A few weeks back I ran smack bang right into the mobile web.

Yeah I know the mobile web isn't new. I have been able to access the web for a while from the crippled bandaid solution of WAP and all its problems, which Philipp Lenssen discusses a lot better than I can here. To the full on 3G version that is now available in Australia in limited areas. Problem is I don't use it that much, you see I'm not often that far from a computer and I hate using the numeric keypad for complex URLs, okay I'm lazy.

A few years back I played around with the mobile web via my Palm V, but the browse support was very poor to the point where you were not sure why the sites rendering badly. Was it the browser or the site itself.

So what changed. Well we were out to dinner (a rare event), very nice meal was had, but we finished earlier than expected. So I attempted to cruised around the web on the mobile looking for something to fill in the vacant hours. This was a nightmare. Sites without content, sites that didn't render, and sites that did render like for normal 800 px x 600 px resolution screen.

So the mini talk on the Mobile Web that Nick Cowie gave for the AWIA at a recent Port80 monthly meeting was renforced by my own user experience, limited that it maybe at the time. It was a real eye opener for me. The results where not that encouraging at all for the Australian mobile web. In general from the very small sample I experienced the traditional web is far from ready for the mobile one. Here are some pointers:

• Make it accessible.

  If you have a web site that in any shape or form the information within it will be accessed by people in a social or entertainment capacity. Then you must consider that people will access the site via their mobile phone.

• It's not boardband.

  Mobiles don't often in Australia have the full download capacities of wired broadband computers , despite various telcos claims the download speed can be as slow as a dial-up modem at times. Allow for this; render with a simple style sheet

• We are impatient.

  Mobile phone users, like me, just want the information. Keep it simple, no drop down menus, not flash, no ajax and limit the use of forms. Just a menu system to get me to the page I need then render the information I need, remove all the meaningless graphics.

• Make the site shallow.

  We don't want ten click, four scroll downs to get to the page, then ten tabs to find the right section on the page. It took me twenty minutes to get to the information I wanted on a site due to the poor design for mobiles.

• Don't use long URLs

  Don't make it long, think up a short version, great for the mobile web. As unless its book marked we may have to type that long URL in on the standard mobile numeric keypad.

• Font size.

  The screens are smaller, don't assume I have 20/20 vision and I can read your 1mm font. I can't, if I can't read your site I'll go elsewhere.

So if you have a site that you think that people may want to have a look at on their mobile what do you do. First don't think about it. Act.

Ensure you know what's going on in this space, get up to speed. The team at Westciv have produced the usual high quality overview of the CSS Mobile Profile Learning the Mobile Web Standards, it's a good starting point. Have a look at the output from the W3C Mobile web Initiative. Maybe consider what Beeweeb are doing with their Mobile Web Toolkit, this can assist you moving towards to the mobile web. Either way you should also have a look at the DotMobi Mobile Web Developer's Guide, very handy if developing or designing for the mobile web.

Download the Opera Mobile Browser onto your phone, have a look at it. It's a different approach but it is gaining traction in the mobile phone arena. However be aware as Kai Hendry points out the compliance to the various specifications (OMA subsets of XHTML-MP [400k PDF] and Wireless CSS [400k PDF]) is ad-hoc at best. Remind you of anything, like maybe the early web, with over 40-60 browsers on the market you really have to keep it simple.

Finally go talk / listen to one of the experts in this field, Brian Fling who is presenting and doing a workshop at Web Directions South 2007 (which I can assume you are going to, and if not why not!).

Show your clients what their sites look like on a phone, make them realise it needs to be changed and that it will cost. Lets get Australia onto the mobile web.

So are you ready for the mobile web? Like the desktop web started with a few minor waves before the onslaught of the big breakers. So the Mobile Web is drawing back and the big waves are coming, are you ready. Surfs up.

Technorati Tags: mobile, Mobile Web, Wireless, CSS, XHTML-MP, Mobile browser, state of the web, dotmobi

I'm be attended both. It's now locked in, airfares booked, accommodation checked out, ticket to WDS07 and OZIA booked?...okay not yet. With OZ-IA I have to wait for Eric Scheid to provide more details, but I know it will be good. As for Web Directions South, as usual John and Maxine have placed me in a difficult position, which workshops to do. Franky there are just too many choices. Damn you John and Max you are making life hard for me, I just don't know which ones to pick!

• OZ-IA.

  The local Australia Information Architecture conference, this is especially good for people like me on the west coast that don't normally get to be in on the IA loop on the east coast. It provides an intense refresher and networking event. I'm looking forward to this conference. If you have an interest in IA then this is the Australian conference to attend.

• Web Directions South.

  This conference has build over the years out of Web Essentials conferences into the premier Australian web industry conference. This is the conference to attend. It covers all that is web design, development and now has a management focus. In a way this year for WDS07 is special, its the first time it's moving up to the next level in my option. It's going to be a challenge for all to ensure that the magic and intimate nature that this conference has built up over the years is not lost. In a way it is critical that it remains the fun learning experience with lots of peer interaction that it has in years past. I'm sure it will. All in all looking at the program and speakers it's going to be yet another action packed conference.

  Oh yeah, go join the facebook group too. And congrats to Scott Gledhill, Ben Winter-Giles, Laurel Papworth, and
  Cameron Adams on the speaking gigs.

If you you haven't started thinking about WDS07 of OZIA07 then you should, September isn't that far away.

Technorati Tags: WebDirections, WD07, WDS07, OZIA, OZ-IA, , IA, Conferences, Australia

Sometimes a little stress is good, it pushes you forward and keeps you from getting too complacent with the way we operate or with our skill set. However what do you do when it gets just way too much, and the source of the stress just can't be removed. Do you just push through and hope it goes away or do you considered that maybe the stress isn't all from the source that you thought it was. If you take the latter approach than maybe you should consider this handy list of ways to reduce your stress levels:

1. Get out there and exercise

   Take a break, even a bit of physical activity is good for you. You get the blood and hormones flowing, you reduce tension and the overall increased blood flow means more blood to the brain, hence that "clears your mind feeling". If you can make the exercise part of your lifestyle so much the better.

2. Make life fun

   Bet you have few hobbies or interests that you have let slide over the years. I can assume that you had a good time with these interests and in a way you regret them having to take a back seat in your busy life. Well the fact is you need these secondary interests, these are the things that allow your mind and body to turn off and rest away from the sources of stress, but still remain active. Try and recapture the "fun" element of these hobbies. And if they get you to go places outside of your daily routine, so much the better.

3. Take five and relax

   Consider getting outside of your comfort zone. Do something different, especially if it is stress reducing. Relax, step away from the problem at hand. Things like massage, yoga, Tai Chi, meditation or even just simply listening to music can help.

4. Stop take a breath

   This may sound really lame. But stop, close your eyes, and take several very deep breaths. This you will find activicates the bodies natural relaxation reflexes. With each breath the tension and stress will reduce.

5. Laugh

   It's well know that the happier and more you laugh and smile the less tense you are. Your entire body responds on a number of levels to the positive effects of laugher. Go watch your favourite comedy DVD, TV comedy, get out of the house go see a local comedy performance or a touring comedian.

6. Get organised

   Sort out what you need to do, make a list. Take some control over what you are doing. Take the stress out of trying to remember it all, and juggle what you need to do mentally. Write it down, organise it. If you want to really get organised on a serious level consider Getting Things Done by David Allen. There is a massive resource on GTD at 43 folders.

7. Talk to someone

   It really is important, talk the problem out. Just the act of talking about the stress or the problem can often point you towards a solution. Even just clarifying the situation in order to articulate it can help as well. Just getting a different perspective on things can additonally reduce your stress levels.

8. Be self aware

   Be very aware of what your tell tale signs are when you are becoming stressed. These could be: restless sleep patterns, mood changes, general tension, increase heart rate, shallow breathing. Look for the signs, remember them, and take action when they occur. This includes seeing your regular Doctor (you do have one don't you).

9. Be kind to yourself

   Make sure that you get a good nights sleep, eat regular meals, and just ensure that your body has a chance to run normally as it should. That means reducing caffeine and alcohol intake as these act as stimulants. Also from time to time reward yourself with a little things that make you happy.

10. Just believe

    You also need to believe and focus on something. Be that the power of yourself, some higher being, method, or just fate itself, it will help. Having this external focus can help you redirect your stress from yourself to something other that you believe is controlling or directing things. This is not really denial of the stress and the problem at hand. More sub-conscious redirection.

So there are ten helpful simple techniques, they may or may not all work for you. Besides these what other techniques do you use when you are stressed?

Technorati Tags: stress, reduce, tension, selfhelp, webindustry, overworked, gtd

It really makes me laugh that the mainstream media seems to be so far behind what is really happening in the Web Industry and its related communities. Case in point, how long did it take them to realise that Kevin Rose and company at Digg existed, 12 months, report on Second Life , 2 years. And now they have just discover the success story of 37 Signals. Come on give me a break. How long has 37 Signals been going, and only now does Time suddenly realised that its news worthly. Me thinks that maybe the media are a little behind on what is happening, like by about six months.

Now let's also consider the general reputation of the IT media, take for example this article by ComputerWorld on The top 10 dead (or dying) computer skills. This type of technical journalism is just sensationalism. You know the way these lists are written, a few journalists sit around a table and throw a few items together, then one goes and finds the facts to support it. Okay some of the points they make are valid, others well you have to question the references and facts they use. Mind you ComputerWorld for better or worse doesn't have the highest reputation, does it.

Now I glance over such IT media RSS feeds from time to time, is it me or do you get the impression you are reading yesterdays news. It's either, a filler story or something you read elsewhere weeks ago (at best).

Now I consider myself typical of my web industry fellows, in that I'm constantly absorbing new information, products, web services (web 2.0 or otherwise) and the like. I have a read list a mile high that never seems to get any smaller. I listen to several podcasts a week, and trawl the blogosphere constantly. Now has all this information and knowledge put me on the edge. The information edge. Not the bleeding skill set edge, hey I'm nowhere near that, trust me.

Now this lag time in the mainstream of information has got me thinking. Is there an information edge. And are we as web professional standing next to it.

Are we living and working that far ahead of the rest of the general community. Is the Web Industry in the leading bubble community out on the social and technological edge removed from the reality of the real world. I know that the isolation of working in the Web Industry in a freelance capacity can re-enforce this , so I'm a bit insensitive towards it. But still the feeling remains. The mundane media et al is just a pale plain reflection of the true sources of information that I access daily.

If this is true, isn't this a tad dangerous when it comes to relating to the needs and requirements of the average Joe on the street. Are we as web professionals in our quest for the latest and greatest stepped away from the people we are trying to serve? Do we all need a constant dose of reality in terms of a bout of usability testing?

Technorati Tags: ITmedia, media, bleedingedge, socialedge

It was a little amazing last night (WST-AU) Twitter had been a little flaky, but at least it was operational. Then "it" started, someone was talking about alternatives to Twitter. Slowly but surely people went and checked out Jaiku, signed up, collected their friends, of course this meant more of their friends signed up as well. The wave of Jaiku signup spam started to lap my email inbox. Within 12 hours my lonely old Jaiku account had gone from 5 odd contacts on Jaiku to a modest 40 odd. It was just amazing to see the power of the peer group. People not wanting to be left out, not wanting to be out of the loop, just in case people did migrate to Jaiku. Often the Jaiku sign up was followed by the statement:

Just looking at Jaiku, I still like Twitter, just having a look.

It was a bit like lemmings going over a cliff. People were signing up at a rapid rate. The funnier thing was that the trend jumped timezones, the "just checking out Jaiku" continued from the OzPack into the the BritPack, and then onto the US. I suppose we geeks like to have a backup system.

Well Twitter has been stable for most of today. Adapt there has been a distinct reduction in usage. But what went wrong, well the people at twitter tell us it was just a series of bad software deployments. Makes me think maybe the cats are running the application deployment at Twitter.

During this time the cry went up for Jaiku base desktop tools. They were reviewed and some taken up, some not. So now people have a Jaiku and Twitter account, so if you want to be distracted by both of them, can you have it all in on application or page.

Well help is at hand, Rodney Olsen suggested people go have a look at TwitKu. Despite the plain interface and the Marquee Tag (urrgh) it does the job at hand, allowing dual posting (why if you have a public twitter feed). Most importantly you can see both streams at once.

Did Twitter Jump the Shark? Or were the cats having a very bad series of days.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Jaiku, TwitKu, Downtime, Socialnetworking, Migration

If you are not familiar with a BarCamp, it is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos, and interaction from participants. The key is everyone shares in the setup, presentations and support for the facilitation of the sessions. So you don't have to present of facilitate, but you have to participate, its about sharing the knowledge.

So are you up for a BarCamp, get those presentations, demonstration, workshops, coding sessions, round table discussion or whatever together. You don't have to be the presenter or facilitator for the session, just be prepared to assist.

Go on register today.

Hats off to Myles Eftos for organising this BarCamp.

Technorati Tags: barcamp, barcampperth, AWIA, perth, WesternAustralia

It's happened before, several times now, and it will happen again. We have had Odeo, SlashDot, Kiko and Friendster. A new social networking style site is the darling of the Internet world, the word on the A-listers lips. Then they couldn't scale, they couldn't maintain the traffic and interest that they had generated and the people, the users, walk. Whether it's because of hardware or software issues or just bad business planning is another matter. But the core is they ignored several key business rules for web startups.

Well over the last four days, Twitter has been non functional more than it has been in the past. It's been constantly loosing tweets, or missing tweets in the feed, or the servers have just been down (those cats seem to be have been a constant problem). This is Twitters longest period of technical trouble. Maybe I'm seeing more of it; having access when the rest of the world is asleep, and a good period for downtime adjustments, but it has been very flaky.

This has lead to a fair number of people, who are new to Twitter to just abandon it really before they got started. This is not good for any startup company. Or as Miles Burke has suggested maybe a name change in jest, is the way to go. The longer term users of Twitter are also starting to suggest that maybe they should be looking for a better alternative (remember people tell that Gen-Y is fickle).

Now we all know it doesn't take much, a few key groups start to make a move to another service and the migration of Twitter will be on. It seems the only real alternative is Jaiku and frankly it doesn't at present have the level of secondary support, that Twitter does There are some more clones, but none like Twitter. However that's all moot if Twitter doesn't work. And who is to say what the scaling methodology of Jaiku is like anyway.

The really interesting aspect of this is the dynamics of the application loyalty base and the social implications from the twitosphere. People are genuinely hoping that Twitter can get over this problem and succeed. They also enjoying and finding the service useful from a networking and professional information source viewpoint. However there is a personal pain point for every user on the usability issues. Even within my small circle on Twitter, several people have reached this pain point and have just closed up Twitter and walked away. If there was a solid alternative I'm sure some would have considered migration.

The question is can Twitter jump the shark? or will it be consigned to the annals of Internet history? Has Twitter learn for the lessons of the past, Ev Williams seems to think so. What do you think, will Twitter be here in six months or so? Will we be Twittering at WDS07?

Technorati Tags: twitter, web2.0, startups, wds07,failures, downtime, gen-y, jumpingtheshark

I'll admit I have not taken a great deal of direct notice in the development of the HTML5 specification by the WHATWG. I have read over the specification from time to time, that's about it. It's not that I'm not interested; it's been a question of resources and time. However with the W3C HTML working group announcing the opening up the process of the draft development process and the merging of their current effort with the HTML5 spec, this has brought the process back onto my radar again. Okay maybe a little belatedly, since this happened in late March (2007).

The HTML5 draft is interesting. I agree with it in parts, other sections I just think are a waste of time, but that's not the topic here, maybe I'll discuss this later.

This brings me to an interesting point on the way we develop such specifications. In this case, I'll use the b and I elements as examples to state my case.

I've heard the rational semantic and sanitised arguments for the b and i elements from Lachlan Hunt and the WHATWG. I can understand why, and I too can give good instances where I have used a span instead, mainly to avoid the old b and i elements, which under this proposal would have the meaning I wanted to assign.

However, let's step back from this and look at the uninformed web designer; the uneducated designer. These people seem to be the bulk of the industry :). Now that's not us. It's the other guy. Right?

They are out there, they don't read blogs, and they rarely attend conferences or events. To them web design is just a job, not a passion. These people may look at a standards reference site once and a while. They see the elements, but don't really read about them.

They are the practical users of web markup. They use markup for what it produces in terms of visual output; not what was intended. Typically for example they see the blockquote element as a way to indent the text. Likewise can be said for the presentational italics. H1-H6 makes the font bigger; and the list goes on. Basically they have no need for semantic pages. Their clients or employers don't want or need them to produce anything close to web standards or the semantic web.

There are two main schools of opposing thought here:

• Web designers should learn the new methods and techniques or get out of the industry.
• Web designers should do what they want. The specifications are just guidelines anyway. They can use the markup to get the results they want. What could here is the results, not how they achieve them.

With the reviewing of the next standard of HTML, we have a very real opportunity to take into consideration the outlook of the uninformed web designer and maybe look at all the elements and see if we can move them forward. However we have to do this without inserting meaningless elements just for the sake of it, but also take into account the legacy "street" meaning of the elements.

I'm not singling out the b and i elements. However for a long time they have come to mean, via word processing mainly, bold and italics. If we change the common meaning of these and other elements mid stream and start telling people that they mean something else, this is going to cause confusion. Confusion is bad. What we have here is an established baseline of differing sematic meaning of the functional and practical use of the styling method verses the element use proposed.

Even if HTML editor vendors and browser manufactures where to choose tomorrow to change the common meaning of these and other elements, it's not going to remove the common public meaning from this type of presentational functionality.

People may not like it but the street will find its use for technology; you have to live with it. What we really need to do is keep it simple and remember people may not look at HTML like we do.

I can hope that this has already been discussed to death several times over, but I would just like some consideration of the "in the wild" (real world) instances on how elements will be used. Not the purely standards based academic discussions that seem to be happening with a consideration given to backward compatibility.

We need to look at what the lowest common denominator of the web design audience is going to do with the next version of HTML. How they are going to approach the output of their favourite HTML generator, text editor or the like for better or worse. What we intend for use is meaningless in some circles.

Technorati Tags: html, , html5, xhtml, whatwg, w3c, markup, elements

What is Second Life, (for those not in the know) it's an Internet-based virtual world developed by Linden Labs, it's based around a free downloaded client application. But you know that Second Life all over the mainstream media.

Later in 2005 I looked back into Second Life, okay better scripting, easier to build things (in relative terms), and at least the client worked most of the time. Some residents had setup business in Second Life. Most of the time it was focused around sex or gambling. I know it's generalising, but how different is this to the real web. The sex (porn) industry and online gambling have led the technological adoption in this area, so why not Second Life too. But again my First Life called, and Second Life remained an unused icon on the desktop.

Fast forward to the present day, recently Kathryn Greenhill has tempted me back into Second Life.

Yeap things have changed. Major real world enterpises have now set themselves up in Second Life, buying up entire islands to promote their real world products. But the real point of interest is the introduction of small business outside of the sex and gambling industries. There is even a community based wiki for Second Life, and there are tutorials all over the blogosphere on Second Life scripting, building, avatar construction, making money, the works. The volume of information on Second Life is just amazing, it really has ramped up over the last year or so, a]]> Sun, 06 May 2007 11:33:54 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/29590 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/27825

Today (4 May 2007) at 13:15 the music died! The last track played out and finished on the Pandora player and it stopped streaming music to my browser. I knew what had happened. I refreshed the page, and I was locked out, simple.

Pandora, if you have not heard of it, was created out of the music genome project. It's internet radio with a big difference, it takes songs and works out how they they are constructed and why they work and relates them to like songs. Basically you can program Pandora with all the songs and artists you like and it will play similar artists. This is ideal for expanding your musical horizons into new and sometimes older music. Sadly however for non-US based users of this service it is no more. About 36 hours before the cut off an email letter was sent to all the non-US based users (they sniffed the IP addresses).

The introduction of the email goes:

We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for most listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.

The bandwidth costs I can understand, and frankly I would have gladly paid for this service, it was that good. But it seems again the man in the shadows, the lawyers and the licencing have killed off another good thing. All this does is make honest people seek out what they want via other means.

Okay from day one the service was intended for US only. But I ask you how many other services are meant to be US only and yet they are used by the rest of the western internet community.

Sure their are similar services, but they where aren't as good as Pandora was. I also wonder what other service/web startup is going to be cancelled for anyone outside of the US. For the record I could get around the IP sniffing, but then I also disrupt my entire business setup.

But now no one wins with this. I miss the variation in music, the artists miss my support. I wasn't even able to access my bookmarked artists or songs, so unless I recall the tunes and artists in question I'm likely to not purse purchasing their CDs. Which is a shame.

Loosing Pandora is like loosing a muse, I constantly use music in general as a mood setter and inspiration for design. It just helps me work. It helps with creativity. I'm not often away from my music.

I'm going to miss Pandora, RIP.

(Update - Bloggy Hell has a suggestion for connectivity)

Technorati Tags: pandora, musicgenomeproject, music, musiclicensing, webradio, internetradio, ipradio

The other day managed to get hold of an invite to the IPTV service Joost, that is currently in Beta (and we all know what that means). First off, I have no invites, so don't ask; okay. Update - I do have a few invites (900+) in reality I think Joost maybe open to the public soon anyway, however you can still email me for an invite (if you want the invite you find my contact).

You connect up to Joost via a downloaded purpose build desktop application. It launches you into the Channel Selector and straight into the programs that are available. The interface is very simple are easy to use with either a mouse or keyboard.

Besides the various channels and ways of customising the programming for your own use, there are also widgets that you can active as an overlay on top of the program being viewed. The widgets include items such as a clock, an Internet Messenger (using jabber or gmail), local chat room, rating scorer, news board and tickler and a few more. These may seem a little boring at first, but consider you can now twitter from within Joost. I'm sure there will be more widgets to come in the future, as this aspect brings an element of social networking, apt a minor one in the on-demand TV world.

The visual quality of the content is not high definition, but it up scales well and present very nicely when displayed on a high definition plasma or large LCD screen.

The content of programming it not all to my taste, but still I found at least 40 hours of viewing on the various stations that I'm going to have a look at. I can see a great potential for this type of TV delivery if the content is improved. My one complaint is the licensing has meant that Joost programming is segmented into three regions: US, EU and the rest of the world. Well I'm in the latter, which is a shame as there are whole channels that I can see and be teased with but can't access.

Yes there are adverts. Some are short; others are of a standard length. You are not, at present, subjected the endless adverts as you would expect. You are lucky if you have one advert in the middle of a program; and for a free service I can deal with that.

The Local TV Scene

I'll explain my TV viewing habits so you have an idea where I'm coming from.

Now I don't normally have access to Foxtel (local pay-TV), the programming just doesn't appeal to me. It's all mostly repeats, and frankly the cost is too high for the quality that you get. I watch a little Free to ai, mayeb 5 hours a week and rest is with DVDs.

Free to air TV in Australia is a little better than your average (compared to US free to air), being selective of the best (and sometimes worst) from the US, UK and European programming.

However these programs are usually a good 6 to 24 months behind their initial screening. This has started to change over the last few years as the free to air TV networks seem to realise that a percentage of people are viewing programs via torrent feed or on copies sourced from friends and associates. This is good, as there is no reason why we have to wait a year or so for a TV series to be aired in Australia.

I have also noticed there has been less creative editing of late. You know what I mean, when up to ten minutes of a program is sliced for advert, usuallyon scene changes or off the sides of the advert spaces.

Is this again a policy decision by the program managers that has been influenced by the fact that people can now source their favourite TV programs elsewhere.

On-Demand IPTV Now!

Looking at Joost, there is one thing I really like about the concept; it's IPTV on-demand. When I want it. No more working out what to watch when, no more programming a PVR, or training it to select the program types and themes I like.

The concept is not new; you can rent a movie online and (with the associated DRM) download or watch a streaming version. The usual on-demand viewing is like your own DVD library; you watch it when you want to. You control your lifestyle not the TV programmers. I can imagine that this type of service has the traditional TV executives either burying their heads in the sand or quivering in their soft leather shoes.

Are these new trends in people's viewing habits and new services like Joost going to change the age of television? Is TV as we know it about to start to morph into something else; a more interactive on-demand service? Should TV executives be scared? I hope so.

Technorati Tags: IPTV, Joost, Televsion, TVProgramming, , JoostTV

First up after a stroll up towards the Bridge end of Sydney, there was a solid day of having Flex downloaded into my head, you know the drill, unscrew top of your head, pour in Flex, mix, re-screw on top of your head, thankyou James Talbot (from Adobe) for the massive headlong push into the world of Flex. I?ll be looking into Flex some more.

After the Flex Workshop, it was time to have the National Adobe User Group. Time to hear lots of empty promises from Adobe. Well I was I little surprised in the question and answer session it has basically all ex macromedia people and frankly for a change they where telling it like it is, no crap, no lies no fluff. Which for once was refreshing.

At the National Adobe User Group, Tim Buntel had a micro presentation on Scorpio (Coldfusion 8), nothing I suspect that we didn?t already know about. We'll get more on this later at WebDU. The interesting highlights where:

• The ability to create PDFs on demand
• Image manipulation (about time too)
• The ability to create Breeze like presentation on demand
• A Rich Text Editor leverage from the use on one tag.
• Acceptance of output from PDF forms into Coldfusion
• Minor improvements to cfscript

The Rich Text Editor is of interest to me, as it?s leveraging the same RTE that I would use anyway, (usual javascript based RTE). It will have the various features turn off or on for the editor's toolbar etc, and will allow support for the control of the HTML output, usual SDK for this editor, but bundled into the expected Coldfusion style tag. The real shocker was the demo. Well Tim shows the RTE and its output text that is now wrapped in a paragraph and font tag. Yeap we are rocking like it's 1999. With a bunch of base HTML code output that just isn?t cutting the standards compliance. WTF! Adobe please get with the party. Use standards, we are trying to build a better web. This little black duck is going to be having words on this one, I can tell you.

Well I have the registration pack. Average bag (like I really need another one!), but the one major oversight is the program booklet, there is no list of the program agenda, no easy reference to what is next on the day and where. Okay if you couldn?t get it into the booklet (printer deadlines and all that), at least have a card printed for the lanyard.

Technorati Tags: ColdFusion, WebDU, WebDU2007, Flex, Scorpio, adobe, usergroup, Richtext, CSS, FontTag, TimBuntel, JamesTalbot

The Day

• All credit to the guys at Nectarine for the Flash based adverts, they where totally awesome.
• The day started with the usual keynote, with the two Mikes, Mike Downey and Mike Chambers dishing up some Apollo goodness. With the alpha of this product slated for release any day now this was a little of a sales pitch and a show and tell. That?s not to say it wasn?t interesting.
• Brandy Fortune led us into the world of usability. The one thing that I found refreshing about Brandy was her frank and honest approach as she discussed the methods, equipment and overview of a generalised ?How to? on usability testing from an Information Architects view point.
• FarCry 4 was next on the agenda, Jeff Coughlin demonstrated the extreme power of the FarCry Formtools. It was interesting, would love to get the chance to inplement a FryCry site or at least be involved with the roll out of one. The power and easy of use of FryCry 4 is a few leagues higher than the previous versions.
• Kai K]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:20:14 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16123 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16122 Yes the previous evenings entertainment at WebDU was ?interesting?, in general all had a good time. As normal things ended all too quickly. I have no idea what the people from the US would have made of the ?Kath and Kim? stage show. If you know, post away below. With some of speakers having a session at today, reality bites and things didn?t kick on that much into the small hours of the morning.

  Day Two

  • The keynote, Ted Patrick showed off the next generation of Flex and its CS3 integration, seeing this I think I?m finally getting it as to where I can use Flex. Tim Buntel ran through some more Scorpio (Coldfusion 8.0) goodness.
  • Now I had a three-way conflict. Go see Cameron Adams and Russ Weakley show people the correct way code (nothing new there). Listen to Caleb Adam Haye pull Yahoo APIs into Flash. Or see Charlie Arehart empart this rapid overview of ColdFusion Caching (it?s C-A-ching Charlie not Ca-S-hing). I opted for Charlie. The range of caching options for Coldfusion that he presented blew me away.
  • Urgent work pulled me away from WebDU, so I missed Jesse Warden Flash Lite talk. Which is a shame. Hoping for the podcast goodness later to fill the void on this one.
  • Okay got to see the workflow from CS3. Thankyou Greg Rewis. Yes, it?s going to be good, yes Fireworks is the optimisation Engine, Yes Dreamweaver and Photoshop can be tightly coupled. Finally I got to find out what has been bugging me for a while with Spry. Greg revealed later the Spry (Ajax) Javascript in Dreamweaver isn?t that accessibility friendly or unobtrusive. So again we all still have a job fixing the output from Dreamweaver.
  • More Scorpio, interface and tags for rapid developments from Tim Buntel, working with Breeze like presentations, PDFs and images. Interesting, but by this stage I was getting a little tired of the Adobe demos.
  • Speaker Roundtable, the usual let?s see the Adobe dudes avoid the hard questions. I would have preferred the non-Adobe people on the stage for a general panel. But we got more Adobe.

  The Wrap

  On a side note, was there a lot of twittering, well no! I was asked countless times, what was Twitter. Maybe Twitter was just not in the mindset of these web geeks. Sure some Adobe dudes are TWI. Some people get it. Some do not.

  WebDU is slated as ?A rock concert for geeks?. Well it had is share of Adobe ?Web Rock Gods?, and the lower profile ?Web Rock Gods? where the real stars as far as I?m concerned. The Adobe crew were interesting, but frankly they where all glossed in a little ?sales? gleam. When it was people like Brandy Fortune (power to you Brandy), Kai K]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:20:02 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16122 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16121 As I have previous discussed this was my first WebDU. I was hoping that it was not going to be a "boys own web geeks club". And thinking back on it now that I am sitting back here at home among those I hold dear, I think it was. I approximated while at WebDU that the percentage of female attendees was well below 5%. The room was just a male testosterone fest at some points.

  As Katrina discusses there was a lot of sexist comments from the audience and speakers on the podium. Personally I didn't find the Nectarine adverts (case in point the Coldfusion one) offensive. As I took it in context of the 1950's extreme stereotype that it projected.

  However comments about people at the conference and other female attendees to me was just as disgusting. It was the level and type of sexism that would not be tolerated in a professional workplace. So why should it be tolerated at a professional web industry conference. The talk at the bar or later in the evenings is not what I'm discussing here. I'm not going to repeat the comments as I don't want to embarrass the people they were directed towards.

  It turned me off. To the point where I just couldn't be bothered talking with some male colleagues at the conference (unless I knew them from before). Hence I think I may have over hassled any non-male at the conference a bit. Sorry if I did. I'm generally a social person I like to meet new people and talk. I feel very sorry for anyone that was offended by some of the comments, all I can say is that not all people at the conference where there for a geek testosterone fest.

  I've said this before, but I also noted out of the wide range of talent (gender aside) only one female speaker could be found. This was frankly disgusting. I know there are a few star ColdFusion / Flex / and Flash non male gurus in Australia and New Zealand. Seems no one bothered to approach them that I know of.

  (Edit - Clarfication : The Conference is not disgusting,]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:19:59 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16121 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16120

  It's an age-old problem, we see it all the time, the Public Relations branch verses Information Technology branch. They just will not see eye to ee. Meetings between the two groups are often polite at best. It's like they are from different planets. Marketing verses the Technies. But does it spill over into the web industry. Seeing as most of us work very closely with the Techie crowd and the Marketing people as well. So does it apply, do we have our own great divide. You know:

  • Designers, those communicative, arty types hate the IT Developer geeks.
  • Developers, those analytical, logical, uncreatives hate the air-headed art-freak Designers.

  Do designers really not understand Developers and visa-versa? Or is there something in the middle the hybrid Developer/Designer? Search on the topic. There is a lot of old material on this one.

  Nathanael Boehm is prompted to raise the question of the hybrid Developer/Designer spring-boarding off Shane Morris's talk at the Canberra Web Standards Group meeting. It's often discussed that the web designers of the 90's with design and development experience don't exist anymore. However I question this, is it a myth? I say the hybrid is alive and well.

  I have often wondered on this point. I'm told all the time that people are specialising; that the age of the multifunction web job is dead. But are people in the web industry that specialised. Are we still specialising is our occupations of a Designer or as a Developer or "Other" (SEO, Project Management etc)? Or are we still all wearing lots of hats?

  Having talked to colleagues on this at length over the years it seems they tend to fall into two camps:

  • The people working in a medium to large team where the roles are clearly defined; or
  • The sole operators or people working in small teams where the roles are very loosely defined.

  So does it really come down to the business or work environment that you are working in that determined if you are a specialist of not. Does this influence the birthplace of the Developer/Designer?

  With most of the web industry being based in smaller teams (okay I have no hard evidence, does anyone?) based on my observations this would mean we should have a lot of generalists (hybrids) in the industry.

  Now is the hybrid Developer/Designer going to be as good as the focused Designer or Developer at their general output? Based on my own experience I would say no.

  They will however have a massive advantage on their focused peers, as they understand the issue that are facing both camps and in maybe able to act. As Nathanael suggests, as a peacemaker, intermediator between the two groups. However this as he points out, you would expect that this would mean they are purely working in a consultative or project management capacity. Does this happen? Well I agree with Nat. Not that I have seen. These types of multiple talented jack-of-all-trades tend to end up as trouble-shooters to quickly solve the immediate problems leaving the focused talents of the Designers and Developers to their respective trades.

  The question is does this divide really exist in the web industry? I don't think it does, not to the extent that is used to.

  Technorati Tags: designer, developer, webdesigner, webdeveloper, webindustry,

  
  
  ]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:19:59 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16120 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16119 Well it's been a little too long since this blog felt the cool breeze on its skin, and the warm caress of the sun on its tags. So its time shed those outer layers and enjoy the freedom this site was born with, a naked body.

  No style, no design, just the raw information. April 5th is the Annual CSS Naked Day. On this day this site will be without any style. This is all in an effort to promote web standards and good semantic markup. Its a day when web sites can show us what they are made of, the raw unstyled information.

  Now I wonder how many ustralia Web Industry blogs are going to get naked at well on April 5th. Come on I dare you. Get naked!

  Technorati Tags: CSSNakedDay, CSSNaked, CSS, webstandards, semantic

  
  
  ]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:19:58 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16119 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16118

  There has been some discussion since Adobe announced their new Creative Suite 3 products on the differences in pricing for non-US countries. Adobe tells us that the pricing models for countries outside of the US are controlled by the local Adobe office to a degree.

  Now I have nothing against the new Creative Suite itself. From what I have seen in the previews and demonstrations, it seems to be worth the United States upgrade price. But how does this compare to previous upgrades? How do the prices in Australia compare to the prices in the US. Are Australian's being ripped off by Adobe Australia? This is what I'm going to be examining here in detail.

  A quick comparison of the recommend retail pricing in Australia versus the US is given below.

  Product	Australian	United States
  	Cost (inc GST)	Cost (ex GST)	US$ Equivalent*	% Diff	Cost
  Web Premium (full)	$2775	$2522	$2059	+28%	$1599
  Web Premium (upgrade from Creative Suite)	$589	$535	$436	+24%	$349
  Web Premium (upgrade from Studio)	$865	$786	$644	+29%	$499
  Web Premium (upgrade from separate products)	$2425	$2204	$1800	+28%	$1399
  Web Standard (full)	$1735	$1577	$1287	+29%	$999
  Web Standard (upgrade from Studio)	$689	$626	$511	+28%	$399
  * - (0.8167 Exchange Rate as of 5 April 2007)

  Yes I'm focusing on the web premium package, mainly because this is the package that I'm interested in.

  Looking at the figures above, Australian's are paying a 25-30% price increase for the same software sold in the US. Now I know the product has to be shipped, but I can bet that it's not really coming from the US, but a pressing plant in China or the equivalent. So why are us mugs in Australia having to pay the price increase for the same software. And don't tell me it's for local customisation. Should we have to pay for this price difference?

  We need to send a message to Adobe Australia to stop being greedy with the local designers and developers. Wake up Adobe Australia, you are in control of the pricing, at least give the local industry and break and do a loyalty early upgrade discount marketing campaign.

  If you could purchase and download the software from the Adobe Store (not that I have tried this one), then certainly that would be the way to go. Mind you, to do so you would have to register the account in the online store as being in the US, and I you will be breaching the licensing agreement. And if you can't download it and have to ship the disks, you will be slugged for GST and import fees. Still all things considered this pricing is just not on. Has anyone considered the Australia-US free trade agreement.

  Price the products too high and the Web Industry will find alternatives. Look at the Microsoft alternatives MS-Expression, okay the product is a little immature, but it's shaping up as an alterative development suite, which is good as it gives us back a competitive market.

  Also the debate has moved into the upgrade prices and their value for money. Clearly from the table below it is value for money if you consider it versus the purchasing of separate items, but it's always been this way, hasn't it. That's why these software suites always sell well.

  Product	Separate Items Upgrade	Web Premium Upgrade
  Macromedia Studio Upgrade Option *	$949	$865
  All Products **	$2174	$865
  * - Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash Professional
  ** - Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash Professional, Acrobat, Photoshop, Illustrator

  But how do the upgrade prices compare to previous versions.

  Product	Previous Upgrades	Current Upgrades
  Photoshop (extended)	$345	$605
  Illustrator	$295	$345
  Acrobat Professional	$275	$275
  Dreamweaver	$345	$345
  Fireworks	$259	$259
  Flash Professional	$475	$345

  Is the current (CS3) upgrade prices good value for money?

  Well if you consider the matrix above the pricing points are very similar. The exceptions being for Photoshop and Illustrator, but if you consider the level of feature improvement and changes from the previous versions these prices aren't too bad.

  Now I do agree it would be nice if Adobe had allowed an upgrade path for Photoshop, Illustrator AND Studio as an item. But sadly there is only three pricing points; separate products, Studio or Creative Suite. This could have been handled a little better with maybe another pricing tier being present. I have attempted via several communication mediums to contact Adobe to get an answer on this, but as expected they are silent.

  What do you think; should here be a third middle tier on the pricing? Is the software priced too high in comparison to the US price?

  Technorati Tags: adobe, cs3, pricing, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash-Professional, Acrobat, Photoshop, Illustrator

  
  
  ]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:19:57 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16118 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16117

  I first encountered Jeremy Keith via his book DOM Scripting, and then again in Sydney at Web Directions 2006, where I attended a very good workshop he ran on DOM Scripting.

  Unlike Jeremy's first book DOM Scripting, which is basically a getting starting guide on DOM Scripting and its use to enhance a web site. Bulletproof Ajax, his latest book, takes things to the next level, in a way. It deals in-depth with the use of Ajax on a web site front end and it's implementation with the least impact on accessibility and usability of the web site.

  However Jeremy has not pitched this book at the back end developer wanting to branch out into the world of Ajax. It is aimed squarely at front-end developers.

  It's not a long read, this book is a short sharp, to the point delivery, an easy read in day or so; in fact it would be ideal for a long plane flight.

  Jeremy presents in a personalised style the information and examples you need to go from knowing nothing of Javascript to understanding the complex issues of accessibility, Ajax libraries and the various different Ajax implementation methods.

  It's more than a quick trip into the Ajaxian world; it's the explanation of a method of Ajax implementation called Hijax. This adds a bonus for front-end developers already working with Ajax, as this book offers the added value of a different approach to the usual Ajax implementation, apt a bullet proof one. This method allows the reduction of the accessibility issues that can surround Ajax; by the use of unobtrusive implementation methods and the use of progressive enhancement methodology for the functionality of a web site.

  Jeremy visits the Ajaxian and Javascript worlds, in several defined chunks throughout the book:

  • Introduction to Javascript and DOM elements from the basics to XMLHttpResquest and data formats.
  • With the basics under your belt, Jeremy presents Hijax.
  • Then he examines the problems with Ajax and the accessibility issues.
  • Finally it all comes together with a mini application example and a summary of the future directions and the pros and cons of various Ajax libraries.

  One minor point that did annoy me with this book, not that it's Jeremy's fault; I blame the publisher New Riders. All the example text is in dark purple, which under some dim yellow incandescent lights can look like the normal black commentary text. To my older eyes this was not distinctive enough. I couldn't differentiate between the commentary and example text at times. This is an accessibility issue in the print layout, which I found amusing.

  Overall is it a good Ajax book?

  Yes, if you are front end developer and you are looking to implement Ajax the correct unobtrusive way with progressive enhancement (which frankly you should be), then get yourself a copy of this book. But if you are solely a back-end developer then this may not be the book for you.

  That said it was an entertaining read into the Ajaxian world.

  Technorati Tags: JeremyKeith, DOM, Javascript, Ajax, Hijax, Bulletproof

  
  
  ]]> Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:19:57 -0700 http://virb.com/tuna/posts/text/16117