The Float Layouts…

Float layouts are known to be a good organizational and designing tool. I have just learned of a Liquid layout.  There is a helpful site called Max Design. They define a liquid layout as; “All containers on the page have their widths defined in percents – meaning that they are completely based on the viewport rather than the initial containing block. A liquid layout will move in and out when you resize your browser window.” So I said to myself, “Self, what is the big deal weather the bounderies are absolute or floating?” I came to the conlusion that it is a usability tool. You have probably had a need for one and didnt even know it.  And right now I notice that wordpress uses Liquid layouts.

Autistic Cukoo explains the floating layout in a easy to understand manner. Simply put, you can only float things left or right and it is generally used for images.  He goes into a deeper discussion, but that is about the gest of the article.

Netmag has a great tutorial on layout design and you can download a PDF file. According to the comments, its a valuable tutorial. I havnt downloaded it yet but I most definitely will.

Semantics and meaningful markup…

According to Wikipedia “,the Semantic Web is an evolving development of the World Wide Web in which the semantics of information and services on the web is defined, making it possible for the web to understand and satisfy the requests of people and machines to use the web content.”

Since the webs conception, now more than ever it is necessary to understand and practice strict and concrete codeing.  With new ideas and design concepts constantly forming, the person doing the codeing will have to take a  creative yet organized back seat to the outside packaging of a web page. In other words, the markup may be way more important than the actual visual page the audience sees.

Semantic Markup

Posh

Explaining Sematic mark-up

Free Stock Footage

I was looking for some footage for my motion graphics class and I found this web site that offers free footage for download. Now it sounds too good to be true, well it sort of is. There clips are a little generic but on the other hand they are totally free, really free. So I thought I would put this out there anyway just in case someone could possibly benefit from the service. Its called Stock Footage for Free. You have to register your account of course, but they dont ask for a credit card or anything. They also offer downloads in Hi-Def.

Web Design: What it means to me.

Amit Benerji describes it best when he says that “Your web site exists for a purpose. It exists to market your product or service, make a favorable impression, and induce people to come back regularly.”  It is imperative that the designer consider these points when developing their website. As we all know, the aesthetics of a site is a superficial  psychological game. As a developer, it not only matters how successful the outside is, but also how successful the inside is.

I found a website that outlines 5 Important Rules in Website Design. The author stresses the importance in the “less is more” approach in order to achieve a well performing website.  Here are the subjects that this designer covers in this article: Do not use splash pages, Do not use excessive banner advertisements, Have a simple and clear navigation, Have a clear indication where the user is and Avoid using audio on your site. I could not agree more with the latter. I hate going to a website and there is some song playing while I am trying to read. I really dont see the point in it.

CSS Web Design and Basics is an excellent resource to go to when your not really sure how CSS enhances your site.  The author outlines some basics to CSS and then gives lots of places to go to for tips and tricks on how to make CSS a part of your internal coding instead of just an enhancement. This site has heavy traffic and those who comment also have interesting and useful links to visit.

In my opinion, web design is successful when the user is able navigate the site with ease, they are visually pleased and interested while at the same time totally oblivious of all that the designer has gone through so that the audience can have that seamless interaction.

By the way, I found this site that gives tips on how to build your own wordpress theme.