James Oppenheim’s blog

IE8 has just announced that it renders the Acid2 Face Test correctly.

Wow, this is huge news for all Font-end Developers (FEDs) around the world. Not to mention all the users that browse the web with Internet Explorer by default. This is a huge step considering the considerable flack Microsoft is getting at the moment from Opera.

As a comparison I thought I would see how other web browsers managed with the Acid2 test, Browser Shots will enlighten us all.

All we have to do now is wait for IE8 to be released and subsequently adopted.

Technorati Tags: Web Standards, Acid2 Test, IE8, Web

Every wondered if websites need to look exactly the same in every browser? Well the world renowned front-end developer and author Dan Cederholm answers the question on a new domain:

http://dowebsitesneedtolookexactlythesameineverybrowser.com/

You have to love the length of the domain name!

Technorati Tags: CSS, Web Standards, Interesting Website, Dan Cederholm, Simple Bits

Recently my site clocked up 32,000 Spam comments. Yes that is correct, 32,000 in just over a year! Spam is the bane of my existence. Why do people do it? It must be working!? Surely not, I don’t need a Rolex watches, diet pills or to increase my credit limit.

AARRRRHHHH!!!!

n a side note, I don’t think I have ever used so many exclamation marks in a post! How about some more for good measure!!!

Down with Spam. Up with good quality content!

Technorati Tags: Spam, Website, Blog comment spam

After needed an animated loading .gif image for a recent Ajax application I did some quick Google searching and came across a fantastic site: http://www.ajaxload.info/

Ajaxload allows you to generate your own animated Ajax loading images with a few simple click. Starting from a number of animation templates you can then choose a background and foreground colour for your new loading .gif. After 30 seconds of playing around, see some of my examples below:

Fantastic, yet simple. This is the way all websites you should be, well done Ajaxload.

Technorati Tags: Ajaxload, Ajax, Interesting websites, images, animated gif

Links, links everywhere! But where, why? Hang on, who?

Link building is an important part in any Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy. In an attempt to make a website seem more popular with search engine spiders it is important to gain quality inbound links to your website.

Link popularity

OK, but what is popularity? Simply put, link popularity essentially describes how popular a website is based on the number of links from other sites pointing to it. For example a site with 100 inbound links is seen to be more important than a site with 10 inbound links.

Link quality

OK so now we have quantity, what about quality? The quality of the link is much more important than the quantity of links. A few good quality links can increase your websites search engine positioning much more than a huge amount of poor quality links. A quality website will have to following attributes:

• A high Google page rank
• Search engine friendly coding with all its pages indexable
• Relevant content to your particular site
• Small number of outgoing links on the page you will be linked on
• The links on the page should be well classified and focused

Avoid artificial link farms and web rings as search engine spiders will place no importance on these types of inbound link. As a general rule, if a link is not created to be read or followed by humans, the link will be considered spam.

Where to get quality links

A great place to start gain quality and relevant inbound links are website directories. Website directories provide a topical and categorised list of links. The Strongest Links website goes one step further by creating a list of website directories ranking them on the quality of link they will provide you.

Next comes the social websites like Digg, del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, Technorati, MySpace and reddit which provide an easy way to create some user generated content (i.e. content generated by you, the user) with links to your website or a particular page /post on your website. These social websites generally have a lot of traffic and a high page rank which can filter through to your website with each link that you create, not to mention all the extra eyes you will have on your website.

It is a black art trying to gain quality inbound links to a website, one that I will forever be wrangling with. If you have any insights, suggestions or funny stories please let me know.

Technorati Tags: SEO, Interesting sites, link building, website directories, social websites

Recently while I was at work pondering what the most semantically correct way to markup a set of search results I realised that Google is 1) smarter that me and 2) rules my life. I can’t stop using Google products from Google Analytics, Google Reader, Gmail, Google maps, Google Earth, Google Trends to even the good old Google web search. One would be forgiven to think that Google is the Internet! Whenever I have a problem at work I open up Google and type in the a search phrase on the problem I need to solve. Then in under a second, bingo, there it is the answer to all my problems. No I do not work for Google, I just love their search engine and yes I do spend a lot of time on the internet.

All this got me thinking; ‘Wow, Google has some very impressive features’. So I decided to put together a list of some of the more handy Google specific search features.

Google time search

Google measurement search

Google currency converter

Google calculator

Google location search

Google business search

As you can see Google has some very impressive features that makes sure it stays number one in the search engine market. One can only dream of what they will come up with next. But for those of us who can’t wait it is always worth a sneak peak into the future at Google Labs to see the latest Google prototypes that have not quite hit the prime time.

Happy Googling!

Technorati Tags: Google, Web, Personal, SEO

Firefox is an extremely flexible browser allowing users to control preferences through an easy to use menu system. The Firefox homepage even goes as far as labeling the browser ‘fully customizable to your online life’. More than just the simple configuration Firefox also allows you to control its inner secrets with the advanced preferences of about:config.

But hang on, this sounds complected and prone to bugs I hear you exclaim. But no no, the Firefox developers have made it easy. To get to the advanced configuration simply type ‘about:config’ into the Firefox address bar. This will show a list of configuration options each with its name, status, type and value. You can also use the filter field to narrow down only to the entries which match your keywords. OK so now we know how to get to the advanced configuration, following are two configuration options that I found extremely useful.

Spell check input fields

Firefox has built in spell checking, however by default they only come up on textareas. This can prove to be problematic, as I have found on many occasions  as I have had to edit the titles of my blog posts after they have gone live. To overcome this and force Firefox to spell check inputs as well as textareas once on the about:config page filter by:

layout.spellcheckDefault

Then double-click on the item in the list and change the value to 2.

Perfecting

Firefox has a strange feature called ‘Prefetching’ that downloads pages that it thinks you are going to click on. Very weird, I don’t know how it thinks it can work this out, but to save your CPU and bandwidth turn off this behavior by going to the about:config page and filter by:

network.prefetch-next

Then double-click the item in the list and change it to false.

Happy customising!

Technorati Tags: Web, Firefox, customisation, web browser

I recently had a large bout of spy ware on my PC, which consequently left my computer paralysed and unable to connect to the Internet! This can be kind of frustrating when you are a web developer: there is only so much I can do on my localhost.

Fortuity, after countless hours spent trying to debug the situation I remembered that Windows XP has a feature called System Restore. System Restore automatically backs up registry and system files whenever you install new software or drivers. System Restore returns your computer to an earlier time (called a restore point) without causing you to lose recent work, such as saved files, history and favourite lists. What’s more, all changes made by System Restore are completely reversible, what more could you want.

To find System Restore go to your start menu then: All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> System Restore.

Technorati Tags: Windows XP, System Restore, spy ware

Directory Critic is a fantastic resource of website directories, featuring over 3900 search engine friendly website directories. Directory Critic breaks down the website directories into a number of categories, including free, paid and deep linking enabling a website owner to effectively target relevant websites when creating a link building campaign.

Website directories provide a good way to promote your website, creating exposure and traffic while building relevant inbound links. Directory Critic harnesses this power and is a must do for all good website marketing and SEO campaigns.

Technorati Tags: Directory Critic, SEO, link building

The new version of Google Analytics has launched and wow is it impressive. Showcasing an intuitive interface with drag and drop functionality, Google has taken its website statistics application to the next level. Showcasing large amounts of data in a easy to understand manner is the main advantage of Google Analytics.

Why would you bother with any other website statistics application when there is Google Analytics. Whats more, it is free!

Technorati Tags: Google, Google Analytics, website statistics, SEO