July 2003 Archives

CMS Needs July 31, 2003
Where’s the easy-to-use CMS for the average small Web site?

Form validation tools July 31, 2003
Shortcomings of form validation toolkits.

California State Fair July 28, 2003
The California State Fair lets you buy tickets in advance from their Web site. That’s good. But the site is a horror house of usability problems.

Zempt competitor? July 25, 2003
What the SocialDynamX MT application is and how it affects Zempt.

Technorati fix July 24, 2003
Apparently the Technorati API service is experiencing some problems today that are causing errors for people using my Technorati plugin. The newest version of the plugin fixes this and adds a new feature.

Rounded corners in CSS July 23, 2003
There lots of ways to create rounded corners with CSS, but they always require lots of complex HTML and CSS. This is simpler.

CSS dotted borders in IE July 23, 2003
One of the many irritating things about CSS support in Internet Explorer is that it incorrectly shows dashed borders instead of dotted borders. Here’s how you can fix that.

More Form usability July 18, 2003
Thoughts on how to arrange fields on Web forms to make them easier to use.

Alarm usability July 17, 2003
I have a new alarm clock. The old one was fine, but a little ugly,...

Simplifying the web, one step at a time July 17, 2003
Some things in Web design are too complex. They make a site hard to build, hard to use, and hard to maintain. So I’m simplifying the everyday components of a Web site and writing case studies and examples in a new feature called Simplified.

Simplified Form Errors July 17, 2003
One of the most frustrating experiences on the Web is filling out forms. When mistakes are made, the user is often left guessing what they need to correct. We’ve taken an approach that shows the user in no uncertain terms what needs to be fixed.

Wireless Google java July 14, 2003
I’ve already had some people arrive here that were obviously searching for wireless Internet in Carmel. If your business isn’t online, you’re losing business.

Carmel Wireless July 10, 2003
If there was a coffee place with free wireless, you could bet I’d be there a couple of times a day. What a competitive advantage that would be.

Writing Realistic Job Descriptions July 10, 2003
Publish a job listing like this one and you are virtually guaranteeing that you won’t get qualified applicants for the position.

Other uses for your content July 10, 2003
When you put information on your Web site, you need to remember that the text you write might be used in ways that you didn’t think of.

Turning away customers July 9, 2003
If a customer is going to go to the trouble of contacting you, it’s important, at least to them. Make sure you’ll see it.

Sports oxymoron July 9, 2003
Only in sports coverage would anyone say "[He] narrowly widened his lead."

Refurb IBM on Ebay July 9, 2003
IBM is using Ebay as a sales channel to sell refurbished products.

FTP filters July 7, 2003
I need is an FTP program that will let me filter the files that get uploaded.

Inter-dimensional spam July 6, 2003
Spam advertising a $5000 reward for help in finding a Dimensional Warp Generator or a Acme 5X24 series time transducing capacitor. Seriously.

July 4 July 4, 2003

Projects need leadership July 3, 2003
Being a leader is hard. Not everyone will like you if you stand up for your principles. But people don’t lead because they want to be popular.

The Not RSS thing July 2, 2003
There’s a new API spec being proposed, so you’d think I’d be getting involved. But I don’t really have the energy.

It's an MLM exchange July 2, 2003
I suppose it was to be expected, but it appears that my Textad exchange is very popular with MLM sites.

No error at all July 2, 2003
Apparently my software is trying to tell me something. If only I knew what that was.

More useless error messages July 1, 2003
User frustration rides high when a program gives a useless error message.

Zempt 0.3 July 1, 2003
Zempt 0.3 is out and ready for download. If you’ve tried it before and didn’t...