Getting Started with Ajax

The start of 2005 saw the rise of a relatively new technology, dubbed 'Ajax' by Jesse James Garrett of Adaptive Path. Ajax stands for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML. In a nutshell, it is the use of the nonstandard XMLHttpRequest() object to communicate with server-side scripts. It can send as well as receive information in a variety of formats, including XML, HTML, and even text files. Ajax’s most appealing characteristic, however, is its 'asynchronous' nature, which means it can do all of this without having to refresh the page. This allows you to update portions of a page based upon user events and provides one of the cornerstones of Rich Internet Applications (RIA) referred to in discussions of 'Web 2.0.'

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2006). Design>Web Design>DHTML>Ajax

If I Told You You Had a Beautiful Figure...

Lay out images consistently across your site using a liitle clever JavaScript.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2007). Design>Web Design>Graphic Design>JavaScript

Improving Link Display for Print

It seemed my zeal for linkage had come into conflict with my desire to improve print usability.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2005). Design>Document Design>CSS>Printing

Let Them Eat Cake

A growing debate pits accessibility against usability. From our point of view, it’s like pitting peanut butter against jelly. This article helps you create a page that is both usable and accessible, saving readers the trouble of scrolling with a little help from JavaScript and the Document Object Model.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2004). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Usability

Ruining the User Experience

There's a lot we, as designers of the web experience, can learn from something as simple as a water glass.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2007). Design>Web Design>User Experience

SELECT Something New, Part 1

So you've built a beautiful, standards-compliant site utilizing the latest and greatest CSS techniques. You've mastered control of styling every element, but in the back of your mind, a little voice is nagging you about how ugly your SELECTs are. Well, today we're going to explore a way to silence that little voice and truly complete our designs. With a little DOM scripting and some creative CSS, you too can make your SELECTs beautiful… and you won't have to sacrifice accessibility, usability or graceful degradation.

Gustafson, Aaron. Easy! Designs LLC (2005). Design>Web Design>CSS>DHTML

Beyond DOCTYPE: Web Standards, Forward Compatibility, and IE8

Progress always comes at a cost. In the case of web browsers, users bear the cost when developers take the rendering of certain authoring tools and browsers (especially Internet Explorer) as gospel. We could spend hours explaining why our sites broke, but wouldn’t it be better if they didn’t break in the first place?

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Web Design>Standards

Understanding Progressive Enhancement

Since 1994, the web development community has beaten graceful degradation’s drum. A carry-over from the engineering world, the concept was, at its core, about giving the latest and greatest browsers the full-course meal experience while tossing a few scraps to the sad folk unfortunate enough to be using Netscape 4. It worked, sure, but it didn’t really match Tim Berners-Lee’s original vision for a universally accessible web. At SXSW in 2003, Steve Champeon and Nick Finck gave a presentation titled “Inclusive Web Design For the Future.” There, they unveiled a blueprint for this new way of approaching web development. Steve also gave it a name: progressive enhancement.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Web Design>Standards