Ma.gnolia: All Mike Cherim's Discussions

New post by Mike Cherim in "Please Report Spam"

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 17:18:29 GMT

At Jun 29, 10:18 AM Mike said...

This is an excellent group with an impressive collection of quality web accessibility-related bookmarks. Good work in spreading the word and helping all of us stay abreast folks. It's a good group and I want to keep it that way. But I need some help.

If you see spammy bookmarks posted to this group, please send me a message via the site's mail system. Please report the offending tag(s), bookmark(s), and user(s).

Today there were some "kayaking" tags so I investigated and determined they were indeed spam, so I removed the bookmarks (which removed the tags), and I banned the user from the group. There may be others in very limited numbers but after a continued search I can't be sure. We don't have a huge spam problem here thankfully.

Lending me your eyes will be to the benefit of the whole group and thus indirectly to web accessibility education, so your small effort will do a lot of good. Want to do more? Perhaps the group could use a moderator. Any volunteers?

Thanks.
Mike

New post by Mike Cherim in "Open new window : warn the user"

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 16:50:09 GMT

At Jun 29, 09:50 AM Mike said...

You're better off with an image because the alt text will more likely be read than that of the title attribute's text. Better yet, though, allow users to decide by either teaching them how to open links in a new window if they want, or add a script that let's them choose it as a preference.

Users can opt-in if you leave it up to them, but if you decide for them they can't opt-out.

New post by naudjf in "Open new window : warn the user"

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 11:10:31 GMT

At Jan 12, 03:10 AM said...

Hi,

I know how to do that with a text link :
- either I put "[new window]" at the end of the label of my link
- either I add a title on the link : it will contain the exact label of my link + "[new window]"

What happens if my text link becomes an image (img tag) ?

New post by James Harrison in "Iframes and accessibility"

Fri, 04 Jan 2008 06:44:30 GMT

At Jan 03, 10:44 PM James said...

I'm not sure exactly what an iframe is. Could anyone tell me. I manage this website http://www.ashleylavelle.com and I wanted to know if anyone could tell me if this framed site is just a framed site or an iframed site. thanks.

New post by Mike Cherim in "New Group Icon"

Mon, 26 Nov 2007 05:08:13 GMT

At Nov 25, 09:08 PM Mike said...

I decided on an icon that better captured web accessibility. You like?

New post by Mike Cherim in "Thanks for the group"

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 04:13:54 GMT

At Jun 28, 09:13 PM Mike said...

Yes! Found a group I can post some of my stories to. :)

New post by Mike Cherim in "Let's get the web's code fixed"

Sat, 14 Apr 2007 06:13:59 GMT

At Apr 13, 11:13 PM Mike said...

Hello group:

I want to start a movement and need your help. I want to try and get code providers, PayPal, etc. to update their code/markup and make it valid and accessible, and available in both XHTML and HTML where applicable.

We shouldn't have to fix it, it'd be beneficial to all parties concerned, and those who don't know web development at all wouldn't care just as they currently don't.

One small fix at PayPal, for example, could positively affect thousands of sites as webmasters plug-n-play that junk without fixing it. If 80% of the possible providers updated their markup it'd be a boon to the web.

What I'd like you to do is blog about it and encourage others to do the same. I have but one small voice in Internet land, but together I bet we could make quite a roar.

Here's my contribution to the cause:

Stop Writing Garbage Code, Please
http://green-beast.com/blog/?p=168

New post by Todd Sieling in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Thu, 15 Mar 2007 00:32:35 GMT

At Mar 14, 05:32 PM Todd said...

That's an awesome spread of answers. Thanks for the input, folks. We're starting to talk with a developer and will bring these ideas to the table when we decide what to focus on.

New post by tim brown in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 27 Feb 2007 14:39:46 GMT

At Feb 27, 06:39 AM tim said...

@Todd: how do you guys foresee the service moving? Will it be focused mostly on memory augmentation? Public staking of ownership/association? Facilitating the discovery of resources?

If, over time, the model of an individual's identity and relationships online becomes so portable as to replace identity/relationship features in standalone social networks such as Ma.gnolia's, what will the real power of Ma.gnolia boil down to?

New post by tim brown in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 27 Feb 2007 14:22:04 GMT

At Feb 27, 06:22 AM tim said...

I second casshern's first and last points. On the fly, part-of-the-browser bookmarking -- where only tagging (if that) is required and no page refresh has to happen afterward -- would be great.

New post by casshern in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 27 Feb 2007 06:02:02 GMT

At Feb 26, 10:02 PM said...

Browser integration!! I think an application that acts ONLY outside a browser is somewhat useless, since we'll have to go back and forth between our browser and that application. So, whatever the application does in "standalone mode", it should also be somewhat linked to firefox/explorer.

*** A plugin to generate a new bookmark menu in FF/IE is a very good idea. However, for that to work, we must be able to put items in groups or categories. I have 100+ keywords, so when I click on "magnolia bookmarks" in the menu, I don't want to have to scroll though a list of 100 keywords. If the bookmarks are listed in CATEGORIES / TAGS / bookmarks, then at least each listing is limited to a few items.

*** Of course, the app should be used for bookmarks management. I really like the way the "organize" section is done in Flickr (drag and drop, etc). This could be useful for submitting bookmarks to groups, to categories, to add a link to a tag or vice versa, etc.

*** "I would like to see some form of browser add-on that would allow me to save my browsing history online". Yes ... more or less like "last.fm" but for pages visited. Google has a similar feature for searched, but of course it doesn't do anything about web sites visited w/o a search. When reviewing our history, regardless of whether we have added a specific site to our bookmarks, it would be cool to see all its "magnolia history" (tags for the words, number of bookmarks, etc.) as well as a "save bookmark" button. Also, a way to search the history of only 1 site would be very useful.

*** A way to add tags "on the fly" to pages. More or less like the google search box in the corner of firefox. Sometimes, I'd like to be able to enter a few keywords and hit enter to bookmark a page. When this field is used to add a new keyword, rather than opening the usual pop up, magnolia could automatically use the title of the page as the bookmark name. The next time we visit the page, it would be cool to be able to see the keywords we added to the page and be able to edit them if necessary.

New post by Nico Macdonald in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Mon, 26 Feb 2007 06:13:36 GMT

At Feb 25, 10:13 PM Nico said...

My request would be the ability to import text files as bookmarks and manipulate them. Since 2000 I have been noting and summarising interesting news pieces, articles, essays and broadcasts under over 100 research categories. I record type of piece (Opinion, etc), title, author, publication, date, summary/excerpts, and URL. There are 100s of pieces I would like to share on Ma.gnolia with colleagues, and they would add historical depth to my bookmarks. I would like to be able to import these text files, parsed into fields, and manipulate them. This could possibly be done with a browser-based tool, but performance would be better with a desktop application. Such an application could be build around a database tool such as FileMaker or MySQL.

New post by tim brown in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 24 Feb 2007 19:41:49 GMT

At Feb 24, 11:41 AM tim said...

Maybe this is too far out, but what about a tool that gave URIs to things that otherwise don't have one? Allow for the upload and ma.gnoliafication of offline resources by letting people have space in which to put those things.

This is more of a service request than an app request, but thinking about a desktop app made me think of all the files I have that would be great to share, tag and publicly "own." And considering how slick Ma.gnolia is and how smart you guys are, I bet this is something you've either considered doing or have thought of an alternative to. :)

New post by Julian Bennett Holmes in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Thu, 22 Feb 2007 02:14:29 GMT

At Feb 21, 06:14 PM Julian said...

Chris: Yeah, I think it's just for browsing.

New post by Chris Messina in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 15:09:25 GMT

At Feb 21, 07:09 AM Chris said...

@Julian: there already is a social bookmark plugin for QuickSilver, but I think you're right... it might be missing the "post to service" feature.

New post by Mike Cherim in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 04:28:01 GMT

At Feb 20, 08:28 PM Mike said...

I wouldn't mind having a second bookmarks menu for my Firefox browser. Customizable of course, so I could have my group's bookmarks on it (a limited number of new ones), or maybe keep ones I've bookmarked (configurable or unlimited). Not sure if it would slow my browser, but it should be fairly simple to make using RSS.

New post by Julian Bennett Holmes in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 01:08:33 GMT

At Feb 20, 05:08 PM Julian said...

I wouldn't want a standalone app - I'd want a quicksilver plugin that allowed me to bookmark the page I'm currently on with Quicksilver.

New post by Chris Messina in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:49:37 GMT

At Feb 20, 11:49 AM Chris said...

A smattering of ideas -- oh, and thanks for opening up the discussion!

* I'd love to create my vision of bookmarks for Flock for Ma.gnolia as either a stand-alone app or a browser plugin, but maybe that's overkill
* I think we should keep an eye on Socialist to see what functions it performs, since there's little need to recreate that app: http://getsocialist.com
* Dead.ilicious already checks for dead links and 404s: http://www.malarkeysoftware.com/projects_dead-licious.html
* I really like the idea of tag joins and statistical information... there's something there in terms of leveraging one's "Ma.gnolia Attention"
* I would have asked for a drag and drop bookmark submitter that's a little faster than the widget... but now we have Tasty, so that might be sufficient for that
* I think the app I want would actually have more to do with exposing and exploring the community functionality of Ma.gnolia -- in terms of discovery and getting to good content more quickly. Let's face it, we can just convert a lot of the Delcious apps to solve many of the ideas presented here already -- what Ma.gnolia has that sets it apart is its community features. I'd love to see something done that really *defines* what "social bookmarking" means... perhaps it's drag and drop to friends... or maybe its groups and discussions as an app?

Anyway, just a few thoughts. Oh, and I would *love* me some Textile in these discussion forums!

New post by Alex Jones in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 13:45:15 GMT

At Feb 20, 05:45 AM Alex said...

Wow, there are some great ideas so far! I really like the idea of browser/system integration of bookmarks, as I currently use a FF extension to sync up bookmarks from work and home. Going to Ma.gnolia.com isn't quite convenient enough for me to use for commonly visited sites - this integration would change that.

Something else I would really like to see is a solid organizational interface that addresses my needs as an individual user and as a manager/moderator of groups. Having a desktop app that would allow me to easily drag and drop, move links between groups, delete links from my groups and consolidate tags would be great.

Alex

New post by Henry Halff in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 03:38:40 GMT

At Feb 19, 07:38 PM Henry said...

How about a browser plugin that would show, perhaps in a drawer, the ma.gnolia properties of the page being viewed and allow one to manipulate those properties.

New post by Elle Rayne in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sun, 18 Feb 2007 21:23:40 GMT

At Feb 18, 01:23 PM Elle said...

I concur with Sean and Daniel.

New post by Stefan Winopal in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 23:18:15 GMT

At Feb 17, 03:18 PM Stefan said...

I'd like to have a Ma.gnolia add-on that completely replaces my browser's bookmarks system, just like del.icio.us does in Firefox. It's a pain to have to use them to have my bookmarks at home (Mac OS X) and at work (Windows) always synced perfectly. I like Ma.gnolia way better.

New post by Bill Puller in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 15:10:42 GMT

At Feb 17, 07:10 AM Bill said...

I would like to see some form of browser add-on that would allow me to save my browsing history online, in addition to my bookmarks and tags. The A9.com Web site used to have this feature and I found it very handy when I was researching a topic, then needed to go back and find a page. I know that browsers have a history option, but I would like to have the information available from anywhere (i.e. school, work, library).

I don't know how you would make this portable since it would be a browser add-on, perhaps it could be implemented through the ma.gnolia site in some way.

New post by Richard Leland in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 13:58:35 GMT

At Feb 17, 05:58 AM Richard said...

i second both the tag join/intersections as well as the popularity idea. i'd also like to see a ma.gnolia app that can take the screenshots of bookmarks and make a contact sheet of the selected bookmarks for printing. i frequently use printouts of sites in design meetings and/or brainstorming sessions.

New post by Cesar H Castro Jr in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 09:47:54 GMT

At Feb 17, 01:47 AM Cesar H said...

How about a comments feature where you can take the Ma.gnolia bookmark and add comment entries to it from the desktop application vice having to bookmark the bookmark with your own description.

New post by U1 in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 08:21:47 GMT

At Feb 17, 12:21 AM U1 said...

I'd like to see a number of how many members of the Ma.gnolia Hot Groups have visited each bookmark. Or at least how many members of the Hot Goups I belong to have visited. That would give me an idea of interest and activity before I view a bookmark.

New post by Larry Halff in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 08:15:20 GMT

At Feb 17, 12:15 AM Larry said...

Daniel, OPML export is available off of the "Publish or subscribe to..." page from every bookmark list or search result.

New post by lwu in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 06:51:57 GMT

At Feb 16, 10:51 PM said...

I've been experimenting with the use of XULRunner to make desktop-abiding apps (30boxes and Zoho Writer in particular), but I think a Spotlight-ish form factor might make better sense for you guys as a first integration point with the desktop.

What if you could click on the white-blue Spotlight icon, or a Ma.gnolia Lens icon, and then have bookmark listings stream back as you as you start typing a search term? I'd use that.

That'd also be a nice integration point for browser-independent bookmarking -- you click on the Ma.gnolia Lens and then click on a little '+' to add the current page you're looking at, whether in Camino, Firefox, or Safari.

New post by DanielKing in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 06:47:36 GMT

At Feb 16, 10:47 PM said...

It would be great to have the option to check for significant changes in title or description of the site since the time of bookmark creation (or the last check). This might indicate that the site has had a major facelift or perhaps has new ownership. It would also be nice to have it return a 404 or other permanent error.

I'd also like to be able to export a search as an opml file.

New post by Sean Brady in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Fri, 16 Feb 2007 20:44:11 GMT

At Feb 16, 12:44 PM Sean said...

I am still hoping for an application online or off that allows me to do tag joins/intersections. When I click a tag, and see the resulting list of bookmarks, I also see a list of all the tags that the bookmark set has in common. The ability to the either include additional or exclude tags from the set to focus down on a very specific set of bookmarks.

New post by Todd Sieling in "February 07 Newsletter Question: The Perfect Thing in a Ma.gnolia App"

Fri, 16 Feb 2007 19:37:56 GMT

At Feb 16, 11:37 AM Todd said...

This month's question is about the possibility of a desktop application for working with Ma.gnolia bookmarks. If it did one special thing that you thought was perfect, what would it be?

New post by bahamut in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Mon, 12 Feb 2007 18:35:02 GMT

At Feb 12, 10:35 AM said...

Myself, I prefer to keep my personal stuff and bookmarks out of groups (except when they are important papers and stuff that everybody would have benefits from). But on the other hand, this is social bookmarking. I think no one loves spam here but a personal portfolio is not really a crime either.

Anyway, this is out of my field since I don't go posting my personal portfolio around as I previously stated.

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 10 Feb 2007 16:04:09 GMT

At Feb 10, 08:04 AM Alex said...

Very cool Cesar! It looks like you've laid a solid foundation. All in all, I'm very impressed with the community of folks and the submissions of links. I've been relatively lucky, as the majority of links that I have removed weren't from the spammers; they were from good members of the group posting links to Web Design firms or personal portfolios. I am writing up some modifications to the group description to layout a couple of ground rules, which will allow linking to a Web Design firm, but only if the link is directly to a piece of content that is helpful and contributes to the Web Design community.

It's a hard balance to strike, that's for sure!

New post by Cesar H Castro Jr in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 08 Feb 2007 13:36:19 GMT

At Feb 08, 05:36 AM Cesar H said...

Hey Alex I feel your pain I run the ( http://ma.gnolia.com/groups/SocialMedia ) Social Media - Sharing your web group and I know the headaches of moderating all too well. How I sort of eased the problem was create a discussion thread labeled ( http://ma.gnolia.com/groups/SocialMedia/discussions/223 ) Establishing Ground Rules and as the title states I wrote down some quick ground rules of the group and then sent out a message to the members letting them know of it. Since then I have cut down the "irrelevant" bookmarks being posted.

New post by Mike Cherim in "WCAG 2"

Wed, 07 Feb 2007 22:31:16 GMT

At Feb 07, 02:31 PM Mike said...

Pretty appalling when the accessibility guidelines aren't very accessible or usable. I have attempted to read them but it was just waaay too much. It blew my mind, figuratively speaking of course.

I have decided to wait for the movie to come out.

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sun, 04 Feb 2007 19:29:03 GMT

At Feb 04, 11:29 AM Alex said...

Very good feedback bahamut. There are definitely several ways for us to classify the topic, and I am glad to see you jump into the discussion, as I think it is a constantly evolving one.

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sun, 04 Feb 2007 19:24:54 GMT

At Feb 04, 11:24 AM Alex said...

Hi Terry, you're in the right group. :) We should definitely discuss Web design in terms beyond the commercial and industry circles. My comments above applied were within the context of Tony's questions about categorization. I should have provided a bit more information in my reply to make that clear.

Oddly enough, my job bridges the worlds of online education and marketing, so I firmly believe that each subject area has a lot to teach the other. I look forward to seeing your contributions to the group!

New post by Terry Patterson in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 10:31:20 GMT

At Feb 02, 02:31 AM Terry said...

I read Alex mentioning something about design relying heavily on solid marketing principles, this makes me question whether or not I am in the right spot. I joined web design group to connect with a group of designers that could concentrate on design for any audience. I seldom work on commercial web design and my audience at work is aimed primarily at basic visual communication for education and online learning. Although basic design principles apply with any web design project, we can talk about designing for the different audience approaches and learn from each other in that way. Having said that, am I in the right group?

New post by bahamut in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 01 Feb 2007 21:10:31 GMT

At Feb 01, 01:10 PM said...

In my humble opinion, if you are interested, is that: web design, marketing design, scientific design, layout design, architecture design ("I think I should hire a designer to boost my house", etc) and whatever design you might imagine has probably one final goal: Describing something.
So as in my understanding, design can be considered the presentation medium. This (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design ) article on wikipedia may have one or two hints about what I mean by "describing", "description" or "presentation".
In short, it is what you look in the end.
From this point I believe html, css are okay since they are presentation tools while php for instance shouldnt be since it is a processing tool (php output is still html). Having that in mind I have a trend to believe that for instance: flash, html, css, xslt, image processing, drawing techniques, and a lot more is related to web design. Hence, you can not build an website (it is web design, not just design) without html or other descriptive technology such as xml. If you just describe your website as a simple image (say: http://mysite.com/image.png) it would lack something that is proper of the web: anchors. The www is all about links. If you are downloading only images then you do not have an world wide web but an world wide gallery.

Accessibility and others are part of the art in it of course. In that article of wikipedia I mentioned they say about "Approaches to design". In this they mention a few like KISS (popular keep it simple stupid) and the User-centered design. I believe Accessibility could be under User-centered design since accessibility is a presentation need.

My two cents. But well, we can always be wrong. Thanks.

New post by Elsa Bartley in "WCAG 2"

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 16:18:32 GMT

At Jan 26, 08:18 AM Elsa said...

OK so what's with the next version on the WCAG? Will the W3C please wake up and smell the coffee, this is going to do nothing for improving accessibility. The first set of guidelines were pretty bad and are now completely out of date, but to replace them with even more overly complex guidelines that basicaly allow you to choose to be inaccessible. What the....?

Accessibility is much more than WCAG, but it would have been nice to see some improvement in this area. I can only hope that the confusing nature of WCAG 2 will cause more people to choose to test with end users, rather than try to rely on inadequate guidelines.

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 15:45:49 GMT

At Dec 16, 07:45 AM Alex said...

Cool. :) Thanks for the update Tony.

New post by Tony Chester in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 14:04:14 GMT

At Dec 16, 06:04 AM Tony said...

Sorry, I didn't mean to start a new thread. I was just trying to show I would like to see CSS, XHTML, and Web-Standards as topics in a Web Design group.

And our business does target other design firms as well as knowledgeable corporate clients. A lot of the stuff on those pages will be for search engines as well ;-)

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 04:30:15 GMT

At Dec 15, 08:30 PM Alex said...

Tony, we may want to start a new thread for your question to avoid mixing the two discussions up. If that's cool by you, please start the new thread and I'll post my reply there and pull both of our posts out of this one. :)

Alex

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 04:27:41 GMT

At Dec 15, 08:27 PM Alex said...

Hi Tony, obviously I don't know anything about the strategy of your business, so please take my response with a large grain of salt. :)

I think I'd arrange things a bit differently for many of the reasons folks noted above in response to my question. I tend to think of the first three categories (Web Design, Web Development, Web Marketing) as a single group because they are so tightly integrated. Good Web Design relies heavily on solid Marketing principles and vice versa. If either is missing, the site isn't doing the job as it should. Tht site in turn should rest on a solid development foundation built specifically to meet the requirements of that one client or product. Ii shold be a whole package, start-to-finish.

[Enter the grain of salt] I do not know is who your target audience is, so this feedback may be useless if you are marketing to potential agency partners. The energy spent promoting CSS, XHTML and standards could be better spent marketing your expertise as a whole and the specific solutions you can provide. You are producing a great package using tools and processes that let you get a professional product out the door quickly without sacrificing future scalability etc. :)

I think a lot of us make the assumption that our clients are as jazzed about Web technologies and processes as we are. Instead of remembering that the client has specific business goals in mind, relying on our expertise to choose the right tools in order to achieve those goals. Those rare clients who want a specific technology will ask you if you can do it once they have decided that you care more about them than code.

Oh, and I would definitely keep Corporate Identity separate though as that is definitely a unique offering and should be marketed as such.

My $0.02,

Alex

New post by Tony Chester in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 21:39:09 GMT

At Dec 15, 01:39 PM Tony said...

This is interesting as we just had a conversation today about the architect of our new site re-design. We are thinking of breaking our services out into 4 categories. Web Design, Web Development, Web Marketing, and Corporate ID Packages.

For content under the Web Design category we are thinking of promoting the likes of CSS, XHTML, Web Standards, User Interface Design, and Color Theory.

CMS, Ajax, programming languages, etc. would go under Web Dev.

I'd appreciate feedback on if you think we are correct in our category grouping. I can see those items being listed here as well.

New post by Mike Cherim in "Iframes and accessibility"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 15:16:24 GMT

At Dec 15, 07:16 AM Mike said...

I don't think iframes are particularly accessible, but I have never used them and thus haven't really studied up on them. Maybe, though, they can be avoided altogether. This article will point you in the right direction: http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200612/dump_iframes_and_use_object_elements_instead/

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 15:03:25 GMT

At Dec 15, 07:03 AM Alex said...

Thanks for participating everyone, please keep the discussion going! I'm glad to see that this quandary isn't just in my head. ;) My example using CSS was probably poorly chosen, as I agree that CSS is a key tool in a Web Designer's belt. Instead, I should have used something along the lines of JavaScript or AJAX.

Like a lot of folks on this list, my work spans the realms of design and development, so I fully recognize that there is a large gray area in between which holds subjects like CSS and interaction design, which may in turn pull in other related subjects like standards, which may then pull in XHTML etc. I'm really interested in drawing a bead on whether or not there is a good cut-off point, where we can say "this is no longer design". There is a converse as well, relating to the print world, which provides some great design resources that are inspirational for those of us on the Web side.

I personally like having some gray area in our group, which is why I have posted several "quasi-related" links (good term Mike) and I don't remove links to sites about CSS and other content I feel is related. Like others who posted above, I belong to several topic-specific groups and value their specific content. As the Web Design group is larger than me, I think it only right to open the decision as to what we should be and my logic up to our community for feedback.

As far as what I have removed, (a grand total of five entries) are links to two different blogging apps, one movie and two bits of real estate spam. I sent messages to the original posters of the non-spam links explaining why I removed them and the two response that I have received were understanding and friendly. The ma.gnolia community rocks!

Thanks for responding to my message and joining this conversation, it is very helpful!

Alex
Who may have rambled on a bit there...

New post by sungecko in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 13:44:42 GMT

At Dec 15, 05:44 AM said...

alex, you have a wonderful dilemma. mike is right, we use all sorts of tools to develop our sites. yet, we could be buried alive in links in here, which could water down the effectiveness of the group. like ryan, i belong to a separate css group because it specializes in something i want to follow. so if you want to exclude a specific subject, go for it. but all i ask is that you state such in the group description, and that the excluded group be available as a separate group beyond this. good luck.

New post by Tony Chester in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 12:23:43 GMT

At Dec 15, 04:23 AM Tony said...

I'm all for CSS being part of the design group as it's an integral piece to a great design. Anything at all that assists with the design should be considered.

What kind of web based apps have been removed or are in question?

New post by raymosley in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 09:36:00 GMT

At Dec 15, 01:36 AM said...

I don't understand how a web design group cannot feature CSS bookmarks. The subject is at the very core of present day design and is essential in any web design discussion or topic. Accessibility and usability are also two elements that should be included in my opinion. I am not a standards nazi but standards plus proper understanding of interface design is at the very heart of web design and CSS is a big part of this.

Maybe I misunderstand what is termed as web design?

New post by Rodney H. in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 04:33:44 GMT

At Dec 14, 08:33 PM Rodney said...

The topic, "Web design", is interrelated and interdependent upon CSS and markup.

Web design without consideration of these two topics becomes theoretical.

You know what I mean? Think of the "designers" (who we have all seen) that are aces in Photoshop, but end building a web page with slices dumped into table cells.

New post by Matt Lindi in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 21:09:29 GMT

At Dec 14, 01:09 PM Matt said...

Ummm - Isn't CSS a web 'design' related topic by definition? Most - or rather, all of the sites that I've built rely on CSS for the graphical representation of pages - eg; their 'design/layout'.

Perhaps I'm missing something ...

New post by aiellici in "Iframes and accessibility"

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 19:35:41 GMT

At Dec 14, 11:35 AM said...

Do you think I could use iframes in an accessible website?

New post by Ryan Brunsvold in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 19:27:08 GMT

At Dec 14, 11:27 AM Ryan said...

Thanks for the discussion Alex. I tend to agree with Vincent. Design should be the primary focus for what makes it into this group. I belong to several other CSS and/or coding related groups and the only reason I continue to use them is for their topic-relevant content. Although I am certainly guilty of putting up plenty of goofball links in the general category, I always try to maintain a discerning eye when it comes to adding links to seperate groups. I believe that enforcing a "design only" standard would definitely enhance the relevance of this group.

New post by Vincent Marcello in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 17:59:48 GMT

At Dec 14, 09:59 AM Vincent said...

There is a couple of ways you can handle this. You could allow for related technologies to web design such as CSS, developer languages etc, or simply make it a 'purist dream' and have it strictly web design. You have to remember though that designing for the web is going to heavily overlap into other areas such graphic design, coding, SEO etc.

As for my own thoughts on this, I am with having it strictly 'design' as it then makes it easier in searching for information pertaining to one subject rather than wading through other areas. But there again I am a categorized kind of person, anyway...

New post by Mike Cherim in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 17:33:22 GMT

At Dec 14, 09:33 AM Mike said...

Hi Alex. I'm probably guilty of sending quasi-related bookmarks as most don't deal directly with web *design* but I figure they'll be appreciated or found useful by practitioners. To me the web design group covers more than the design aspect of it. I suspect others feel this way too. Design and development are two different things, but I know they are used interchangeably by many. When I send a bookmark to your group it deals with an aspect of web design with its broader meaning (development). In other words I send topics related to standards, accessibility, CSS, mark-up, best practices, even more obscurely-related info such as PHP. Anything a web designer/developer might be interested in. Again, my thinking is this is stuff a "web designer" will want to know.

If this isn't deemed allowable any longer and you want to close it up some, or it's not what the group wants, I understand, just let me know. I don't have much to offer in the design-only category, though, so it would be somewhat limiting. The size of this group sort of indicates it's a catch-all for anything somewhat related and would be a group with interests broader than design only.

Not my call, though. Just let me know.

New post by Alex Jones in "Cleaning Up or Moderating/Managing a Group"

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 20:02:27 GMT

At Dec 02, 12:02 PM Alex said...

The Web Design group grew quickly right from the start - a beautiful thing to behold. That said, I occasionally see bookmarks that don't fit the stated goal of the group (""). Some of these are on the edge, so I leave them (those that stray away from design, into the CSS realm for example), others are off base (a bookmark for a Web-based app that has nothing to do with design), which I remove.

My question to fellow members of the Web Design group, as well as to other group moderators and managers is this: where should the line be drawn? While I have no desire to be really strict and I like the fact that there is ,and should be a sizable gray area due to the nature of the topic; I want to keep the group focused and encourage other groups to spring up to cover new topics.

Should the Web Design group stick strictly to issues of Web *Design*, or is it okay to include links to related subjects like CSS technique and the like?

Thanks!

Alex

New post by Mike Cherim in "Thanks for being there"

Mon, 21 Aug 2006 13:09:15 GMT

At Aug 21, 06:09 AM Mike said...

A heartfelt thank you goes to the members of this group. Because of you and people like you, the web is getting to be a friendlier, more accessible place. Good job!