CSS: Style Sheet Guidelines

Web applications should always adhere to W3C standards and validate correctly. Numerous excellent CSS style Guides are available that discuss the how-tos of achieving these objectives, below are a few:

References:

• Miha Hribar
• Interface / CSS Coding Guidelines
• NYPL Style Guide

Tutorial:

• Style Master CSS Tutorial

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For the future, to add presentational effects and Web page style, validate documents at the HTML 4.0 level (for the cleanest possible markup), so pages contain little or no HTML 3.2 presentational markup or proprietary stylistic hacks, and use the World Wide Web Consortium ‘ s Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) language to add stylistic effects to your pages.

• W3C’s HTML Home Page
• Web Style Sheets
• Specifications for HTML
• WDG HTML Validator
• W3C HTML Validation Service

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Top Ten Resources

• Designing For Multiple Browsers Without Being Bland
  A concise, sober, and BRIEF description of a good Web authoring strategy. Other fine articles by the author include What You See is Not What Others Get and Widen Your Web Site ‘ s Audience . Stephen Traub.
• Getting Started with HTML
  A primer to Learning HTML 3.2 by Examples , this is a comprehensive and succinct Guide to writing standard HTML.
• Web Site Design Tips
  Web site design tips for the beginner to the expert. A great collection of classic web site design tips that will build a strong foundation for any new web designer. /a>
• The Web Design Group Reference Section
  Excellent background information and technical details on HTML authoring. Web Design Group.
• Designing for The Web
  A series of informative articles on Web site design, including A Web Site is a Harsh Mistress & Rules of Thumb. The special focus is on complementing Web design skills with competence in interface design . Don ‘ t miss Web Site Design. Diane Wilson.
• Useit.com: Usable Information Technology
  An expansive resource on usability and user interface issues – - featuring several extremely challenging and well-researched essays on Web design and style. Jakob Nielsen.
• Understanding HTML
  An outstanding presentation of HTML basics by an Australian with a fine writing style. Dianne Gorman.
• Hints for Web Authors
  A short yet insightful historical analysis of conventional vs.web publishing , Hints for Web Authors is replete with solid recommendations on how to succeed with the latter, including a few pragmatic suggestions mixed in there for good measure, “… in hopes that others may find ‘ em useful. ” Warren Steel.
• Dan’s Web Tips
  This huge resource contains a balanced summary review of most of today ‘ s important Web authoring topics. Daniel Tobias.
• HyperText Markup Language
  World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) home page for HTML. Here you will find pointers to specifications for HTML, guidelines for how to use HTML to the best effect and pointers to related work at W3C. W3C.

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Accessibility Guidelines and Tools

Other Web Accessibility Resource Links

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From the original article by:
Russ Weakley
13-August-04

Web standards – more than just ‘ table-free sites ‘

The term web standards can mean different things to different people. For some, it is ‘ table-free sites ‘, for others it is ‘ using valid code ‘. However, web standards are much broader than that. A site built to web standards should adhere to standards (HTML, XHTML, XML, CSS, XSLT, DOM, MathML, SVG etc) and pursue best practices (valid code, accessible code, semantically correct code, user-friendly URLs etc).

In other words, a site built to web standards should ideally be lean, clean, CSS-based, accessible, usable and search engine friendly .

About the checklist

This is not an uber-checklist. There are probably many items that could be added. More importantly, it should not be seen as a list of items that must be addressed on every site that you develop. It is simply a Guide that can be used:

• to show the breadth of web standards
• as a handy tool for developers during the production phase of websites
• as an aid for developers who are interested in moving towards web standards

The checklist

1. Quality of code
   1. Does the site use a correct Doctype?
   2. Does the site use a Character set?
   3. Does the site use Valid (X)HTML?
   4. Does the site use Valid CSS?
   5. Does the site use any CSS hacks?
   6. Does the site use unnecessary classes or ids?
   7. Is the code well structured?
   8. Does the site have any broken links?
   9. How does the site perform in terms of speed/page size?
   10. Does the site have JavaScript errors?
2. Degree of separation between content and presentation
   1. Does the site use CSS for all presentation aspects (fonts, colour, padding, borders etc)?
   2. Are all decorative images in the CSS, or do they appear in the (X)HTML?
3. Accessibility for users
   1. Are “alt” attributes used for all descriptive images?
   2. Does the site use relative units rather than absolute units for text size?
   3. Do any aspects of the layout break if font size is increased?
   4. Does the site use visible skip menus?
   5. Does the site use accessible forms?
   6. Does the site use accessible tables?
   7. Is there sufficient colour brightness/contrasts?
   8. Is colour alone used for critical information?
   9. Is there delayed responsiveness for dropdown menus (for users with reduced motor skills)?
   10. Are all links descriptive (for blind users)?
4. Accessibility for devices
   1. Does the site work acceptably across modern and older browsers?
   2. Is the content accessible with CSS switched off or not supported?
   3. Is the content accessible with images switched off or not supported?
   4. Does the site work in text browsers such as Lynx?
   5. Does the site work well when printed?
   6. Does the site work well in Hand Held devices?
   7. Does the site include detailed metadata?
   8. Does the site work well in a range of browser window sizes?
5. Basic Usability
   1. Is there a clear visual hierarchy?
   2. Are heading levels easy to distinguish?
   3. Is the site’s navigation easy to understand?
   4. Is the site’s navigation consistent?
   5. Does the site use consistent and appropriate language?
   6. Does the site have a sitemap page and contact page? Are they easy to find?
   7. For large sites, is there a search tool?
   8. Is there a link to the home page on every page in the site?
   9. Are links underlined?
   10. Are visited links clearly defined?
6. Site management
   1. Does the site have a meaningful and helpful 404 error page that works from any depth in the site?
   2. Does the site use friendly URLs?
   3. Do your URLs work without “www”?
   4. Does the site have a favicon?

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TreeMagic Cypress is a new lightweight browser plugin for WordPress. Install, configure, then double click any word, or select a group of words on the page. On mouse-up a small popup appears adjacent to the selected text that gives you instant access to define, expand and explore related resources. It does not replace or interfere with existing hyperlinks, but adds an instant and powerful reference compliment to all your texts, regardless of formatting and styles.
The plugin can be configured to any external Internet website, as well as connecting to your own data, or network. TreeMagic Cypress is available as a free download from the downloads section of this site

The popup has a list of links that is configurable from the plugin administration section. The idea is that when you double click or select a group of words on a page, the popup is invoked adjacent to the word(s) allowing you to rapidly select a web site from the list. Typical examples of this are search engines, Wikipedia, Refdesk and similar knowledge-base sites. After selecting a site, the word(s) you have selected become part of a search string that returns results in a smaller separate popup window. You can of course keep your query results ‘on site’ such as searching your own content, help files or related resources. Because the query URLs are completely configurable in administration, you have total control over the searches, including opening the results page in a resized new window or using the existing target.

TreeMagic Cypress is not new technology and utilizes a small javascript and css to provide the fastest possible way to show extended meaning, content and relationship for text on a page. Once installed every text word on your site, that is not a hyperlink is potentially active. It does not interfere with any other mouse click functions and is totally unintrusive in use. Installation is simple, via a standard WordPress plugin. There are no database changes and the plugin adds negligible overhead to your HTML.

The broad concept is to provide the visitor greater freedom to take diversions from interesting cues in the text, but not taking them from your site in the process. Too many turns in the road and too many temptations to explore, can take your focus away from the content on a page. Most of us have come to realize that it is all too easy to be a ‘browser butterfly’ taking detours from hyperlinks and searches that often leave you marooned and lost in hyperspace. TreeMagic Cypress addresses the need to explore and supplement page content from other resources, but keeps your visitors safely focused on your website.

Searches can be configured for anything from a dictionary definition, translations, image searches to a full blown encyclopedia expositions. Following further links within the results ‘new window’ allows readers to explore in a separate browser page, while keeping your website in view when they want to return. Because we use a new window to display content, all your usual browser tools are available such as page saves and bookmarking your excursions for future returns.

As a web master, you have a simple administration interface that gives options for adding and deleting your website search strings, also the results window target and size. We have included a few samples to get you started, but the choice is up to you to provide the most suitable supplementary content for your website. There are numerous types of applications available for this tool and because you can manage your own reference links, you can offer a variety of offsite or internal content. All you need to do is track down your reference site and discover the correct query string.

Some typical examples of sites are as follows:

Google search
–Images
–News
–Maps
Wikipedia search
Currency converter
whois /IP lookup
answers.com
dictionary.com
Clusty.com
Translation
–en-fr
–en-ge
–en-it
Currency conversions
–£-$
–$-£
Navigation
–Home
–Contact us
–Help!
–Site map
–Site search

Do you need TreeMagic Cypress?

One of the main considerations with WordPress is choosing carefully which plugins to use. Too many and your website can suffer with decreased performance. Because of the tiny script footprint, this plugin will not add any significant processing burden to the database or page loads. It’s simple to use and will add some great features to your web page texts with the minimum of setup. The features and benefits are only limited by your imagination.

Download here …

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Licence.

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WordPress for Wiki prototype

According to Wikipedia:

A wiki is software that allows users to create, edit, and link web pages easily. Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites and to power community websites. These wiki websites are often also referred to as wikis; for example, Wikipedia is one of the best known wikis.^[1] Wikis are being installed by businesses to provide affordable and effective Intranets and for Knowledge Management. Ward Cunningham, developer of the first wiki, WikiWikiWeb, originally described it as “the simplest online database that could possibly work”.^[2]

Why wordpress as a wiki?
Put simply, WordPress is probably the finest Internet publication system available. It efficiently broadcasts posts to search engines and social networking services and provides excellent visibility, both in design, code structure and connectivity. To combine these well established features and the collaboration qualities of a wiki like setup produces a good combination of high visibility and group authoring requirements.

The following plugins have been chosen to emulate a wiki-like feature set. Most wiki features have been accomplished with these carefully selected plugins. We will evaluate this setup and refine/adjust as required. Most of these plugins have been selected to provide ‘connectivity’ between subjects, topics, keywords and meta information.

0. Awsom News Announcement: Allows you to post news announcements in the area above your posts on the index page (or anywhere else you want). By Harknell.
1. Audit Trail: Keep a log of exactly what is happening behind the scenes of your WordPress blog. By John Godley
2. Autolink tags for content: This plugin automatically checks out your posts to add tag links for the tag text in the posts. By Kelvin Xu.
3. Image Caption Easy: Transforms the alt text of an image into a caption which can be controlled through css. By Mark W. B. Ashcroft
4. SH-Autolink: In posts and comments, it transforms predefined words automatically into hyperlinks. By Stevie.
5. Snippet Highlight: embedd code between <pre> </pre> tags. apply code language as css class: php, css, js etc. By Roland Rust.
6. Subscribe2: Notifies an email list when new entries are posted. By Matthew Robinson.
7. TreeMagic-Cypress: Way of making Internet and Intranet information easily accessible. By Ambient Webs LLC
8. Upload+: Secure, cleaner and customized file names for uploaded files. By Pixline
9. User Permissions: Per-post user permissions By John Godley.
10 WP-DownloadManager: Adds a simple download manager to your WordPress blog. By Lester ‘GaMerZ’ Chan.
11 WP-Footnotes: Allows a user to easily add footnotes to a post. By Simon Elvery.
12 WYSI-WordPress: This plugin adds a more advanced WYSIWYG editor to the WordPress post editing screen. It includes advanced image handling, including on-the-fly thumbnail resizing and compression. It also includes Martin Chlupác’s excellent Iimage Manager v 1.4.1. By MudBomb.com.
13 Yet Another Related Posts Plugin: Returns a list of the related entries based on keyword matches, limited by a certain relatedness threshold. Like the tried and true Related Posts plugins—just better! By mitcho (Michael Yoshitaka Erlewine).

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