Archive for January, 2009
Posted on January 29, 2009 - by Khaled
The Beauty and the Web: Thoughts about the importance of the visual aspect in Graphic and Web Design
TRUE BEAUTY!, originally uploaded by Pureen.
This was a part of a longer article but it got righteously chunked from it by the publisher to whom I submitted the paper. I chose to post it here as it contains some points that deserve to be shared, and probably discussed, with you.
Nowadays it is obvious that images are very important for humans. On the net Images and graphical interface and presentation are very important components of most of the websites.
Having a well designed site with attractive images that can express a given message will make a huge difference for your visitors and that will probably lead them to have a better opinion about your site and you. The internet is becoming more and more visual, people are making sales or hiring decisions based on the looks and how much your products (and images) can be incorporated and nice to see in their daily life.
So even if you’re a top notch programmer or developer you will need a nice usable front-end! You can have the best of the applications developed but you won’t go far if it does not look good or if it is not useable! If you can’t do it yourself seek help. Graphic designer, artists, User experience designers (UX), Human-computer interaction (HCI) guys are just there for this.
Of course there are multiple definitions and interpretations about beauty and beauty in Graphic/Web Design. But there are simple rules to always respect. For some Graphic design is a type of art while for others it is just a tool or a medium to embellish web sites, web applications, software or documents and to guide the consumer while using them.
Almost everywhere and at anytime visual images are there trying to drag our attention and to persuade us of something! Or may be to amuse and impress us! And any Graphic or artistic web designer try to communicate a message through their production and through a given style they chose.
Another important point is the choice of the right colors palette for the right production whether it is a Web site, a print document or anything else. Colors are very important as they mean something! Yes colors are significant! Just remember that even the flowers colors mean different feelings and mind-sets. The same rule applies for Web and Graphic design. Choose the right color for the right product! Do your research in this field. Don’t create dark Web sites for young teenage girls! Yet don’t create flashy pink business cards for a CEO of a big company! I know I am pushing it to the limit but this is just to caricaturize the mistakes that can be committed when it comes to choosing the right colors.
Try to always be creative and innovative and to align your elements carefully to render something that is coherent and “beautiful” to see.
Just try to put as much time on your images and graphics as you put on your copy and texts. This will have a concrete effect on the way you are perceived by your visitors and potential clients.
The above posters about graphic design are taken from Veerle’s Graphic design poster competition.
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Posted on January 29, 2009 - by Khaled
Fresh news from SitePoint
Newspaper and tea, originally uploaded by Matt Callow.
SitePoint.com, the Australian online media company, has been very active during the last days. First of all they have released a new Mozilla FireFox extension (Add-on) called FireScope that integrates with Web developer tool “Firebug” to extend it with references for HTML and CSS. I checked it out and I really loved it. I think it is a lot more useful than the other SitePoint FireFox Add-on: Dust-Me selectors (That finds unused CSS selectors).
Something else is new and very useful in SitePoint. I’m talking about the JavaScript reference that completes the SitePoint References collection (with the HTML and CSS references). I was really waiting for this one myself and it turned out to be even better than what I wanted.
Finally SitePoint are looking for 4 Part-time Bloggers that will have to post 5 times per week with a minimum length of 300 words per post (The optimum being 400-600 words). So if you think you can be one of them go ahead and apply!
More hot news soon! Don’t forget to subscribe to be notified via RSS or E-mail. Or just follow me on Twitter
Posted on January 24, 2009 - by Khaled
XHTML Users: Grow up!
During the last years Web standards started to gain an increasing popularity among Web designers. Still Web standards addicts are a ceaselessly growing minority until now. This is probably due to the fact that the majority regards the use of web standards in their projects as a hard process that requires a lot of time and process. Which is not 100% true in my opinion as Web Standards are the only right way to go! Dedication to standards is the key! following the W3C recommendations is a must! This is the first post from the “WEB STANDARDS ARE THE ONLY WAY!” series. And what a better start than having a “pragmatic evangelist for web standards and accessibility” sharing his view about subjects like the future of HTML, the use of XHTML or Should we start using HTML5?
So here’s a short, yet very interesting, interview with Tommy Olsson. But first let’s introduce Tommy to those who don’t know him. Tommy is a Swedish Web standards and accessibility Guru. He’s the Design Team leader at the SitePoint forums (so he’s my boss there!). He has written many articles for SitePoint and especially he co-authored with Paul O’Brien the SitePoint CSS reference. He had also won the “HTML/XHTML Guru” award of the SPF community for several consecutive years. You can check out his blog here.
The Future of HTML and HTML5
1. Almost 20 years after the first relase of HTML how do you see its future?
I’ll confidently state that HTML will have its place in web development for the foreseeable future … provided you don’t ask me how long that is.
There is a need for a semantic markup language to exchange information between people. Although there are fashionable trends with ‘rich content’ (which invariably means ‘flashy’ and ‘pretty’ rather than ‘useful’), all such technologies have drawbacks when it comes to accessibility. HTML as such is inherently accessible.
2.What are your thoughts about HTML5? should we start using the released drafts especially with the available validators? What does it add? is it heading towards more respect of semantics? What potential does HTML5 has?
HTML5 worries me. A lot. I’ve been using HTML since 1993 (before it even had a version number), so I’ve seen the changes it has gone through. In the mid-’90s there was a loss of focus on semantics, in favour of presentation, but it quickly became apparent that this was the wrong way to go. Content and presentation should be kept separate, which is why CSS was invented.
The ongoing work with HTML5 seems to ignore semantics to a large degree. Yes, it proposes to add a handful of semantic element types, but it also adds purely presentational stuff that – in my opinion – doesn’t belong in a markup language.
Even worse is that it redefines long-established semantics of existing element types. For instance, the P element type no longer denotes a paragraph; it becomes a generic block-level container – nothing more than a synonym for DIV.
The contempt for accessibility is even more worrying. The drafts propose to eliminate several important attributes (or at least make them non-required). The reason appears to be a lack of support in contemporary assistive technology.
My opinion is that HTML5 is to semantics and accessibility what Herod was to the Bethlehem Playground Association!
Should we use it? For experimental purposes, perhaps, but I would strongly recommend against any attempt to use it on a serious, professional web site. Why? Because it’s not a W3C recommendation. It’s just an early draft which is likely to change many times before consensus is reached. (If that ever happens.)
XHTML? Again?
3. What are your thoughts about combining HTML5 and XHTML2?
XHTML2 is not backwards compatible with HTML at all. That’s also true for parts of HTML5, but not to the same degree. (If I’ve understood the drafts correctly.)
XHTML2 did show some interesting proposals for semantics and accessibility, but the fact that it’s an application of XML makes it utterly inappropriate for web pages, at least until the day we have really good authoring tools. Handcoding XML is not a good idea in a production environment, due to its draconian error handling.
XHTML2 and (X)HTML5 aren’t compatible, and their progress appears to diverge. I think it would be difficult to reconcile them into a single markup language.
4. What do you say to people ‘using‘ XHTML ?
Grow up! 
Seriously, XHTML is long dead, due to a decade of horrible abuse. Not even the bleached bones remain.
Web Standards & Browsers?
5. Why should Web designers always respect Web standards?
For the same reason that other professionals should respect the standards of their business. It makes life so much easier for everyone – browser vendors, web designers and developers, users, …
Anyone who tried to create web sites during the Browser Wars of the late ’90s will know what I mean .
6. What’s your favourite browser and why?
Opera. It’s the most standards compliant browser, which means it’s easy to see if I got my stuff right. It also comes loaded with tons of useful features (and, admittedly, quite a few I haven’t yet found a use for). It’s more customisable than any other browser and it’s available for lots of different platforms. I use it with GNU/Linux at home and with Windows XP at the office, and it looks and works exactly the same. I even use Opera Mini on my mobile.
I rarely use the mouse when I browse, preferring keyboard navigation. And there’s no browser that beats Opera when it comes to keyboard navigation!
7. Which Web browser do you think is going to gain even more market shere in 2009?
I really wish I could say Opera, but I don’t think it will happen. I’m sure IE8 will take a large piece of the cake when it’s released, regardless of how good (or bad) it turns out. I also think it’s quite possible that Chrome will increase its share – possibly at the expense of Safari and/or Firefox.
8. Anything you want to add?
You really don’t want to ask a chatterbox like me that question! I can talk ’til the cows come home, you know that.
But I’ll settle for, ‘Thanks for letting me use your soapbox for a while.’
I enjoyed having Tommy answering these questions that might briefly summarize the actual situation when it comes to HTML, XHTML and HTML5. I think this short interview will be a good and fast to read reference for many web designers. I hope you enjoyed it too and that it will help you making the right decisions when it comes to web design and web development. To make this blog post even more interesting I am including Tommy’s HTML Guru list! check it out
So You Want To Be An HTML Guru?
Try this list compiled by Tommy Olsson based on articles published on SitePoint:
I may add another nice article: Learn HTML and CSS: An Absolute Beginner’s Guide by Ian Lloyd.
Stay tuned for the next posts of the “WEB STANDARDS ARE THE ONLY WAY!” series! Don’t forget to subscribe to be notified via RSS or E-mail.
SitePoint HTML & CSS references:
Posted on January 20, 2009 - by Khaled
Easily Create “Obama style” graphics with Photoshop
Easily show your support! This tutorial will show you how to use Photoshop to quickly turn your photograph into a graphic that has the “Obama style”. WIth Obama the internet was used at its fullest so this tutorial seems to be something in tune with his campaign! especially that today is his inauguration day. Start with your photograph, set the mode to CMYK.
Hit ctrl+M to pop up the curves window. Set channel to black, output to 70 and input to 35.
Then go to filter > Blur > Smart Blur. Set Radius to 2, threshold to 50 and quality to high.
Revert back to RGB Mode. Go to Image > adjustments > Gradient Map. Set the first color at location 0% (blue color: #03334c ), the second color at location 25% ( red color: #d91a21), the third point of the gradient at location 60% (color: #70969e) and the last one at location 100% (color #fce3a6). and hit OK. You will obtain this:
Add some ornaments and text to customize it more.
Tweak it a bit more with Mask layers, dodge and burn tools and you’re quickly done.
This was a tutorial written on the fly for the occasion of Obama’s inauguration day! Let’s say we’re full of hope right now for the future.
Posted on January 20, 2009 - by Khaled
I Love Wildlife
I Love Wild life! Yes I do. And when we love something we try as hard as we can to protect it. Wild life is endangered! This no news for you! Many animal and vegetal species are becoming more and more rare! threatened by anthropological activities. Global warming is a sad truth with fatal effects. I thought why not openly and clearly show -as web designers, developers, programmers, graphic designers…- our support and love to Wild life worldwide? why not display a small graphic on our blogs, web sites to attest this love? to say that we care! That we tr to shut down our computers when we don’t need them! And that we don’t print documents unless it is necessary!
I created some graphics that you can freely post on your blogs and web sites to join this campaign and spread the word. You can also create your own graphics and it will be nice to post the links here in the comments! If you are interested in how I created those graphics then they are mostly based on sxc.hu stock photos with some tweaks and adjustments with Photoshop. For the frogs there’s a tutorial here about how I created them.
I would also like to post a link towards an incredible nature and wild life photography site : http://luislouro.com. Luis Louro is such a great photographer! just browse his galleries and slideshows and you will be truly and genuinely fascinated by the beauty of Wild animals and vegetation. As you probably know too I am also a scientist I had the chance to see many animal and vegetal species in the wild in Africa and Europe and I can only say that such encounters are fascinating and life-changing! Especially african fauna is incredible. Diving allows you to see marvellous things. I hope everyone will have the chance to witness this beauty! And most importantly to preserve it for our children and grandchildren!
If you need other graphics sizes just let me know!
Posted on January 20, 2009 - by Khaled
Create a cool frog in just 3 steps with Photoshop
Another quick photoshop tutorial…So do you remember this fella?
If you were a regular reader of this blog when it used to be called “No relation” then you will recognize this frog as it was on the header. You can download the full resolution stock photo from sxc.hu for free. I will quickly show you in 3 steps how to turn this plain ordinary frog into a cool one! Ok first of all let’s change the eyes color to something more attractive and exotic! what about pink?
Step 1 : Eyes color
Start with the selection of the eyes with the elliptical marquee tool.
Now we’re going to add a new adjustment layer to tweak the Hue/saturation of the eyes.
Set the hue/saturation to the following values:
Of course by setting the hue value differently you can have a different eyes color. Just choose what you like!
Step 2 : Body color
Ok don’t deselect just inverse the selection (ctrl+shift+I). Add a new adjustment layer of Brightness and contrast: set brightness to +30 and contrast to +25.
Now as you see the colors are a lot more lively and nicer to see!
Step 3 : Final touches
Ok use the Burn tool (brush 35px, Range: Midtones; Exposure: 30%) and darken the shadow and the lower parts of the frog. You may want to use the dodge tool to add some brightness to the eyes. The final result will look like this:
I hope you enjoyed this quick tutorial. If you need more details about the steps just let me know.
Posted on January 16, 2009 - by Khaled
Easily achieve the trendy LetterPress effect with Photoshop
In late 2008 and early 2009 LetterPress effect is becoming increasingly popular and used in many web sites. So here 2 quick examples on how you can create a realistic letterpress effect with Adobe Photoshop (Version 7 or newer). This will take you just a couple of minutes and you can achieve it even if you are a beginner.
Example 1:
Open Photoshop, create a new document (600 x 400 for instance). I started with a white background and typed the word Letterpress (Font: Century Gothic, 60pt, All caps and set the color for instance to: #00bae8).
Now we are going to add layer effects (double click the text layer) and simply check the inner Shadow box and set it to these values (shadow color: black #000000):
You will obtain this kind of effect:
As you see we’re almost there! You can customize a bit more with overlaying a gradient overlay or you can rasterize the type layer and work on it with burn/dodge tool. You can check out this tutorial to see how to use Dodge/Burn tools. You should be able to end up with a final aspect that looks like this:
I just applied a gradient overlay effect and some burning at the base of the letters.
Example 2:
Ok, let’s see another variation that might work better if you are after a metallic Letterpress effect. Create a new document, fill in the background with a light grey color (#d0d0d0 for instance). Type in LETTERPRESS (Font: Century Gothic, 60pt, All caps, Set tracking to 50 and set the color for instance to: #919191). Now we’re going to add an inner glow effect this time. Set the Inner glow values as following (color: #000000):
The noise percentage can be tweaked and set to what is best for your purpose!
Now apply an outer glow with these settings:
You should obtain something like this:
All you need now is to play with your background to make it look like brushed metal using noise filters and motion blur along with dodge/burn tools. May be also add a gradient overlay to the text layer and you will have something that looks like this:
If you think I should put more details about the creation of this metallic background or on the last steps of this tutorials let me know!
Posted on January 13, 2009 - by Khaled
50 Typography Resources you must look at!
Typography is much more than just using a given font with a given size, style or weight! It is an important component of Web Design and a powerful communication tool. Here’s a collection of useful links to some interesting, articles, books, slideshows, resources and portfolios about this amazing domain of Typography.
13 Articles You should read:
Reading these articles will help better choose your fonts, their sizes etc., along with learning some very useful tips and tricks and necessary theoretical knowledge.
- 8 Definitive Web Font Stacks : A nice article written by Michael Tuck and published by SitePoint.
- Better web typography: Published by .net magazine and written by Craig Grannell.
- A Not-So-Sweet Tale of Digital Type: Written by Andrew Twigg and published by AIGA.
- Typography Matters: An old, yet quite educating, article by Erin Kissane published by A List Apart.
- Web Typography Cheat Sheet: A typography cheat sheet published by Modern Life and written by Stuart Brown.
- Web Design is 95% Typography: An oliver Reichenstein published on information architects.
- Better Font Management: Written by Joel Sacks and published by Digital Web.
- The Principles of Beautiful Typography : An awesome article by Jason Beaird published on SitePoint
- Typography and Web Advertising: Making Every Opportunity Count: This one is dealing with the special case of typography for Web advertising. Also published by Digital Web and written by Alexander White.
- The Anatomy of Web Fonts: Andy Hume’s article.
- Top Ten Web Typography Sins
- 16 Best-Loved Font Bits In Web Design
- Create a font Part I and Part II : an outstanding article from I love Typography
6 Slides about typography you must see:
Easy to visualize slideshows (thanks to slideshare) that will let you rapidly learn nice facts about typography.
- Beautiful Web Typography: 7 tips on de-sucking the web by Simon Klein.
- Elegant Web Typography: The typography speech of Jeff Croft from Web Directions South (September 2008) in Sydney.
- Better Typography: Nice slides by famous Mark Boulton.
- Typography: Past & Future I
- Typography: Past & Future II
- Typography: The last Secret Weapon.
5 Books about typography you should read:
Probably the best books arounf about typography in my opinion. Read them and you will learn tons!
- The Elements of Typographic Style
- Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students
- Designing Type
- Type: The Secret History of Letters
- The Complete Manual of Typography
26 Inspiration, resources & Portfolios you should look at and bookmark:
Showcases, Artists portfolios, tutorials, Addons, guides, blogs, inspiration galleries, and outstanding typography sites with a lot of noteworthy typography resources.
- Words Are Pictures
- Alison Carmichael
- TypeNuts
- TypoPhile
- The Type Directors Club
- Typographic Posters
- Best typefaces of 2008
- A guide to Web Typography
- I love Typography
- The Font Feed
- TypeOff
- Sexy, Bold And Experimental Typography
- Typography In Motion
- On snot and fonts
- Mark EastMan archive
- FromFiftyFive
- How to recognize a font? A mini guide to successful Font recognition
- Identify that Font
- Font Finder: A firefox/Thunderbird addon that will help you get styles of selected text.
- Free Fonts
- exljbris Font Foundry
- Font Wrek
- FontStruct : Build, share and download fonts.
- Type Foundry
- NovemberBorn sIFR
- Finally you may want to take a look at some nice videos about Typography posted on Vimeo.
I hope these collection of links will help you better understand and better use fonts for a nicer typography and better web design practices! These links may be useful either you are creating web sites or print work.
If you like the article bookmark it and digg it! Don’t forget to subscribe via RSS or E-mail. Or just follow me on Twitter!
Posted on January 10, 2009 - by Khaled
Does your kid have champion genes?
Since the day scientists were able to sequence the human genome there were some huge leaps in the human genetics field. Many human characteristics and body functions are now directly linked to their genes. For instance there’s probably an intelligence gene! So what if we apply our current knowledge to more precise goal? i.e. are there any genes that predispose a human to be a sports champion? If yes, why not try and find them and be able to test our children since their youngest age?
Don’t just want to know if your child can be the next Roger Federer? Michael Jordan? Tiger woods? or may be Tom Brady? What about Michael Phelps? Heather O’reilly? Nadia Comaneci? What if you could tell if this might happen even before your child learns to walk? Well may be you can!
For less than $200 (even lower some times) companies like Atlas Sports Genetics, CyGene and Australian Genetic technologies will analyse the DNA of children as young as 1 and the results of the analysis can help predicting wether or not they genetically predisposed to be sporting champions.
All what is needed is a swab taken from inside the child’s cheek to obtain sufficient DNA. After 10-15 days the results are dispatched and may even come with a signed certificate attesting , with details, the potential “Genetic Advantage” of the child. They summarise all you need to know about physiological strengths and probable suitability of the child for certain types of sports.
These tests may have some advantages if used wisely. An implication of higher instances, like sports ministries, seem to be necessary to avoid any excesses. Such studies seem to be pushing the limits of the current scientific knowledge. The day where we will be able to predict the sanitary future and predispositions of humans for certain jobs or activities seems to be around the corner. Such situation may lead to some dramatic events though. Telling a child that he will never be able to be as good as his favorite athlete no matter how hard he tries is a problem! and might have terrible psychological effects on the child!! Should we tell him/her in such cases? should we let them try and waste their try knowing that they will probably fail? On the other hand, does knowing that a kid is predisposed to be a sports champion dive us the right to push him towards sports and performance pressuring him to give his best even though he does not like sports? This may lead to depression, a general feeling of melancholy and may, in some extreme cases, push the child to commit suicide! We, as intelligent humans, must be very careful on how to deal with such issues! How someone will live his life knowing that he will have some cardiac problems or diabetic disorders? Again should we tell him? And, for instance, will any company hire someone that is predisposed to be ill with some chronic disease? or someone who has “bad” intelligence genes? Should these kinds of tests be prohibited? Discovery is good! But should always be used wisely!
Posted on January 8, 2009 - by Khaled
The Y Chromosome Mystery!!?
Hybridization is a natural process happening with or without human intervention. It is an important evolutionary phenomenon that helps understanding complex mechanisms such as speciation. Hybrid zones between related species are thus regarded as “natural laboratories”. So mating between genetically divergent species or populations is quite common in nature.
Key insights into the process of speciation can be provided by comparing the genes flow rates throughout the whole genome and therefore underlie reproductive isolation. Some recent studies (2008) led by Geraldes et al., reported the geographical distribution of Y chromosome lineages in wild populations of rabbits from Iberia and southern France. This revealed that Y chromosomes showed a high level of differentiation between rabbit subspecies on either side of the existing hybrid zone. This was in clear contradiction with the evident gene flow detected at other loci from other chromosomes. This suggests that the Y chromosome might play a key role in reproductive isolation. This a new case species with mosaic patterns of differentiation across their genomes.
Comparisons of introgression levels between the Y chromosome, the X chromosome, the autosomes, and mitochondrial DNA are essential to the knowledge of speciation genetics. Particularly, the important role of the sex chromosomes in reproductive isolation predicts that genetic markers found on these chromosomes will often show restricted gene flow compared to other loci.
An alternative explanation can also be suggested. Relative levels of differentiation might simply echo the rate of ancestral lineage sorting (due to differences in effective population size) which is expected to be fastest for the Y and the mitochondrial DNA, followed by the X chromosome, and finally the non-sexual chromosomes. Crossing test can be useful to assess the validity of either hypothesis.
Multilocus surveys of population differentiation will be increasingly used in the speciation research nascent field. Soon we will be witnessing entire genomes scanned for introgression in hybridizing species. However this method will still be challenged by the fact that we still ignore what does an outlier locus look like? In fact, this is a common problem with other genomic researches….
Posted on January 7, 2009 - by Khaled
Top 10 Web Design / Web Development Podcasts
Nowadays, Podcasting is gaining a ceaseless increasing interest. The word podcasting was created by blending the words “iPod” and “broadcast”. This is due to the fact that the first podcasting scripts were developed for Apple iPod portable media player. However, an iPod is no longer required to listen to podcasts. Most Media Players will do the job! I prefer iTunes though as it allows searching podcasts, subscribing to them (free and paid podcasts do exist) and of course listening to them. iTunes offers really cool features for this.
Podcasts are generally a series of audio or video files which are diffused on the web via syndicated download, through Web feeds. So they are a perfect combination of RSS specification and the MP3 compression algorithm.
Over the few last years I gathered a nice collection of podcasts that I like to watch/listen to. I am going to share with you the top 10 podcasts that I favor when it comes to Web Design and Web Development.
1. BoagWorld.com
Paul Boag’s Podcast (co-hosted with Marcus Lillington) started since August 2005. It has, as of today, 147 episodes. Episode 148 will be released within a week or so. Paul deals with different subjects related to the web design business. He usually invites some big names to the show. The live streaming recording is a nice bonus too!
2. SitePoint.com
A fairly new, yet excellent Podcast, that started last November (2008). The Hosts are Brad Williams, Patrick O’Keefe, Stephan Segraves, and Kevin Yank. The SP Podcast is about The Web industry. This is an outstanding show with different point of views. 5 episodes till now but the 6th is in its way soon!
3. Photoshop User TV
An excellent Podcast to watch for Photoshoppers! Hosted by the Photoshop guys: Dave Cross, Matt Kloskowski, and Scott Kelby from the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP). The Photoshop guys share each week some very nice Adobe Photoshop tutorials, along with some very cool tips and tricks that will hugely increase your Photoshop productivity. 167 episodes for now.
4. Web Design TV
This podcast is produced by .net magazine. This podcast deals with different web design aspects and presents several software tutorials and tips (CSS, Graphic design, Flash, Photoshop…). The podcast started back in March 2008 and 28 episodes were released till now.
5. Adobe Creative Suite Video Podcast
The Adobe Creative Suite Podcast features tips and tutorials mainly about Photoshop, Indesign and other Adobe CS software. It is hosted by Terry White. This is a 2 years old podcast that started in 2006 and still active till now.
6. The Rissington Podcast
Hosted by famous web designers John Oxton and Jon Hicks. Deals with Web geeky stuff. Started in late 2007. 19 podcast episodes were released.
7. php|architect’s PHP Podcast (P3)
A bi-weekly radio-style podcast full of news, events and discussions about PHP. It is probably one of the oldest Podcasts on the net as it started since 2003.
8. Appclinic
A video Podcast with tutorials for graphic designers hosted by Adam Hay.
9. Rookie Designer
An audio podcast about web design as a job/career hosted also by Adam Hay. This podcast wasn’t very active lately but the early episodes are great.
10. Rails Podcast
A nice rails podcast.
Now even if some of these are less active these days, listening to older episodes is really a good thing that will help learn tons of things. Most of them are available for subscription via Apple iTunes which the media player I really recommande for podcasts.
Posted on January 7, 2009 - by Khaled
Donuts!
Donuts… Who doesn’t like them? They are delicious, easy to prepare and you may eat them basically anytime of the day! You can eat them while working etc… There are so many different recipes for doughnuts but one of my favorites is chocolate donuts!
For this recipe (~30 donuts) you will need:
- 1 fresh egg
- 3 ½ cups of flour
- 1 cup of sugar
- 5-7 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup mashed potatoes
- 75-100g of bitter chocolate
- 2/3 cup semi-skimmed milk
- fat for deep frying
Beat egg until they become homogeneous and light and add the sugar and continue beating. Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie (hot water bath) and add it to the sugar eggs mixture. Add the mashed potatoes and the milk.
Add baking powder and salt to the flour and bake till. Wrap the dough in plastic and cool it in the fridge for 2 hours. Then roll it out on a floured surface. Cut with floured doughnut cutter. Fry, turning each donut once, in deep fat at about 350° until the donuts become golden colored. Transfer to paper towels to drain.
You may want to dip it in melted chocolate or even some honey.
That’s it! I hope you will enjoy it!
Posted on January 6, 2009 - by Khaled
WebScienceMan is here!
WebScienceMan is plugged and running
After a few years of running this blog under the name of No Relation, I decided a while ago to Change the name along with a full redesign (which did not happen since almost two years). So now this blog is running under the name of “WebScienceMan”. This change was discretely announced before! Read the about page to have a better idea about the motives.
REVAMPING PROCESS
During this revamping process the CMS was upgraded to WordPress 2.7 (this was very smooth and I really love the new features of this version). I also created a new graphic design that dubbed “The Rainbow Cliff theme”. I’ve laid this graphic over the structure provided by Paper C theme (which was a gift from a friend of mine) after retouching some HTML, CSS, PHP and JS. New Plug-ins were installed among which I will mention:
So you may have understood that from now on there will be polls and surveys carried on so don’t dither to come back, check and vote.
ADVERTISING
From now on you can purchase an advertising spot on WebScienceMan to advertise your products, your services, your site or whatever. Find out the details here.
Polls
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