Five Ways to Increase Targeted Website Traffic

Website visitors do not arrive magically… they follow recommendations from others, such as links, display ads, or even offline word of mouth. As 2007 turns into 2008, here are 5 easy ways to substantially increase the amount of traffic coming to your site.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2007). Articles>Web Design>Search Engine Optimization

Web Hosting from Hell: One Key Tip to Prepare for the Worst

One of the things I’m most familiar with on the Web is Web hosting companies– choosing them, working with them, yelling at them, comparing their services… After the last week of what could only be described as “the Web hosting experience from hell,” I’m now well-versed in leaving them too. Consider this article my Public Service Announcement on a bad Web hosting company. If you read until the end, you’ll find out which well-known company wins the award for “most terrible large-scale Web hosting company.” If you don’t, you’ll just get my angry rant. Either way, this should be informative.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2007). Articles>Web Design>Hosting

The Top Five Dumbest Things Web Developers Do Today

The Web is certainly much different in 2007 than it was in 1997 when I created my first Web site. There were things back then that were really annoying (under construction .gifs, blinking text, and ugly frames)… I certainly contributed to the ugliness. But 2007 has its share of terrible Web practices too. That got me thinking: what bothers me the most about Web pages today? Here’s my top 5 list of the poorest things Web developers are doing in 2007.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2007). Articles>Web Design

Parse a String Using JavaScript

A handy trick for Web Developers in the ability to parse a string to check for a given substring. In plain English, this means checking if a word or part of a word is contained within text. This tutorial demonstrates how to do this using JavaScript.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2007). Articles>Web Design>Programming>JavaScript

What’s the Difference Between HTML and XHTML?

If you’ve mastered HTML, you’re 90% of the way towards using XHTML. They’re actually very much the same thing—tag-based markup languages used to display Web pages. The difference is only seen by the people creating the pages (Web designers, programmers, etc.) and focuses on “forgivability”— HTML allows for some ugly code (mixed case tags like , improperly nested elements, and unclosed tags), while XHTML does not. If you write HTML, it’s probably a good idea to start using XHTML practices anyway. It will take 5 minutes to learn, and it’s just a better way of doing things.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2006). Articles>Web Design>HTML>XHTML

CSS Link Styles

One of the easiest, yet most interactive, elements you can add to your Web site is dynamic link text—links that change their appearance once the user puts their cursor over them.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2006). Articles>Web Design>CSS>Typography

Horizontally Center Layout in CSS

A good way of dealing with users on different screen resolutions is to center your Web design horizontally. This will ensure, regardless of the user’s screen size, that there is an equal amount of space to the left and right of the main design area, producing an overall "fuller" look to your site.

Jason, Chris. ChrisJason.com (2005). Articles>Web Design>CSS