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New Version of CodeProfessor April 1, 2007

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To supplement the last post stating a slight change of direction of this blog, this post is to let you know that CodeProfessor is moving up to the root directory as of this site. The slight shift in focus is that most of the posts will be about web 2.0 and web 3.0, as well as mashup applications that you can build with very little programming.

Slightly New Direction March 27, 2007

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With all the great new Web 2.0 mashup applications that are coming out - such as Yahoo Pipes, Teqlo, OpenKapow and no doubt others - I realized that I could stick with my agenda of having this site be about “light coding” even if I started discussing these applications. (I’m not only changing content direction - slightly - I’m also going to give the site a theme facelift.)

Plug and play modules with virtually no programming required are very likely the future of application design for the masses. Imagine being able to write your own web-based …

Springdoo: Voice + Video Emails and Video Shoutbox November 22, 2006

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Springdoo might sound like what you step in in the park after the snows have melted but it’s actually a pretty neat text, voice and video email service - with a few features to separate it from other similar offerings. You can choose to include whatever combination of content you like, and the interface is similar to standard webmail clients. The demo reel is damn funny but the freebie account is actually pretty swet: 10 min audio, 3 min video, 5Mb file upload, unlimited SpringMails, 100 Mb storage space. Anyone replying to your recording is allowed 30 seconds. There’s …

Roll Your Own Social-Photo-Video-Sharing Site With Ning October 7, 2006

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I’ve written about Ning in the past. The general ideas is briliant: create a few plug’n'play building blocks, invite deveopers to join for free and let them create their own mashup of functionality. True modular web service creation, with reduced development time - sometimes all it takes is 5-15 minutes to put something together.

Well they’ve added a few more modules that you can use to build your own photo-sharing or video-sharing site. There’s also a module for creating a social network. So you can combine these and older modules to come up with some fairly interesting combinations. Older modules …

Revamping Blog Information Design And Layout August 20, 2006

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Chris Pearson has recently talked about how the information architecture of blogs is lacking because of the reverse chronological view of posts. This tends to limit the experience of visitors, especially if they have come to your site from its web feed subscription. He suggests that bloggers should consider other blog architectures, to present posts in some other manner than just reverse chronological.

One particular suggestion of Chris’ stuck with me, because it reflects what I, as a former print magazine publisher, would like to do with some of my blogs: highlight my best work, not necessarily my most recent …

Abazab - Video Comments Shoutbox July 31, 2006

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Communicating with your friends and your blog visitors appears to be a hot activity. First there were regular text comments. Then there were text shoutboxes, followed by audio mailboxes and video clips. Combine them altogether and you have video-commenting shoutboxes.

Video shoutboxes let you post your own video clips on your blog. Your visitors can sign in to their own (usually free) account and then post their own video clips. In this post, I’ve used the Abazab video comments shoutbox from FestoonInc.

You can see a sample below. There’s a default video and a couple of short ones …

Applying The Principle Of Kaizen To Weblog + Website Design July 24, 2006

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One of the most overwhelming aspects of publishing multiple blogs is coming up with suitable page themes. Sure, there are loads of free theme templates available, but you probably want to customize it to give it your own “brand”. If you have limited time, resources, or skills for improving your current design, consider applying the principle of Kaizen.

Kaizen is a Japanese word for a Chinese concept. Essentially, it translates to “improvement by slow, steady degrees.” Application of this concept is the main reason I don’t worry when friends tell my blog designs are ugly. Yeah, I know the stats …

Branding Your Site With Favicons July 23, 2006

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Looking for a way to brand your website/ weblog without some honking big logo? Try a favicon. Depending on the browser you’re using, if you look up where the URL of this page is displayed, you might see a light green triangular icon with a black spiral. That’s my “favicon” version of my Chameleon Integration Systems‘ logo (seen somewhere on this page.)

The original logo was sketched out by me, then reworked by Bill Dubs, my brother’s biz partner for their award-winning “green” ad agency, Dubs & Dash. The spiral represents the tail of a chameleon, the green simply …

Do We Need Multi-Column Layout Web Page Designs? July 8, 2006

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Given how long desktop publishing software has been around, and how powerful it is, have you ever wondered why (X)HTML and CSS have such a hard time producing multiple column web pages? Sure, you can create multiple columns with XHTML tables, but you cannot auto-flow text between columns. Sure, you could try replacing tables with CSS code, but try to properly align a layout with more than three columns with CSS, and you’ll be tearing your hair out. Well, UXD (links below), User eXperienced Design, has an exciting post about the new multi-column feature for CSS 3.0 - something I’ve …

Create Your Own Wordpress Themes + Plugins June 30, 2006

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If you’re a fan of the WordPress blogging platform, you’re probably well aware of the wide range of plugins and page themes that are available - many for free. While this weblog is generally aimed at bloggers/ online writers who want to tweak their existing blog platform setup, occasionally you may want to write your own themes and plugins from scratch. Or not. Here are some of the resources I’ve been using for all the (free) plugins I have planned for you for this year and next. These resources range in target from beginner to advanced WordPress user. (I’ll …

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