Theory / Ideas Tutorials

  • Web 0.2 in the Web 2.0 World

    I grew up in the time of web 0.2. Counters, GeoCities, and guestbooks ruled the web world with an iron fist. CSS was the new technology. "Bookmark This Page" had taken over the JavaScript world. And lastly, IE4's interface was beautifying desktop browsers everywhere.

  • Work Efficiently with jEdit Macros

    As I've mentioned in the past, my text editor of choice is jEdit. jEdit is an all purpose text editor with numerous features that allow you to code more efficiently. One of those features is the jEdit macro. jEdit comes bundled with dozens of macros for editing Java, text files, and so on. You may also record your own macros. Here are a few macros I use to make writing my posts faster.

  • Confessions of an Eccentric Web Developer III

    It's so fun to share my innermost web development thoughts. Some people get furious about some of my ideas. Luckily I don't give a damn. Take my thoughts for what they're worth.

  • 5 Ways to Contribute to Your Favorite JavaScript Framework

    While you may not be a core member of any of the JavaScript frameworks, there are many ways that you can help contribute to the framework and team. Here are just a few.

  • Big Questions, Short Answers

    There are a lot of "deep" questions when it comes to JavaScript libraries, CSS, server-side languages, and programming philosophies. Rather than drone on and write a novel, I decided to answer some big questions with few words.

  • Tips For Better Page URLs

    Page URLs are probably more important than most people realize. No one wants to deal with marathon URLs and meaningless querystrings. Here area few tips for keeping your URLs respectable.

  • Confessions of an Eccentric Web Developer II

    My original article, Confessions of an Eccentric Web Developer, got quite a bit of attention. I have a lot of controversial views and I'm not afraid to stir the pot. Since we last spoke, I've compiled another list of confessions and feel like it's a good time get them off of my chest.

  • 6 Ways To Subliminally Tell Users “Don’t Come Back”

    There are many practices that I can't believe are still on the internet. Here are a few ways to tell the user to never come back to your website.

  • 6 Ways to Remind the Mustaches That You’re Important

    We all feel as though we aren't as appreciated as we should be sometimes. Our every day dominance of the web world gets taken for granted by those that aren't tech-savvy, especially the higher-ups in the organization. I've come up with a few ways that us programmers and designers can make the "Mustaches" in the organization remember how important we really are.Print Code to Their PrinterMany times, printing your code to the printer they frequent is the only time the Mustaches have a chance to see your work. I say this, of course, because there are no computers on the golf course. Printing your server-side language (PHP, ASP, Java, Cold Fusion...) is a must. If you're feeling frisky, go ahead and throw some XHTML or JavaScript with it. To increase the effect, print your code out compressed. Don't include CSS though — far too humanly-readable.Speak Lingo When Mustaches Are PresentIf you see a Mustache walking down the hall toward your department's cube-neighborhood, wink to fellow employees and start keyword-stuffing your sentences. And I MEAN keyword stuffing — like getting removed from Google keyword stuffing. For example:

  • Dear Developers, Don’t Hardcode Copyright Years

    Keeping your website current is extremely important when your goal is increasing return traffic. One easy place to make your website look current is in the copyright text at the bottom of the page. This is a rather obvious and easy thing to do, but some sites have overlooked their copyright year.