Display by Label: Web_Design

Remodel.

Friday, November 02, 2007 | comments (9)

I've had a few late nights this week. Because it was time for a remodel. And remodels happen best at night. And I just hope my new neighbors don't have sensitive ears. Because my office shares a wall with them. And there have been keyboard taps coming from over here. Lots of 'em. Tap. Tap. Tap. Remodels can be loud affairs.

Remodels also works best when all the lights are out, save one. Sitting in a shadowed room. Headphones on, all snug and complete. Tonight it's been a lot of the Soul Coughing that fills them. And I'm mouthing lyrics here . . . Irresistible. Bliss. — And ever since then I got disseminated. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yeah. It just flows better this way.

And so, as you may have noticed unless you're reading this from a feed reader, nicolasix has been spruced up a bit. Some new color. A wider look. A more newsy feel. A lot of the ideas for the look and functionality have been fueled by a project I'm working on right now for a client. That tends to happen a lot. As I work out problems in other projects, it gives me ideas for my own site. And it's great when that happens — when the pro work you do fuels your personal work.

And so I'm writing this now at 3am and, well, there's not much else to say. I'll post this in the morning because right now it's difficult to see what I've just written. Yep, there's really no telling. I can tell there are words there on the screen, but I'm not really sure what they say. Sometimes my head just reaches that buzzing conclusion of no more input. But I can still output. I just don't know if it makes sense or not. And no amount of Soul Coughing can drown out the sound of those sheets calling me. So distracting.

So real quick, a few things to point out:

1) Most people's screens are set for 1080 pixels and above these days, so the wider default layout shouldn't be too big a problem. But if yours isn't and you're getting a horizontal scroll bar in your browser, then try clicking the 'Narrow' link at the top right of the page, or in the footer. This will make it more comfortable for you 800 x 600 people. And your setting will be kept on that computer, so when you come back again and again (hint, hint) you won't have to make the adjustment each time.

2) As you can probably tell, with the new layout you can expect more photo posts. That was one of my primary motivations for the remodel.

3) Two other sites deserve some mention here, as I drew some ideas from each of them. First, a site I discovered recently: 5ThirtyOne. This one sort of confirmed in my head that, yes, it would be alright to use a more newsy-themed layout for a blog. So thanks for that. Second, I've always loved the way suicide blond's comment form was laid out, all tarski style, so I borrowed that general concept for mine. Again, thanks.

As usual, all content is driven by my own ColdFusion code and styled with my own CSS templates . . .

So that's about it. Let me know what you think. What you like. Or don't. Ideas for things to add. Or subtract.

And have a good weekend.

link to this | comments (9) | File: Web_Design Nicolasix CSS Code Blog

Lemony Goodness

Saturday, May 20, 2006 | comments (11)

Welcome to Nicolasix, Summer Edition. While the layout is mostly the same, you will notice a few changes:

The main navigation menu has moved to the top of the page, where it has always wanted to be, but until now, has never been able to muster up the self-confidence or poise.

I also threw in some very 'Web 2.0-ish' grayscale fades (because I'm nothing if not fashionable and hip and I need that reflected in my site).

Since it's summer and all, I removed the picture of me waking up and, in it's place, put a big juicy lemon. Now, if you think I'm going soft on you with the bright happy color, I will remind you that the lemon is one of the bitterest of fruits. So suck on that.

And for a little bonus entertainment, try clicking on the Greek symbols over on the right, above the RSS heading. Go ahead. All the cool kids are doing it. It's fun.

I'll wait . . .

See? Now, couldn't you just play with that shit all day and all night? It works a little better in Firefox, but should still do it's thing if you're using IE. Oh, and it's brought to you by the good folks at script.aculo.us. (Thanks Thomas, if I'm ever in Vienna, I'll certainly buy you a beer.)

So there's more changes to come, but that's all for now. Leave me a comment. Let me know what you think. And let me know if anything looks (or behaves) funky in your browser.

link to this | comments (11) | File: Blog Web_Design

Adventures in Web Building: Polly Exhumed

Thursday, March 30, 2006 | comments (4)

I've been extra techie-minded lately. Basking (or floundering) in my nerdishness, depending on how you view it. One of the fun (or frustrating) things about being a Web developer, again depending on your view, is that there are always new tools, new ideas, new ways of doing things coming out. And sometimes it isn't so much that these things are 'new' as it is that people are applying older ideas in new and interesting ways. Voilá Web 2.0! Sometimes they make you stop what you're doing and say, 'Hey, I need to check this out.'

Now, this isn't a tech blog, and I'm pretty much a techie-imposter anyway, so I definitely won't try to make it one, but I thought I'd highlight a couple of neat things I've been playing with lately.

1) There has been quite a stir in the developer community about the upcoming release of the IE7 Web browser and the effect it's going to have on existing page designs, particularly ones that are CSS-heavy. I've been wanting to download the beta to experiment, but since doing so would replace the existing version of IE on my machine (in typical MS loveliness), preventing me from being able to test in IE 6, I have refrained. Until the other day when I remembered I had an old laptop under the bed, not doing anything. Polly. The laptop's name is Polly, and it used to be Catherine's. So I booted her up (Polly, that is, not Catherine) and (after resetting the system clock) she still worked, though she's got a fan in her that's loud as hell. Anyway, I downloaded the IE7 beta onto her and have been playing around. Honestly, it's not as kinky as it sounds.

For the most part, the new IE is good. It has a lot of the same functionality as Firefox, which is a positive step forward, but it still lacks all the Firefox charm. It definitely seems to handle CSS more faithfully, which is good. I have found a few display problems in some of my pages, but they're probably the result of prior hacks I had used to get things to display properly in the old IE. I'll have to look into that a little more.

2) I've also been playing around with some stuff I found on script.aculo.us (link via Sixfoot6 - thanks!). The code is easy to implement, cross-browser compatible, and allows you to make some pretty neat usability tweaks, which have the added advantage of looking very cool. I don't have any examples to show yet, but after some initial playing around, I've already thought of a few ways I can put it to good use.

So there you have it: the exciting life and times of yours truly. One of these days, I will get back to telling stories and thinking about things other than Web development, but for now this stuff is kind of at the forefront of my brain.

Oh, one other thing: I had to cancel my trip for this year's men-only fishing trip because there's just too much going on right now and I got kind of behind after my trip to Texas. Do I feel less manly for backing out? Yes, dammit.

link to this | comments (4) | File: Work Web_Design Tech IE7 CSS

Look Maw, No Tables!

Sunday, February 26, 2006 | comments (5)

For the past several months, I've been working intermittently, between projects, on making this site's design completely CSS-based, and doing away with tables completely. All the sites I've been building for clients have been CSS-based, and all the while mine has remained woefully filled with tables, and I've begun to feel jealous of this fact. Until now. Friday I started using a new style sheet and display template. I still use a few tables on the photo gallery pages, but for the rest of the site (the blogs, etc.) it's all CSS. A few pages are still displaying kind of oddly and I'm trying to resolve those issues as I come across them. IE, for instance, still has a few quirks (of course). But since this is my personal site and not a client's, I'm going to ignore them for now. I'm sure I'll fix them eventually.

For those of you who are saying Table what? CSS who?, I'll just put it this way: I've done a little modernizing here at nicolasix. Upgraded the plumbing. Switched out the electrical outlets. Installed new wiring. It looks the same, but it's actually quite different and works much better than it did just a couple of days ago.

So, now that changing the design is a simple matter of switching out a style sheet, my plan is to put up a new look and feel every so often. Eventually, there may be several designs available which people will be able to choose from. But given my current workload, and my tendency to be a perfectionist about things like this, I'm betting this won't begin to happen until late Summer or Fall.

Oh. I almost forgot: I've also changed this site's URL structure. Instead of the long, unpleasant URL's I had before, I now have much shorter, easily digestible URLs that look something like this: www.nicolasix.com/257/. A minor thing, yes, but one that gives me great pleasure as it will lead to better security and better search engine indexing.

Now, back to other coding projects . . .

link to this | comments (5) | File: CSS Tech Web_Design