Owner: SX Web Development blog URL:http://www.simplex-media.com/blog Join Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:38:05 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: A growing blog featuring tips&tricks, reviews and guides about everything from web development to graphics. Site statistics:Click here
PNGPong: Cross browser PNG Transparency solution 2007-10-04 14:12:11 So, i stumbled upon something cool today, called PNGPong.
PNGPong is a cross-browser
PNG transparency script. It fixes PNG transparency for:
IE6-7
Safari 2.X
FireFox 1.5-2.X
Camino 1.x
Im not gonna explain how it works, neither how to use it, because the author of the hack does it way better.
Check it out here. Read more:Cross
, Transparency
AJAX Application Interface 2007-10-04 13:23:43 Today i have been web-designing. Finally, i got a new idea.
http://simplexmedia.deviantart.com/art/Web-Application
-interface-66489163
My dream is to get this stuff live on a AJAX
platform. It’s supposed to be a online one-window web development environment.
Send me a mail if your’e interested in using it, i can code the stuff in XHTML/CSS for you. Read more:Interface
Looking for writers 2007-10-03 12:14:43 Simplex Media Web Development blog is looking for a new writer. We are looking for people interested in either/and:
HTML
CSS
JAVASCRIPT
AJAX
PHP
Photoshop
And the internet in general.
If you feel like this is a job for you, please send a mail to: ryum@simplex-media.com
No payment. Take this job as a hobby, we are not telling you to do anything if you take the job, other than writing a few articles every week.
I hope for some interest
- Morten Ryum
How to host and install phpBB2 for free 2007-10-02 11:11:07
Shortcuts
Chapter 1: Introduction & Information
Chapter 2: Hosting & Gathering Information
Chapter 3: Preparing for upload
Chapter 4: Uploading phpBB
2 to your server
Chapter 5: Installing phpBB2
Chapter 1: Introduction & Information - 2 minutes
Introduction
There’s a lot of sites availible online which allows you to automatically set up a forum for free. But why should you set one up yourself?
No forced ads
You can upload whatever you want via FTP
You can freely modify your install
ation
It’s lot more professional
You can choose whatever version you want, and upgrade at any time
You can more easily intergrate your system
In general, it’s a non-flexible solution. So, you want to set up your very own forum, totally free? We’ll show you how…
General Information
1. We are going to install phpBB 2.0.22. This is the most popular, stable and flexible free forum system availible on the web.
2. We WON’T show you how to use the administratio
Version 2 Release 2007-10-01 07:23:04 *Fireworks sounds & applause*
After a few days getting our blog out of the free skin and nearly unmodified site structure, version 2 is here.
Release
Splash Screen
The Web Globe
The first thing you may have noticed, is that the color has a whole new color scheme. This scheme is based on the globe icon you find in the banner. This globe icon is clickable, and includes important links&content. I like to think at that as a start-button for quick navigation. And it’s fancy too, right?
New Menu Structure
I have to say once again that some of the links who would normally have been included in the tab navigation, is now placed at the globe drop down navigation. Now, the most important navigational links are placed at a one click distance (the tab menu), and less used links, are placed in the dropdown menu.
New Permalink Structure
The old permalink structure we’re all a little random and didn’t provide the reader any information at all. It also was bad SEO’ed.
Working on v2 2007-09-29 09:01:42 As you might see, the page looks a little unfinished, and that is because im working on a v2 of the site, and the reason im keeping this open to the public, is because i want people to see the development of the page!
Color Guide 2007-09-28 16:27:17 Colors
Colors is one of the most important factors for a good website. However, if a person creates a website without the right color harmonies, the website will look horrible. A good example is those piczo sites using black & pink. They are way too intense, hurting your eyes. And we have those using gradients from light grey to white (like i did, lol). It looks soft & plain, but maybe a little boring? So, read on in a few minutes with me to learn how to choose the right colors. It may help you a bit when designing websites.
The Color Wheel
The first tool invented for finding color harmonies, was the color wheel. It consists of the three primaries, red, green, blue. Yes, spoken in “tech language”, RGB. Between these colors are their analogous colors. Pick a point in the circle, and find the exact opposite point to find the color harmony for the first picked color. Read more about the color wheel.
This method works, but it definiatly not the best way, and the least Read more:Color
, Guide
A review of 2Shared - Free file uploading 2007-09-28 09:20:36
2Shared is one of the most clean upload sites i’ve ever seen. It features a simple to use, once click uploading interface, with no “premium user” bragging, actually no registration bragging at all.
The uploading goes super-fast, and it’s easy to share your files. The only ads you will see is two ads on the downloading page, this is of course to finance some of the server costs. 2Shared uses JavaScript which allows you to save all of your uploaded files, for organizational use. It also has a multi-upload and sharing feature.
As far as i know there is no file size limit, and i think all files are allowed for uploading. It just works!
Check it out here: 2Shared File Uploading Read more:review
Yellow Icon Crystal is released 2007-09-27 15:08:45 Yellow Icon has done it again. Created the most beautiful icons i have ever seen. And guess what, there are thousands of them.
We get them in transparent PNG formats, they are getting more & more popular. Yeah, i’m talking about web application icons.
This year, stylish PNG icon packs have been popping up all over the internet, and many sites dedicated to these icons are growing. I believe this is caused by web 2.0 style trends, and well - the release of new operation systems.
We got for example FamFamFam’s silk icons. Doesn’t ring a bell? Oh well, you’ve seen them. The author has created 700 of those, and they have been ruling Web 2.0 Applications since it’s release.
YellowIcon is a company dedicated to creating icons commercially for companies. However, some of them are released for free, and this time, a pack of 1500 free icons in different sizes.
Like the look of this icon? Wow, it’s detailed! Sizes from 16×16 to 128×128.
You ca Read more:Yellow
, Crystal
Review: AdGridWork 2007-09-27 14:36:28 Woah.
It’s all i can say after being introduced to this great innovation by my friend Kirth. You might have seen something like it before, but this one, is awesome. AdGridWork is a new, innovative way of ad-exchange. Wonder how these ad-exchange systems work? I’ll show you how.
You add an advertising script on your site, displaying minimum 2 ads. When you get outbound clicks, your site is displayed randomly at a corresponding page (with same keywords as your page), which gives you again, inbound clicks. This results in smooth, targeted free advertising, and of course better PageRank. The people visiting your page through these incoming links may blog or talk about it, increasing traffic even more.
AdGridWork follows this model in a really smooth and elegant way, and that’s the thing i love about it. AdGridWork is using a model working just like social marketing, however, it’s all automated, and give good results.
Now, you may ask, why should i have ads on my
Top reasons not to use internet explorer 2007-10-16 14:15:00 This satirical article is meant as a preview, and changes may occur frequently within the next 24 hours! I do have a lot of typos, but i had to get some content published. Enjoy.
Even though Microsoft spent 5 long years to develop the new Internet Explorer 7, it appeared to be exactly as fucked as i thought it would be.
This is where the Microsoft developers spend most of their time, at the “Longhorn” pub in Whistler Mountain (on pic). You may recognize the name “Longhorn” maybe? It was the codename of win vista.
In this first edition of my new blogseries “Microsoft, you loose” i will, once again, talk about Internet Explorer. This time, i’ll be featuring the top reasons not to use IE. The titles are “powered” by imaginary microsoft developer quotes ^^. Enjoy the good litterature.
10. “Leave them with no choice, but to follow OUR guidelines”
Let’s face it. Even though how much we work to make our apps fit IE, the
Worstoftheweb 2007-10-15 15:28:48 I’m too lazy today to write a good, informative post, but im not leaving you without content anyway, so…
For a long while ago, i browsed the web, looking for bad websites. I discovered the site: www.worstoftheweb.com Worst of the web features, well - the worst websites still on the web. And there’s a lot of them. Dig into the archives, and you can really find some goodies that make you laugh big time.
Subscribe by e-mail - Get great stuff. 2007-10-14 08:31:17 Every week we will be adding new links in our mail confirmation messages to something really cool. If you choose to subscribe at that time, you will receive the link to the featured stuff
once. If you want more, refer a friend!
This week, I’ll show you where you can do this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIFCV2spKtg
That’s right, Seam Image Carving. A whole new algorithm which let’s you easily resize or remove parts of an image, without stretching pixels. Absolutely amazing. Subscribe
today by e-mail, and you will receive the link immediately.
You can subscribe by clicking at the link in the “Subscribe” section in the sidebar, or go here.
The best photoshop resources 2007-10-13 14:58:13 If you’re looking for the best places to find high-quality and lots of resources, you have come to the right place. In this blog post, i’ll show you the best of the best free photoshop resources in the following categories:
Cut-outs (also called “Renders”)
Tutorials (also referred to as “Guides”)
Fonts
Communities
Brushes
Stock Photos
Cut-outs prize winner: iPhotoshop renders
iPhotoshop wins the prize in this category because they simply have lot’s of cutouts. I mean lot’s. iPhotoshop has lot’s of renders, in own categories, including “premium” renders made by iPhotoshop staff. One minus though, the render library is simply impossible to search through using a normal search phrase, since most cutouts are batch uploaded. This is an endless but somewhat untidy collection of renders i do recommend.
Yeah, i know, iPhotoshop has copied and published other sites renders under their site name. But now, iPhotoshop has made an
Notepad++ 2007-10-13 05:10:22 Notepad ++
It’s lightweight.
It’s packed with features.
It’s an easy to use application.
It’s notepad++!
These are the most important keywords of the notepad++ application. You may ask, what’s notepad++? Notepad++ is a multi source editor. It can edit the most known languages such as HTML, CSS, PHP, JS, C++, Perl, Python, etc by the click of one button. It’s a very lightweight application (1,7 MB), but it still has a lot of handy features. One of the most important features, is tabbed editing with quick file handling, such as closing, and saving.
When it comes to HTML & CSS editing, which i use this editor for, it has live colored highlighting, which makes the source easy to read. But because this application is so lightweight, it has no intellisense or debugging options. This means, this editor is not for the rookie.
One cool feature is a really easy to use macro function. Just click start, do your work, stop, and run. Easy as pie, and it deliv Read more:Notepad
5 Good JS Frameworks 2007-10-10 14:12:27 How was JavaScript before the frameworks came?
Quite boring, unfunctional & plain.
The frameworks were made to let you create powerful scripts by writing less code. The question is, where do you find the best frameworks? Here’s 5 frameworks i like, each numbered on how good i think they are. Don’t take my word for it, choosing a framework depends on the person picking! This time, ill keep it simple, just showing you the frameworks, and linking to their pages. From there you can read more.
5: Yahoo User Interface Libary
Current Version: 2.3.1
Comments: It’s a good framework, with rich functionality
Project Page: Yahoo User Interface Libary
4: Dojo Toolkit
Current Version: 0.9
Comments: Heavy toolkit with lots of features.
Project Page: Dojo Toolkit
4: Prototype JavaScript
Current Version: 1.5.1.1
Comments: Great features
Project Page: Prototype JavaScript
2: jQuery
Current Version: 1.2.1
Comments: Lightweight, easy to write system with lot’s of features. Reco
“Unfold” - Website Design 2007-10-08 16:31:52 So, tomorrow afternoon, i will give you a complete explanation of the “Unfold the web” anti internet explorer campaign. To give you a little sneak preview of how this project work, i have created a sneak preview design of the “normal user” version of the campaign.
The project has a quite interesting concept i would say, and i’m going to work a lot to spread the word. One more thing - the normal blog posts, tips&tricks will be back along with the “unfold the web” campaign. Stay tuned!
The design is located here: http://www.iphotoshop.org/upload/public/1064/pngcopy.png
Please note that any changes could occur, and this is not the final version of the page.
Feel free to comment! Your feedback is important.
Read more:Website Design
Internet Explorer - Designed to make developing hard? 2007-10-07 14:33:13 The threat
has always been here. Since the release of InternetExplorer
4, we developers has always been tired of fixing bugs for IE. Bugs like bad compitability, different CSS displaying is just one of them.
It won’t leave us…
The big gap between Windows XP & Windows Vista resulted in defaulting Internet Explorer
6. Internet Explorer 6 had bugs which seemed completely stupid, and required own hacks to display properly. We thought that in IE7, Microsoft would finally follow the W3 standards. We were wrong.
And it doesn’t stop there. Microsoft implements Internet Explorer in all Windows versions. This means, that any normal web user not interested in/not able to change to a proper browser, is stuck with IE. By July 2007, 20.1% is using IE7, and 36,9% is using IE6. This means, over half of all internet users are using a bad developed browser. Microsoft has gained full control of the web, and we cannot accept that this is happening. Still - most developers are using Read more:developing
How to make an hoax 2007-10-20 16:26:26 The internet is the only free media today which are easy to reach, and easy to publish. This makes the internet a place where the boundaries are few, and it’s easy to create non-true stories & rumors, also called ‘hoaxes’. I do have to say, that I’ve gone straight at many hoaxes, and believed them. Some of them are so - well, mainly great made, that they are hard to reveal, unless you take it through moderation.
Making a good hoax is an art i really want to perform, but i do not like to mess with other people’s minds. However, if YOU want to, you’re welcome to try. I wanted to write an article today about this topic, and i decided to write my tips to writing a good hoax.
Have fun!
Choose the right kind of topic
It’s very important to choose the right kind of topic.
A good hoax topic could be for example a secret beta on the web, or a secretly taken photo of an unreleased product by a known retailer. Create a topic about something that int
Sensor - A time sensitive CSS Switching script with or without JavaScript 2007-10-18 10:45:18 Sensor
is the ultimate time sensitive CSS Switchingscript
Sensor is a newly developed script by me, which let’s you create time-sensitive CSS files. Let’s say, you want one skin at the morning, one at the afternoon, and one in the night. This script let’s you do so. Unlike the other CSS switching scripts out there, this one uses JavaScript
when the visitor user has enabled it, but if it don’t, it uses PHP configured after your desired time zone.
Main Features
Compatible with both JavaScript enabled browsers (live) and JavaScript disabled browsers (php set after your time zone)
You can change the skin every hour automatically throughout the days 24 hours
Easy to customize, could take some time though, depending on how many different schemes you’re using.
No copyright notices required for using
Lightweight & simple, easy to further develop
Files to download
Right click > Save file as…
sensor.js
config.php
Installation Procedure
Step 1: Uplo
Celebrating my 30th post 2007-10-17 09:41:12 Yeah, thats right! Yesterday, i wrote the article Top reasons not to use internet explorer and guess what? It was my 30th post. So, i celebrate this post by picking my favorite posts i have already written, and featuring them here. I also have a new feature, and i’ve reached a milestone i want to tell you about. Check it out beneath this favorite-list!
Top 5 Scripts
This post surely created some buzz on blogs with up to 2000 feedburner subscribers! This is my favorite post so far.
Photoshop Resources
This was one of my first “real” posts, and what i was trying to create was a high-quality, high-traffic gaining blog post. It didn’t work out that well, since just a few people visited this list, after the social bookmarking pages was done listing my page on recent entries.
It’s still a good post, and i hope you’d enjoy it too.
Color Guide
This is one of the most proper and best traffic magnet i’ve created. This is what i consider as a useful post,
PageRank jump from PR0 to PR4 2007-10-29 03:58:19 Guess what guys?
We jumped from PR 0, to PR 4. That’s about it. I’m very statisfied for this change since i’ve been waiting a long time for google to update their pagerank and put me out of their sandbox. Hello world. I’m here. Proof
This blog post made me even more happy: http://www.kukuh.com/2007/10/28/pagerank-update/
This IS NOT today’s fancy, interesting blog post, as usual, it comes in the evening.
Have a nice day!
Read more:PageRank
How to customize a form 2007-10-28 13:08:44 So, let’s say you are creating an online application, styled used CSS. You are creating a login form, But the HTM default style doesnt fit into your page.
The solution: Use CSS classes.
A class works just like a blueprint. It’s a recipe for an object you can create fast, and easily. CSS Supports classes, as most coding languages do. Classes can be applied to almost any HTML element. This includes lines, text, boxes, textareas, images, header tags and more. In this guide, we will be applying classes to “Input” tags.
There are only 2 steps required to apply CSS code to an input box. And it works just like any other CSS linking element.
Precautional step: Link stylesheet
I’m a fan of using external stylesheets, and so are we going to do in this tutorial. If you havent already applied an external stylesheet, do so by inserting this code in the section of your page:
<link href=http://www.simplex-media.com//”style.css” rel=”stylesheet&rdquo
Back again 2007-10-28 04:56:34 After a week break, im back again, ready to write cool guides, top 5 lists, news & satire!
New articles starting from today evening.
BlogRush Phase 2 released! 2007-10-31 01:42:51 The v2 version of BlogRush has just been released. And it rocks. Totally.
I’ll be back on later today to review the changes. You can see it yourself by either logging in at BlogRush, or registering here. It’s worth it, believe me.
Automatic ways to promote your blog 2007-10-30 15:53:58 Every blog writer wants his articles to be read. I mean, who doesn’t? I blog to be found. But how do you get people to read your posts? In this blog post, i will be showing you the hottest of the hottest techniques to get your blog to be found, without any daily extra work. Don’t expect them to be working right away, and remember, content is king, stay on topic, and write often.
Blogrush
Blogrush is one of the greatest automated blog promotion tools available for free. It works like this; add a javascript widget to your blog, display 5 relevant blog topics (useful for visitors), every time you display the widget on your site, it will be displayed with one of your posts at another relevant site. This results in creating a “good circle”, giving your readers useful “stumbled” links to other relevant topics, as well as promoting your blog. BlogRush has a great affiliate program, and guess what; if you register through me, i get 1 extra link shown on othe
Tired of blogging 2007-11-05 08:47:19 Hi fellow readers,
The latest days i’ve stopped writing, and thats simply because im out of ideas and inspiration for my blog. I’m simply tired of blogging, it’s all empty and boring. What should i do? I need your advice. Please, leave a comment, send an email, or anything. Give me a tip on something to write about, or maybe a short notice with feedback.
Thank you so much!
Web 2.1 - Web Trends Forecast 2008 2007-11-20 07:48:26 The web is evolving like never before. Websites are made every second, and new services are popping out everywhere. It could be quite hard for web developers to say “stop”, and stop learning new methods.
But what has changed, and what will change? How do you follow the trends ? I present to you, the web trends forecast for 2008.
Less images > More CSS
Extensive use of CSS is flowing on the web like never before. Why make images, which loads slow, instead of using CSS? When used with the right colors, sizes, and margins, the css is the most vital part of a good web 2.1 application. Images is not longer design - it’s the content.
Modern AJAX driven applications
Ajax is the future for all modern web applications. Ajax provides the user with the opportunity to reload the website, get new content, or submit a query without reloading the browser page itself. It results in a quick responsive user interface, with less clicks. Now, don’t get me wrong. Ajax isn’ Read more:Trends
, Forecast
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