Rob Eberhardt

• Tool - Exchange 2003 SP2 IMF Keyword Manager
  Now I don’t have to edit raw XML and double-check that I didn’t screw it up (open in IE to verify well-formedness, wait/worry for 7513/7514 logged events). 
  
  
• Picture - Computer hardware poster
  Reference of over 170 different computer connectors, RAM, CPU sockets, etc.  I put a giant version on my office wall.
  
  
• Article - 10 CSS properties missing in IE6
  
  1. Rounded or Curved Corners
  2. PNG alpha transparency
  3. Opacity
  4. Fixed Position
  5. Min-width & Max-width
  6. Hover for non anchor elements
  7. Min-height & Max-height
  8. Bicubic scaling for images
  9. Negative text indent for input button
  10. Text shadow
  Good article on what most browsers offer designers these days.  I would just add box-shadow.
  
  I happily got to use about half of these features on my most recent site, thanks to some great IE shims:  
  
  
• DD_roundies and DD_belatedPNG
  Excellent IE shims for Rounded Corners and PNG Alpha transparency.  There are tons of other IE shims for these, but after much homework, I say these are the best and you want them.  (FYI, I’ve made peace with requiring Javascript for design enhancements, which these are). 
  
  Now if Drew could port box-shadow to IE, my heart would sing.
  
  
• Article - Universal Internet Explorer 6 CSS
  Article lays out the basic ways to handle IE6 design in 2009, and a fascinating new suggestion.  To wit, not to waste hours in time and a client's money on lengthy workarounds in an unnecessary attempt at cross-browser perfection.
  

Remember the IMG element’s LowSRC attribute?  Unfortunately, no modern browser does!  While the big ones used to offer this for the slower folks among us, they have all dropped support for it.

I need it again, though!  A current project calls for a (just) 320x280 high-color illustration with alpha-transparency – nothing other than a full 32-bit alpha-channel PNG will do that justice.

Out of the editor, it’s 160KB, which is huge for homepage decoration.  A good PNGCrushing got that down to 106KB, which is still 16 seconds on 56K.  Oh, and there’s the rest of the page too…

A pinch of JQuery and classic Javascript later, and LowSRC works again!

$(function() {

  // jLowSRC - Rob Eberhardt (@slingfive.com), May 2009
  $("IMG[lowsrc]").each(function() {
    if (this.readyState=='complete' || this.complete==true) { return }

    var lowsrc = $(this).attr('lowsrc');
    this.lowsrcElem = this;
    if ($.browser.msie && $.browser.version <7 && lowsrc.toLowerCase().indexOf('.png') >-1) {	//IE6
      $(this).wrap('<span></span>');
      this.lowsrcElem = this.parentNode;
      this.lowsrcElem.style.display = 'block';
      this.lowsrcElem.style.width  = this.offsetWidth;
      this.lowsrcElem.style.height = this.offsetHeight; 
      this.lowsrcElem.style.filter = "progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.AlphaImageLoader(src='" +lowsrc+ "')";
      this.style.visibility = 'hidden';
    } else {
      this.lowsrcElem.style.background = 'url(' +lowsrc+ ') no-repeat 0 0';
    }

    this.onload = function() {
      this.lowsrcElem.style.background = '';
      this.lowsrcElem.style.filter = '';
      this.style.visibility = 'visible';
    }
  });

});

It works in Firefox 3, Chrome, Safari 3, Opera 9, IE 7 and 8.  I also got it handling IE 6 (with a small re-flow jump to the final image), which is the bulk of the code.  (Dear 33% of the world, your web browser is 800 years old and eating our brains.  Broadband isn’t free, but newer browsers are.)

For testing, I simulated modem speeds and “first loads” (disabled cache) with the brilliant Fiddler2.  It’s not just a noticeable improvement, it’s the difference between getting sandwich or sticking around.

Hope it helps someone else!

Kevin Pang’s 10 Programming Proverbs Every Developer Should Know

Great stuff there.  You got that?

My friend Dave Spiess asked me to clarify the term “web developer”.  I could go on and on about my experiences and opinions, but a picture is more digestible, so I drew one:

BTW, here’s an quick/easy way to make graphs: http://graphjam.com/ (my graph there)

Microsoft has:

• IE8 final being released at noon today. Hoorah!
  Now if MS would just force-upgrade the IE6 holdouts!
• SuperPreview for side-by-side (or overlaid!) browser layout testing
  I grabbed SuperPreview the moment it was announced yesterday. Looks great for IE6 & 7, but it didn't find any of my other installed browsers, or show Safari/Mac like the demo, and I see no way to add those. Hm, maybe they're still working out kinks...
• Silverlight 3 beta - big wow for high-performance cross-platform video
  That said, Silverlight is still the "Un-web".
• Expression Blend 3 preview - Sketchflow especially looks awesome for bigger projects
  I'm still not sure I personally can trust a WYSIWYG editor. Frontpage still haunts me.

Submitted to http://www.google.com/contact/spamreport.html

Interestingly, it's no new problem and Google is aware of but ignoring it?  Maybe if more people fill out the form to complain...?