December 17, 2008

House Made of Web

I saw a little tweet from David Airey the other day: "@davidairey Ever wonder how your website is constructed? http://www.sitonomy.com/ " - and I clicked through, thinking this was perhaps a web designer talking about the process by which a site is built. Instead, Sitonomy is a nice little app which breaks down the various pieces of technology used to build a site.

But that got me to thinking ... perhaps I should explain how websites get built.

I know a great many folk who think it's some magical or terribly arcane process - but it shouldn't be.

First, a little backstory. Because I enjoy backstory and by golly, you wouldn't be my reader if you didn't enjoy backstory too. (Right? you like backstory, right? Crap. Just me. Well, there are people STARVING for backstory somewhere or another, so you just eat this all up and enjoy it and think about those poor backstory-starving people in Narnia. You're the lucky one, remember?)
I got my start in web design back in the Mosaic age. (Think Neolithic period of the web.) It was 1996 and I thought the web was a great place to store my class syllabus so my students couldn't lose it. Most of the students at Notre Dame in 1996 had computers in their rooms - and those who didn't seemed to constantly be in one of the computer labs scattered all throughout campus - so this seemed like a nice "bonus" I could do for my students. It also gave them the added benefit of being able to access their syllabus from home - or show it off to their parents.

Of course, I came up with this brilliant plan most of the way through the fall semester and decided I'd have it up and ready in time for Spring semester. I had been reading the source of most web pages and it looked pretty simple to do. In the end, however, I had to use a program called Navipress in order to get the site done in time for the semester to start.

Over the course of that semester and the following summer, however, I began writing all of the code for my site myself ... and it quickly expanded beyond just a syllabus site for my students.

This was, of course, the days of grey backgrounds everywhere ... horizontal line dividers marking divisions in pages that went on for screens and screens and screens ... and, for that matter, screens that weren't much bigger than 800x600 for most people. Oh the excitement when we could make text BLINK at you. And change colours! OOOOOOH! and looky at that nifty animated gif of a man digging a hole at a construction site.

Yeah, even "Under Construction" pages on a website were fun and exciting back then (instead of the incredible no-no they are now).

So, I learned HTML through looking at other website code and the crappy HTML that Navipress had written for me in my haste to park my thoughts on the information superhighway. I eventually found my way to the HTML Writers Guild and started learning how to code well.

A guild! My geeky Dungeons & Dragons heart overflowed. I was joining a real-life modern-day freaking GUILD!

I learned a lot over the next few years and became a very strong web advocate within my department, encouraging our publication of more and more department materials and resources on the web and very much encouraging our instructors to put their syllabi on the web as well as handing them out the first day of class.

As much as I loved teaching, I was utterly fascinated by the web and how we were starting to use it. My first lessons in user-interface were not through some book about good design - my first lessons were the tough ones handed out by my students. It seemed no matter how hard I tried to organize the growing amounts of information I had on the student segment of my site, the more complaints I heard.

Actually, I think the harder I worked on trying to make the site better for all, the more I took complaints and criticisms to heart.

All of my students used the site in different ways. One wanted the site to tell him when everything was due in one big list. Another student wanted it broken down by assignment. Another wanted it listed day by day.

And none of them were wrong. They simply had different methods of processing information and differing ways to parse logical data.

As much as it could sometimes frustrate me that I had "gotten it wrong" yet again, I found this real-life course in information systems to be fascinating and endlessly engaging.

How DO you put together a site so that every single user will find it - if not easy to use, at least understandable and logical once they get the hang of it. (And get the hang of it quickly.)

I hope that I taught all of my students something useful and positive about writing and about reading. I hope that I didn't kill anyone's interest or discourage them.

I know they taught me a great deal in return - even when I was discouraged by their apathy. (I mean come on, doesn't everyone just LOVE taking first-year writing classes?)

Next time I'll go into the modern process of how a website is conceived and constructed.

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:17 AM | Comments (4) | Blog | Design | Stumble

December 16, 2008

MS Recommends Using Another Browser

(Well, duh. I've been saying THAT for years. Nice of you to jump on the bandwagon, Microsloth.)

Mention Internet Explorer to any web designer and watch that person begin ranting, gnashing their teeth and wailing.

There's nothing worse than fine-tuning the code of a website to match your design ... only to realize that YET AGAIN, the non-compliant Internet Explorer has totally bolloxed the whole thing up. Works fine in Firefox. Looks sharp in Opera and Konquerer and Safari. You're a frigging genius of the ether ...

... and it looks like pants in every version of Internet Explorer. And we're not talking some Red Monkey Jeans hip pants that all the cool kids are spending $300 a pop to look just as cool as everyone else kind of pants. No. We're talking hideous 1970s plaid pants from Herb Tarlek at WKRP kind of pants.

And. Every. Single. Version. of. IE. Has. A. Different. Problem.

Every. Single. One.

It's enough to make me go utterly stark-raving mad.

So the fact that today the BBC has an article wherein apparently Microsoft has discovered a security flaw so bad they have not yet released one of their crappy-ass half-complete updates, makes me laugh.

Instead, Microsoft suggests that you download and use another browser.

Lemme tell you something. Once you download Firefox, just keep using it. Please. Don't go back to IE. Import all of your bookmarks and preferences and passwords and all that good stuff.

And then just delete IE from your computer and never use it again. Please. PLEASE? I'm begging you. Do it for the children. Do it for the good of standards-compliant browsers around the world.

Do it before I go bald trying to write a new stylesheet for EVERY SINGLE VERSION of IE instead of writing just one stylesheet that works for all browsers the way Los Interwebz intended.

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:43 AM | Comments (4) | Blog | Design | Never Underestimate the Power of Human Stupidity | Stumble

December 1, 2008

meh

I hate snow.

Posted by Red Monkey at 8:13 PM | Comments (0) | Blog | Stumble

November 20, 2008

Teh Funneh (tm)

I have not Teh Funneh for you today. But Katie does.

Seriously. While I am guilty of typing LOL far too often when I really only smiled or perhaps let out a quiet chuckle, Katie regularly has me laughing to the point of tears in my eyes.

And the really sad thing is ... it's NOT really a funny thing. She's had a headache for EIGHT frigging weeks ... countless visits to countless doctors and through it all? She's kept her Funneh.

In this selection, her doctor has decided that biofeedback will cure her eight week headache. (This after he insisted it was her sinuses and her ENT guy said, umm, no, it's not that - but geez, these are some insanely interesting sinuses, thanks for coming in, hey, while you're here lemme stick a camera down each nostril and get some pictures of this.)

We conversed at length about my medical history and she said she just wanted to evaluate my "muskles" and soft tissues today and then we could develop a plan. So the first thing she does is stand behind the chair I'm in and starts whoorling my head around in circles.

She does not tell me what she's doing, she doesn't say to relax or to oppose her, she's just slow-motion whiplashing the shit out of me. And continuing to ask questions THE WHOLE TIME.

Seriously, I'm thinking if you do biofeedback, you might want to read the file on your patient before you start trying to, oh, I dunno, start twisting her head in the place where the two vertabrae were removed from the Chiari Malformation corrective surgery.

Anyhow, check out Katie. Despite living in Suckville for the last eight weeks, she's kept her funny. You can thank me later, after you wipe the tears out of your eyes.

Posted by Red Monkey at 4:30 AM | Comments (0) | Blog | Stumble

November 8, 2008

The Job ...

Since I have had it forcefully pointed out to me by a dear friend with whom I don't speak often enough any more, I figured I should log in and make one final post about the job situation.

I have never in my life met so many genuinely kind, sweet and friendly people in one place in my entire life.

Yes, I'm serious.

After 16 months of freelancing, I expected it to be quite difficult to get used to going back to a full-time gig. I had a short first week partly to give myself some time to prepare for going back to work (getting some clothes, for one) and to have my birthday off ... and to make for a shorter first week. Since I'm not a very outgoing person, I was more than a little nervous of being back in cubicle-ville.

I needn't have worried. People are still coming up to me to introduce themselves with a genuine smile and a "great to have you here." Our team leader (she doesn't like to be called boss) got everyone in marketing to sign a birthday card for me - and I tell you that it nearly made me tear up. I do not tear up. It's just not something I do - but the genuinely sweet welcome and notes in the card just kind of overwhelmed me. I tacked it up to the cube wall already to remind me on the inevitable days in every working life when things are not going so well.

I've been working on very simple, minor projects so far to give me a chance to get used to the system and the department procedures. Relatively dull work, but I would MUCH rather learn the system on some "dull" project and feel confident about everything when I tackle a more complex project! So, their training falls right in line with how I prefer to be trained. The procedures for working on projects and project approval are also right in line with how I would prefer things to go. Seriously, it's like I was supposed to get a job here. Communication is primarily by IM and email - again, my preferred methods. But the designers still turn 'round and chat about projects as well.

I'm a weird blend of shy and can't-shut-up - so I'm not sure what my co-workers think of me just yet. I mean, we seem to get along - I certainly think they're pretty cool. But I go through spells of sitting, facing my computer and zoning out ... and then when I do join a conversation, I fear that sometimes my storytelling self might take over more than I would really like. (Oh, that reminds me of "this time at band camp" ....)

The gentleman who does the Spanish translation of the site is already starting to speak to me in bits of Spanish since I made it clear that I need to practice and that I honestly enjoy Spanish. I think he grins at me every time he sees me.

All in all, the company workings and the individuals all seem beyond my wildest imaginations. I will miss doing some print design work - but hopefully I can, after things settle down a bit, get some freelance commissions to do some of that on my own time through Oppositional Design. I have to finish the freelance commission on a website before I can accept anything else right now, though.

Hopefully my body will start getting used to the new schedule soon and I won't be quite so exhausted. And then things can FINALLY get back to normal around here. :)

Posted by Red Monkey at 10:55 AM | Comments (9) | Blog | Stumble

October 31, 2008

A Flood ...

A flood of relief.

After nearly 16 months of worry, panic, rejection and work ...

... I begin my new job on Wednesday, the day after my 40th birthday. What a beautiful present. I got the finaly official start date/time just a little while ago.

The relief is palpable in the house.

Details? Not so many as I don't really blog about work. I'll just say that I'll be one on a team of web designers for a major e-commerce company. And I'm just beyond over-the-moon about it. I think this team seems really awesome and I'm really looking forward to it.

Posted by Red Monkey at 12:53 PM | Comments (5) | Blog | Stumble