#27295
The pace of new browser releases may be slower than it was in the early days, but developers must still confront a bemusing array of browser versions and brands that support some JavaScript features but not others. To combat the problem, scripters commonly provide two or more code branches so that a browser follows an execution path containing statements that it supports. Browser sniffing — the task of inspecting navigator object properties for version information — has become largely unmanageable given the browser version permutations available today. This article presents details on an alternative solution — object detection — that frees JavaScript developers from most of this versioning mess.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>Standards>DHTML
#14810
Online Documentation and Online Help
A bibliography that presents major works on topics discussed in the book Inside Macintosh: Macintosh Human Interface Guidelines.
Apple Inc. (1996). Resources>Bibliographies>Documentation>Online
#27306
Since there are clearly times when it makes sense to use a plug-in, the question arises of how to deal with those who don’t have the required plug-in installed. As Web developers, we have several choices. One option is to do nothing, simply serving the plug-in-dependent content. The trouble is that those that don’t have the required plug-in will get a rather disturbing page with a broken plug-in icon where your beautiful multimedia should be. Another option is to give visitors a choice between the plug-in version and the static HTML version of each page. Sometimes this may be the best choice, since it gives your visitors control over their experience. There are two problems, however. First of all, the choice itself interrupts a visitor’s experience of the site. Second, it requires them to know what plug-ins they have installed. But why should they need to know? Many users don’t know a plug-in from a spark plug? The final and often best option, the one this script is designed to help with, is to check to see if each visitor has a given plug-in. If they do, you can go ahead and serve them the page with the plug-in embedded.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>Server Side Includes>DHTML
#27294
As web sites become more and more like traditional applications, the call-response-reload model used in HTTP transactions becomes increasingly cumbersome. Instead of delivering a single dynamic page, the DHTML or JavaScript developer must create a series of separate pages. The flow of the application is interrupted by page reloads whenever the client communicates with the server. Remote scripting provides a solution to this problem, easing development of complex JavaScript applications, and providing a better experience for the end user.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>Standards>HTML
#27315
Most developers are happy to follow the W3C guidelines and have their pages 'just work,' with no need for browser-specific HTML. Safari has the features you'd expect of a modern browser plus a few unique ones; understanding these, as well as a few Safari development tricks, will ensure your pages work exactly the way you and your users expect.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>Standards>Web Browsers
#14811
Strategies for Producing Browser-Based Technical Documentation
This Technical Note attempts to provide a few good strategies for resolving some of the issues around producing and viewing Web-based technical documentation. The Note may be useful for engineers, technical writers and content producers who must wrestle with issues of producing documents such as ReadMe files, Release Notes, technical articles, and other forms of technical communication that land on the Web.
Apple Inc. (1996). Design>Documentation>Help>Online
#27296
Supporting Three Event Models at Once 
Events make the client-side JavaScript world go ‘round. After a Web page loads, the only way a script can run is in response to a system or user action. While simple events have been part of the JavaScript vocabulary since the first scriptable browsers, more recent browsers implement robust event models that allow scripts to process events more intelligently. The problem, however, is that in order to support a wide range of browsers you must contend with multiple advanced event models. Three, to be exact.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>DHTML
#27310
Typographical Features of the Cocoa Text System
It is common, especially in technical writing, to mix languages with differing text direction, such as English and Hebrew, in the same line. Some writing systems even alternate layout direction in every other line (an arrangement called boustrophedonic writing). Some languages do not group glyphs into words separated by spaces. Moreover, some applications call for arbitrary arrangements of glyphs; a graphic layout may require glyphs to be arranged on a nonlinear path.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Typography>Programming>Macintosh
#27311
Universal Access: Computers That Everyone Can Use
Apple has been working hard on Universal Access and it's time for you, the developer, to incorporate Universal Access into your application if you haven't done so already. This article guides you through the reasons you will want to provide Universal Access, the architecture underlying the technology, and how to get started incorporating these features into your application.
Apple Inc. (2006). Articles>User Experience>Programming>Macintosh
#21742
This document outlines typical areas of concern when porting a Microsoft Windows application to Mac OS X, and provides guidance for transitioning to the Mac OS X UI.
Apple Inc. (2004). Design>User Experience>Human Computer Interaction
#27291
SOAP, the Simple Object Access Protocol, is the powerhouse of web services. It's a highly adaptable, object-oriented protocol that exists in over 80 implementations on every popular platform, including AppleScript, JavaScript, and Cocoa. It provides a flexible communication layer between applications, regardless of platform and location. As long as they both speak SOAP, a PHP-based web application can ask a C++ database application on another continent to look up the price of a book and have the answer right away.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>XML>SOAP
#27304
This article covers vertical sizing and shows how to determine the height of elements with CSS. Once you’ve mastered both height and width, you should be well on your way to effectively using CSS.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>CSS
#27305
Web Page Development: Best Practices
This article gives some practical hints on how to create standards-conforming websites, and to work around some of issues that will arise for Explorer for Windows. Before you start coding your website you must make a few decisions—which DOCTYPE do you use? Do you use pure CSS, or CSS with Minimal Tables? We'll discuss these topics, and then go into some design guidelines and issues to consider with XHTML and CSS.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>Standards
#27308
WebObjects is Apple's suite of tools and object-oriented frameworks for creating and deploying scalable, reusable web and Java applications for the Internet and intranets. WebObjects supports the development, deployment, and extension of standards-based web services without the need to write low-level SOAP, XML or WSDL code. Tools enable code-free generation, configuration, and testing of web services from existing data assets.
#27290
XML Transformations with CSS and DOM
Mozilla permits XML to be rendered in the browser with CSS, and manipulated with the DOM. This is a real boon to those of us eager to experiment with XML transformations (both visual and structural) without having to delve into unfamiliar technologies such as XPath, the verbose traversal language of XSLT. If you’re already familiar with CSS and DOM, you’re more than halfway to achieving XML transformations in Mozilla.
Apple Inc. (2006). Design>Web Design>XML>CSS
