White Papers
Web Industry Articles, Research and Musings
Do Search Engines Index That?
February 27, 2007
Approximately four months ago, a small group of Web developers representing the International Web Developers Network (IWDN) devised an interesting search engine experiment. The question had been raised whether the text within a link's title attribute gets picked up by search engines or not. None of us knew the answer, and before long, we discovered we didn't know the answer to a lot of questions regarding how search engines index text in HTML. The purpose of this experiment was to see which methods of presenting information on a Web site would get picked up by search engines and which methods would be ignored.
Read more
Show/Hide with a Slide
November 14, 2006 / January 4, 2007
This script came from a request for a mechanism that would allow someone to toggle and element "on/off" using a smooth sliding mechanism to show and hide it. The original script was made strictly for objects at the top of a page. An improved version was released soon thereafter.
Read more
Automated Breadcrumbs Script
June 8, 2006
Paul Hirsch recently wrote and released a breadcrumbs script that takes advantage of an optimized folder/file system to serve up secondary site navigationonto practically any Web site.
Read more
Web Developers Exercise: Rounded Corners
August 26, 2005
This brief exercise shows how you can create a box with rounded corners that allows text to flow into the space that the corners occupy.
Read more
"If Only..." - The battle cry of the enlightened developer
October 15, 2004
Have you ever experienced the unnerving feeling of having had a personal breakthrough or moment of self discovery as a Web developer, and suddenly realized you have sites "out there" with your name on them that contain fundamental flaws? I have, and I would venture a guess I'm not the only one.
Read more
Characteristics of Professional Design
October 15, 2004
Recently, I had an interesting question posed to me by a fellow developer and member of a popular online forum. He wanted more insight into the characteristics of a professional site. He had been told by his peers that his work is "good" but not "professional," and this concerned him greatly. Immediately upon reading his question, it occurred to me he might benefit most from approaching the concept of professionalism from a completely different angle.
Read more
The Relationship Between Deregulation, Ownership and Media Convergence: Good in Theory, Bad in Practice
April 19, 2001
Evolving technology has forced media entities to reevaluate their relationships with each other and with their audiences. The concept of media convergence is just as it sounds; it is the blurring of lines between the various established mediums of communication. The emergence of online technology has been the primary instigator of media evolution for three reasons.
Read more
