This article outlines 10 patterns that designers should pay more attention to when crafting a web site. Much of the information deals primarily with making information and the overall interface more usable and readily accessible.
Posted at 2:41 PM
I'm one of the many proud owners of the iPhone 3G. Like many, when the iPhone 3GS was launched at WWDC this year, my existing piece of Apple hardware felt somewhat inadequate.
Therefore, I quickly jumped to the thought of upgrading to the new 3GS (with the "S" standing for speed). To my dismay, the new phones would cost $399 for 16 GB and $499 for 32 GB respectively.
The question quickly became, is it worth paying $400 to upgrade to the new iPhone 3GS? Let's take a quick survey of what has been upgraded between the two phones (I'm sure I'm missing a few things, but that's okay):
Ultimately, these changes are hardly helpful (with the exception of the improved speed). My recommendation is to simply wait for the next iteration of the iPhone next year. Or, if you must have the latest technology and are a loyal AT&T customer paying over $99 a month on services, you'll most likely be put up for upgrade pricing 18 months after your last phone upgrade.
Personally, I'm waiting until next summer. That is, unless I break my existing iPhone in the meantime, in which case I'll be seeing an iPhone 3GS in my near future.
Perch Content Management System →
This content management system is different from others, as it relies on existing pages instead of templates built into the management system itself. In addition, the system is incredibly lightweight and easy to use and allows for a quickly made dynamic site with minimal effort.
Posted at 8:33 PM
So. A few months back, a friend of mine stated that he saw ads on my blog. Seeing as though I never try to monetize my sites, I took this as a laughable claim and was similarly unable to find these ads he spoke of. I verified these findings with a few others, and they couldn't find any ads either.
Today, however, when my sister visited my site, a large ad was clearly visible on the right hand side. I immediately started looking for the source of the problem. It was no where to be found in the source of the page. The problem was nested in a piece of JavaScript I use to open outbound links in a new window.
The source had been changed so that, instead of displaying links in new windows, it displayed a large banner ad on the side of the page while placing cookies in the users browser.
I apologize for not picking up on this sooner, and am looking into how it occurred in the first place. This should serve as a lesson in how not to secure a website.
Posted at 3:22 PM
It's no surprise that Facebook envies the recent attention Twitter has been receiving. Even Oprah jumped on the tweeting bandwagon. However, when people start to compare the two services, it's like comparing apples to oranges.
Sure, they're both social networking platforms, but Facebook has to focus less on what attracts people to Twitter and more on what they do well themselves. Facebook blew past MySpace in the social networking race and has maintained that position ever since because of the elegance of their system. Now, Facebook is trying to make their service more like Twitter, replacing statuses with "What's on your mind?", and trying to display all news as a continual flow. This is a step backwards for a complex data site that needs a sense of hierarchy in data.
All in all, Facebook is in a league of its own, receiving almost ten times more traffic than Twitter. However, if this is to stay the case, Facebook needs to realize the purpose of their own site and not try to overcomplicate what was once terribly simple.
After nearly five years of having the same boring, monochromatic design, I took a few hours today and redesigned kimages. Also added the wonderful feature of multiple-image uploading.