Zen Coding – a new way to write HTML lightning fast
The other day I purchased a new editor called Coda. I might review this fantastic little piece of software at a later date, but one of the reasons I purchased it was to use some of the many plugins the community has created for it. One of these plugins has been produced for several editors and could change how you code. It’s called Zen Coding, and it will make you write large chunks of HTML a lighting speeds.
What is Zen Coding?
Zen Coding is hard to explain, but if you have been working with HTML and CSS for awhile now you should be able to pick it up very quickly. It’s easy to learn and best shown by example, so lets start with an example.
The Zombie Journal is finally ready
For over a month now I have been slaving away on an idea I have had for quite some time. It’s probably the largest personal site I’ve ever built and it’s my first real foray in the world of Drupal. Let me tell you, Drupal isn’t an easy undertaking, but it’s very powerful. If you don’t know much about Drupal you might want to check out Dries Buytaert’s blog and see who’s using it… in short, a lot of big names.
But this is about The Zombie Journal
This post isn’t about Drupal, this is about The Zombie Journal, my newest site. Consider it still rough around the edges. I have a lot of ideas which I have not yet implemented, but for now I am hoping to see The Zombie Journal grow into a social network for Zombie fans of all sorts. If you sign up for an account you can post your own zombies stories of your fictional encounters with these diabolical creatures we call “the undead”. You can also share zombie resources, rank and vote on content and participate in the forums. If you are even mildly interested in zombies I urge you to sign up today, and follow The Zombie Journal on twitter.
Adium spam comments
Adium is a fantastic instant messaging program for the Mac that allows you to connect to many different chat clients like Yahoo, MSN and Google Talk just to name a few. Unfortunately if you have an MSN / Windows Live Messenger account on Adium you may be bombarded by the parasitic individuals of the web also known as spammers. I’m not sure why this only seems to happen to my MSN account, but there is a simple fix.
Bespin, web design in the cloud
Mozilla Labs released a really exciting Open Source project this month called Bespin. It’s still in an extremely early alpha stage right now, but it looks promising and really gets the imagination going. There’s a great video by the developers about what Bespin is all about, but the real highlight is near the end when they talk about different scenarios in which Bespin could be used.
Google Chrome – first impressions are the most important
Google Chrome was officially released today and of course being the Geek that I am I had to download it at work and at home and yes I am writing this blog entry from Chrome. Although I have not spent a long time with it, so far I like it, and for a first beta launch it is remarkably polished. This of course is nothing new for Google — they have a reputation of releasing extremely polished beta products. I also fully expect Chrome to be in beta for at least two years, but by then everyone will long since forgotten that it is a beta.
Google to launch a web browser – Chrome is here
The web is buzzing with news of a Google browser. The news was launched via a 39 page comic. The browser is called Google Chrome, and at last check the site was offline but rumour has it that it will be back online tomorrow. Google has also announced on their blog that they sent out the news a bit early by accident. Personally I think they may have just been trying to generate blog sphere buzz and it has worked
This is really big news and probably really bad news for Microsoft. Google has already released Gears a browser add-on which allows Google to jump start browsers ahead into more modern standards. Chrome will use webkit, the same engine that Safari uses, but it will not use the webkit Javascript engine. It will use it’s own, which should make apps run much faster and with more features.
Could this really be Google’s entrance into the desktop market? I believe the future of applications is online. Everything is headed in that direction. More and more people are accessing their apps and data in multiple places and on multiple devices, and right now the major player in that space is Google.
Update: Google Chrome – first impressions are the most important
More info at TechCrunch:
Meet Chrome, Google’s Windows Killer
First Images of Google Chrome
No Joke: Google Introduces The Chrome Browser With A Cartoon
Gravatars, what are they and how do I get one?
A few days ago I added Gravatar functionality to my blog. A Gravatar is a unique picture or icon of yourself which is stored online and globally accessible by blogs that implement Gravatar, or globally recognized avatar. When you post or comment to Gravatar enabled blogs your own avatar will show up on that blog if you have signed up for one on the Gravatar site. It’s a nice way of making your posts more unique and personalized.
Free WordPress theme – Deep Red
I finally got around to releasing my old WordPress theme Deep Red. Anyone can download it and use it. I have included the PSD file so you can tweak it, change it, or do whatever you like. You will also find all the slices in the Photoshop file.
This theme also uses Alex King’s popularity contest plugin. You can see it in the screenshot below on the sidebar; it tracks your most popular posts and displays them on the front page. You do not need to add this plugin to use the theme as there is a function check in the theme that will omit that section if you do not have the plugin activated.
If you like it, flip me an email so I can see how you have used it.
Download WordPress theme and PSD file.
Using WordPress custom fields for toggling plugins
More and more I find myself using WordPress as a CMS. This requires a little more customization than you would need for the average out of the box blog experience but WordPress can make a wonderful little CMS. Custom fields are just one way to gain finer control over your pages and posts both for blog or CMS functionality.
Firefox 3 Launch Party Video
Still more Firefox 3 Launch Party news. Chris Luckhardt of motionblur studios was filming throughout the entire party which was hosted at the Mozilla Toronto Office. He has put together a YouTube video of some of the highlights and says…
I posed a simple question to the crowd – “What does Firefox mean to you?”.
For people who know me, yes that’s me near the end of the video, I forgot all about it. Great video Chris, thanks for sharing.
Check out my previous posts, Firefox Launch Party photos and Toronto Firefox Launch Party.
