December 2009
6 posts
Why isn't Blueprint (or any other CSS framework) a...
Let me start by saying I really love the idea of saving time when I design and develop a site—I use all kinds of time savers. Any well thought out system that results in cleaner, more maintainable, simpler code is definitely a good thing. Thusly, I’ve used CSS frameworks in the past to save time building layouts and creating grid-based, standards-compliant websites. So, why isn’t...
SDG + Typekit
Last night I did some regiggering to the Sentinel Design Group site in order to do a bigger redesign quicker and easier in the next few days. Part of that process was upgrading to Nanoc 3, a Ruby-based CMS that generates flat HTML. It’s a pretty simple concept—one that you wouldn’t think is all that helpful—but it really speeds up development.
The interesting part, though,...
The Angry Crowd Strikes Again
While I was checking out this slick email marketing site Mail Chimp, I noticed something rather peculiar—the crowd behind the chimp looked uncannily similar to something I’d produced a few years back. I thought for sure they had somehow dug into my discarded pile of Flipswap comps and gleaned a piece of my work. But, alas, it turns out even though there is a likeness, no wrongs have...
MuseoWatch 2009
Whenever I recognize a font that I’ve used before, I immediately develop an irrevocable hatred for it. The latest recipient of this maddening dislike is exljbris Font Foundry’s Museo, an organically-seriffed typeface that I used in the last revision of the Flipswap site. A specimen:
See, here’s how I used it:
The problem came when I saw these two sites last week. These two...
WordPress Title Trickery
Here is a bit of the code we’re using on a new site redesign. We needed a custom, more descriptive title on certain pages.
It grabs a title from a custom field if you set one, or just gets the page title if you don’t. Also, since WP doesn’t display the page’s title if you’re on the homepage, we’ll grab custom text from the site’s description (which we...
Ok people, this is what happens when you don’t have HIG (human interface guidelines) for your platform. These Android Developer Challenge entries represent a core sample of the best applications Android has to offer.
Based on the icons alone, it is clear what kind of junkiness you can expect in app they represent. This kind of stuff is endemic in the open source community.
Do any of...