… oh yes and best of all it is open source!

After saying all of that, I can’t say my implementation of it is that hot. So many of you have been badgering me about this that it has been somewhat rushed. Instead of putting together the CSS from scratch I have bastardised the code that was already there. The result is that it doesn’t scale as well as I would like (in fact it doesn’t scale at all in IE) and it could have really done with some more testing.

Disclaimers aside, I am generally pleased with it. Finally the listeners of the podcast have somewhere to talk about wider issues that don’t directly relate to my posts. My hope is that this can be a place where we encourage one another in good practice both when building and when running websites.

Although I suspect in the early days the forum will be largely dominated by designers and developers, my ultimate hope is that website owners will start to use it to discuss their unique problems too. It seems to me they are sadly lacking a good place to discuss their problems.

Visit the forum now

Oh yes and one more thing… no question is too stupid to ask. This forum is for everybody, beginners and advanced developers alike. Anybody criticising others questions will feel my wrath! ;)

Podcast 51: Better Google Listings

Posted in Classic shows on September 26, 2006 by Paul Boag

We all want better listings for our sites on Google, but search engine optimisation often appears to be a dark art and a morally murky area. In this show, we explore the issue and provide some practical advice.

Podcast: Download (28.3MB)