CSS ID selectors not as fast as I thought

Don’t use IDs in CSS selectors? ❧ Oli.jp (@boblet)

Modernizr 2.0

Modernizr 2.0 has just been released. This is turning into a fully-fledged framework, with the addition of media queries, a build process and a resource loader on top of the core feature detection that it provides.

Chrome Developer Tools Video

Irish and Feldman go through the Chrome Developer Tools. 'Break on Subtree / Attribute / Node' could be a godsend for debugging asynchronous callbacks.

jQuery Mobile Alpha Release

jQuery Mobile alpha has just been released. It certainly has borrowed from jqTouch (literally) which is not a bad thing, and there will be more confidence in adopting this given the momentum behind jQuery.
Documentation is slim at the moment so we're working off a single demo application for guidance. Looks good so far, although there needs to be support for live/delegate handlers to facilitate DOM manipulation: right now dynamic content injected will not be processed automatically by the parser (you can do it manually).
Nevertheless, loads of controls, transition and styling support. A remarkable achievement for the few months that they have been at it.

Refactoring CSS

SASS and LESS are CSS preprocessors which offer a fantastic way into more structural CSS.
They provide the ability to use variables, mixins, arithmetic and inheritance to create CSS rules, which are then parsed to produce valid CSS. The real benefit of this is that it allows refactoring of CSS, so you can take whatever you've written, and extract commonly-used values / repeated sections, and assign them to variables which can be referenced throughout the CSS. Variables can be given semantic names to make the CSS more readable. Additionally, with nested rules, you can see the cascading hierarchy directly in the code, making it easier to identify redundant rules and repeating patterns.
SASS is a little more advanced in terms of features, but LESS offers a javascript processor, for easier testing and integration. You choose, but either way this is a great step forward. This stuff should be in the CSS spec from the start.

Chrome Frame - no longer beta

Google announces that Chrome Frame is now on the Stable channel.


Great news for those still struggling with IE6. At least it offers an improved chance of getting customers to adopt CF now. Spread the message: standards compliance means faster rendering, reduced markup, improved network performance, simpler code development and maintenance, future proofing and accessibility.

State Pattern

So an RIA page needs its state to be driven by a server side engine, lots of if/else statements are going to happen for sure. The State pattern is your friend here. It allows a server class to have a set of state objects, of which one is current at any time. Each state controls the behavior of the class for a certain command, and determines the next state to transition to.
Any changes to the system behavior can be made just by modifying the states. Saved me a lot of messy code.

The UI SelectMenu from the Filament Group solves a lot of issues with styling of select controls. It allows formatting of individual options and content-agnostic control of the width, amongst other things.
These guys are doing great work with progressive enhancement. Looking forward to reading the book.

jQuery for Mobile

Just heard that jQuery is extending out to the mobile platform [http://jquerymobile.com/].
It will be interesting to see how this plays along with the existing pack (jqTouch, Titanium, Sencha Touch etc.). Also in the running is Dojo mobile, early in development, but I've greater confidence in their widget set.

 
 
 
 

Isabelle

Isabelle Victoria Taylor Fallon was born at 6:40 pm today. Weighing in at 7lb 6oz, she'll be well able to handle her older brother pretty soon.
All the family doing great.

On holiday in Florida and the Cayman Islands

 
 
 
 

Matthew Portraits

 
 
 
 

Matthew Videos

Ben

At the Farm

More pics

 
 
 
 

Early pictures of Matthew

Flock Browser

I just got hold of the new Flock browser (1.0). Looks pretty comprehensive, if not a little cluttered. I'll need to use it for a while to see if it is any good. This post was written in Flock anyhow so if it works it will be a good start

Blogged with Flock

Google Web Toolkit : First Impressions

GWT is a framework for developing Ajax-like web applications. The major differentiator is that the code is developed primarily in java, and compiled into JavaScript for deployment on a standard web server.
The benefits up-front are those that favour java development in the first place: strong typing, debugging, unit testing, OO design, refactoring etc; all things that imrove the experience over pure-javascript development. The major drawback seems to be the fact that the java needs to be compiled to javascript at some stage and so is limited in the constructs and libraries that it can use.

From the getting-started examples, the code is developed like a Swing or Eclipse plugin; you create your UI controls, give them attributes and behaviour, and attach event handlers to react to user events and position all of this on a layout grid (if you like).

The model-view-controller paradigm is up to you to implement if that is the application structure you want to create. More natural is the AJAX structure where the application is hosted on a single html page, and all events trigger RPC calls to the server, and the response data displayed using scripting in the same page.

Vienna Feb 2007



Me and Genevieve in Vienna. We found a lovely apartment just beside the StephansPlatz.
The Dohertys got us tickets to the IAEA Ball in the Hapsburg palace and the State Opera, neither of which hosted the giraffe.

La Rosarie

Montignac

Heres a pic of the pool at La Roserie in Montignac where we stayed in June.
Lovely gastronomic hotel, old style with traditional French food and great wines.
Right on the shore of the Vesere river, perfect for a peaceful break.