A Brief History Of Technical Illustration

A history of technical illustration, from the classics to the present.

Hulsey, Kevin. Kevin Hulsey Illustration. Articles>Graphic Design>Technical Illustration>History

A Bright Idea: Web-Based Surveys

If you’re looking for a quick, simple, and cost-efficient way to survey your members, you may want to try a Web-based survey service such as Zoomerang. Zoomerang offers users the ability to create and design their own surveys, send the surveys to targeted groups, and download the results, which Zoomerang tabulates.

McEwen, Kathryn. Tieline (2003). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Surveys

The Brilliance of Smart Photoshop Objects

When it comes to editing an image, that typically means going back into the image app, recreating the image, then putting the newly created image into your site. A serious GoLive advantage is that communicates directly with your imaging apps to regenerate a new image right in place on your page.

Mac Design Magazine (2005). Design>Web Design>Graphic Design>Adobe GoLive

Brilliant Button Maker

A form-based interface to generate 80x15-pixel buttons, like those often used to identify RSS feeds.

Luca Zappa (2005). Resources>Web Design>DHTML

Bring Data to Life: Art and Information Can Complement Each Other

Using Photoshop, Illustrator, and Freehand to create better charts, graphs, technical diagrams.

Abes, Cathy. MacWorld (2001). Design>Graphic Design>Technical Illustration>Charts and Graphs

Bring the lnternet into Your Documents on Budget and on Time  

Technical communicators can mine the Internet for fresh approaches and information to prepare documents with efficiency and minimal expense.

Murphy, Avon J. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>Information Design>Research

Broadband Reality Check!

I just can't escape those shrieking ads and articles: 'Everyone has broadband – or at least, they're getting it next week!' Because of this overwhelming hype, many Web developers and content pros currently seem preoccupied with learning how to produce broadband content....I must admit that I've been lulled into the broadband fantasy to some extent, too. I live in a very 'wired' town (Boulder, CO), and we currently have both DSL and cable modem connections at our home. So I've been sucking down a lot of broadband content lately. I've gotten very spoiled! However the vast majority of Internet users (even in the US) cannot get broadband.

Gahran, Amy. Contentious (2000). Design>Web Design>Usability>Bandwidth

Broadcasting Type

Putting type on a path is not a new concept. However, Adobe InDesign CS adds a new twist to it. Not only can you put type on a path, but you can also link from path to path to have one continuous text flow. In this tutorial we’ll use this technique to replicate Apple’s new AirPort Express ad.

White, Terry. Layers Magazine (2005). Design>Typography>Software>Adobe InDesign

Brown Bagging, Storytelling, and Persona Building: Three Effective Strategies for Creating Participation (Includes Buy-In) for a User-Centered Design (UCD) Process And Communicating Success!  

This paper identifies challenges for obtaining managerial buy-in for a user-centered design process using performance tasks. Initially, it presents lessons learned from a case study. Next, it provides strategies (leadership, persuasion, organizational conflict, active listening, and teamwork) for obtaining buy-in from work team and their constituencies. Last, it concludes with recommendations for obtaining buy-in from managers.

Carey, Jennifer and Gloria A. Reece. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Project Management>User Centered Design

Browser Chart

One of the biggest pains about making Web pages is having to keep track of which browsers support what features. Wouldn't it be nice if there were some way to keep track of it all? Well, we've whipped up a few articles and charts to make things easier for you.

Webmonkey. Design>Web Design>Standards>Web Browsers

Browser Usage Statistics

Statistics on browser popularity, as of December 1996.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (1996). Design>Web Design>Statistics>Web Browsers

Brushed Metal Effects

In this tutorial we'll look at using some of Photoshop's tools to produce realistic brushed-metal effects. You can easily apply these effects to text or to other objects such as geometric shapes and interface bars.

Elated (2001). Design>Graphic Design>Software>Adobe Photoshop

The Budget Webmaster's Guide to Increased Credibility - Part One

perceptions speak louder than words. Take another look at your site, or, better yet, get a fresh eye from another person in an online community you belong to. It may not be clear to your visitors that you are employing privacy protection techniques.

Abayomi-Paul, Tinu. SubmitYourArticle (2004). Design>Web Design

Budgeting for Advertising and Customer Experience

The most effective companies realize that they can't succeed on advertising alone; the customer matters.

Hurst, Mark. uiGarden (2007). Articles>Web Design>Usability>User Experience

Build a Cross-Platform Web Design Testing Station in Mac OS

Everybody talks about cross–platform testing, but nobody’s shown how to do it on a nuts–and–bolts level. Until now. Sciortino’s comprehensive tutorial for Mac–based web designers will set you up with the testing platform of your dreams. (’Nix and Windows users, we hope to do the same for you in a future issue.)

Sciortino, Paul. List Apart, A (2002). Articles>Usability>Web Design

Build a PHP Switcher

ALA's open source style sheet switchers are swell so long as your visitors use compliant browsers and have JavaScript turned on. But what if they don’t? New ALA author Chris Clark tells how to build a cross-browser, backward-compatible, forward-compatible, standards-compliant style sheet switcher in just five lines of code.

Clark, Chris. List Apart, A (2002). Design>Web Design>Server Side Includes>PHP

Build a Search Engine in PERL

Everything you wanted to know about using PERL to build a simple search engine for your site (but were afraid to ask).

Ryan, Joseph. List Apart, A (2002). Articles>Web Design>Search

Build a "Send to a Friend" Page

In this quick 'n easy tutorial, Short shows how to increase the popularity of your site by building a simple 'Send to Friend' form in HTML and ASP.

Short, Daniel. List Apart, A (2001). Design>Web Design>Forms>ASP

Build a Shopping Cart Application Using XForms

This tutorial focuses on key aspects of the W3C XForms 1.0 standard to produce a fully functional Web-based shopping cart. With this approach, the reader will get a good start at creating real-world applications with XForms, without having to learn the entire XForms specification.

Speicher, Steve K., Keith Wells, Jan J. Kratky and Kevin Kelly. IBM (2007). Design>Web Design>E Commerce>XForms

Build Accessible Online Forms

Ask anyone who has had to fix a Website that's littered with accessibility howlers, and top-most in their list of problems encountered will be forms, closely followed by tables. These two topics always seem to present the most difficulties, but they needn't be a problem. For the most part, forms are a problem because the extra accessibility tags are simply not known to the Web designer -- after all, it looks right, it seems to work... what's the problem? Only by switching off the monitor and using a screen-reader can our oblivious Web developer understand the issues.

Lloyd, Ian. SitePoint (2003). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Forms

Build Ajax into your Web Apps with Rails

Ruby on Rails provides an excellent platform for building Web applications. Discover how to use the built-in Asynchronous JavaScript(TM) + XML (Ajax) features of the platform to give your application the Web 2.0 rich user interface experience.

Herrington, Jack D. IBM (2006). Design>Web Design>Ajax>Ruby on Rails

Build It Right And They Will Come  

Teaching through the Web requires instructors to reconsider their previous assumptions about the nature of teaching, lecture, testing, and student/teacher interaction. In online classrooms, instructors often serve many design and maintenance roles. Managing the time required for these roles is an inescapable part of online instruction. The simpler the overall course design, the less often the instructor has to shift from role to role. Online instructors must use textual, visual and interactive metaphors consistently to help guide students toward productive forms of interaction. Finally an equal mix of textual, visual and interactive rhetorics is vital for effective online course design.

Gillette, David. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Education>Instructional Design>Online

Build Up Links to Your Website

Link building is an essential part of any online marketing strategy. Learn how to in this article.

Moss, Trenton. Webcredible (2004). Design>Web Design>Marketing>Search Engine Optimization

Build Web apps with ThinWire and Java code, Part 2: Using the SplitLayout Class

With ThinWire, an open-source development framework, you can build Web applications that look and feel like desktop applications. In this five-part series, you'll learn how to develop rich Web applications using ThinWire and Java. In Part 2, you learn to use the SplitLayout class in conjunction with your own layout management code to dynamically change the layout of a ThinWire GUI based on the current size of the Web browser window.

Baldwin, Richard G. IBM (2007). Design>Web Design>Server Side Includes>Java

Building a Barrier-Free Web

Architects call the concept of making choices that work best for the greatest number of people 'barrier-free design.' While no Web site—or building, for that matter—can be equally accessible to everyone, the intellectual shift from thinking of accessibility as an add-on can be liberating. There are plenty of good reasons for constructing your sites with as few barriers as possible.

Kuchinskas, Susan. New Architect (2002). Design>Web Design>Accessibility