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Web site updated.

I re-themed this thing today. I picked up the Canvas theme by WooThemes and customized it to fit my needs.

I wanted to go back to a white background with dark text. Easier to read. I also wanted two columns in the sidebar. Not sure why, just something I wanted to try.

Overall, it’s lightweight and everything loads fast. There’s no major graphical overhead on this site layout.

The Canvas theme was really easy to modify to my needs. It’s basically a theme that has a lot of built in customization possibilities, and it’s easy to configure and put together a nice looking site very quickly.

I like it.

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Multi-Browser testing for web development

Anybody who develops websites knows all about having to test for all kinds of different web browsers. Here’s a good page that will help you get a better grasp on multi-browser testing of your websites.

The site uses a neat screen shot request grouping mechanism to fetch all sorts of different browser screen shots of your web site. Browsing through the rendered images that have been returned is easy as well.

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Nothing to See Here… Just Claiming This Blog

Here I am, just claiming this blog, you can move along now.

Technorati Profile

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PHP: The Difference Between print & echo


Straight from the php.faqts knowledge base:

There is a difference between the two, but speed-wise it should be
irrelevant which one you use.

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Dreamweaver 8 Can Crash, And At The Same Time Lose All Your Usernames And Passwords For Defined Sites

This seems to be a common issue.

Here’s a quick article about preventing this issue.

It’s always best to have another quick source for grabbing your ftp accounts.

  • Keep a spreadsheet of all your ftp accounts.
  • Or keep a text file.
  • Or write them on a sheet of paper and keep it in a fireproof safe next to your desk.

Also, keep account information safe and secure.

I guess what I’m really trying to say is that you should not depend on an application like Dreamweaver to remember all your account information in a reliable manner. Use something else.

Maybe try this password archiving application?

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How do you keep Flash objects and animations from overlapping your dynamic javascript?

Adobe Flash (It’s weird not calling it Macromedia Flash anymore…) on a website doesn’t like to play nice with DHTML objects when they overlap on the layout of a website. I’ve run into this issue a few times. Sometimes a dynamic drop-down menu will not play nice with a flash object that it can’t overlap.

Here is a good visual example of Flash & DHTML conflicting

You can’t get that drop-down menu to lay over the top of that flash animation in some cases. At least, you can without probably going through too much trouble to make it worthwhile. If you want to take a crack at it I have some links later on in this article that will get you going in the right direction.

Flash & DHTML Overlap Avoidance is the most bullet-proof option

  • I like to avoid situations like this so that I don’t get hung up spending too much time on something that is minimal in importance to the overall scope of the site.
  • I like to and sometimes need to make dhtml and flash work around each other in a website in a short matter of time.

For those two reasons I generally will say that you should:

Plan around the fact that Flash animations will probably overlap some of your dhtml stuff.

Just design with this issue in mind.

Make sure any dhtml stuff won’t overlap with flash stuff.

Simple.

Where should a person start looking to deal with the Flash & DHTML overlap issue?

If you want to try to make your flash stuff play nice with your dhtml stuff, then check out these links and start playin’ with code and techniques to make it work for your situation:

A iFrame could be the answer

I’ve also seen suggestions to put the Flash animations in an iframe. This works, but then again, your flash animation is in an iframe. Most would consider this not worth the trouble. I would anyways. The technique could be called the iFrame Shim, from what I’ve heard. Either way:

There are some tutorials out there too

If you must, here’s a good tutorial:

You will find that there are techniques to make Flash not overlap your dhtml, plan on spending a little bit of time to make it work for your situation and you’ll be alright. But, if you don’t have much time to deal with this conflict, avoid it.

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