Blog template, design tips and tutorial

Users of Photoshop will get the most out of Jennifer Apple's "Blog Tutorial - Tips For Blog Templates & Blog Design In Photoshop", but there's some good information there for any blog designer. She suggests making a splash, changing the banner background, and more. She also has a very nice collection of blog-related links, including to Wikipedia's blogging terms.

Top 10 blog designs

On-page samples and links to sites the author believes are great blog designs. They can be a good source of inspiration.

Validate your web pages!

If you create your own web pages, you should validate them to make sure the code is correct for the web "document type" (DOCTYPE) you have specified. If you don't specify a DOCTYPE, one gets assigned by default.

Online tools let you check:

• The HTML code
• The CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) code
• Accessibility by the handicapped

If you buy a web design creation service instead of creating your own, it's still a good idea to see if the firms' code passes these checks. Validators usually refer you to a specific line in the code so you can locate and fix problems.

Below are a few links to get you started. You might also want to read, "Should you validate your web page?"

HTML validators

• HTML and XHTML Validator by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
• CSE HTML Validator Lite
• W3C Link Checker - checks for bad links
• HTML, XHTML, WML, XML validator
  

CSS Validators

• W3C CSS Validator
• WDG CSS Check
  

Accessibility checkers

• AccMonitor online
• HiSoft Cynthia Says
• WebAIM's WAVE
• WebXACT
• Accessibility Valet
• LIFT Online - 5-pages evaluated free
  

Why adopt accessibility guidelines?

Web developer Andy Hagans found that a high degree of web page accessibility greatly improves Search Engine Optimization (SEO)." Do you want better search engine ranking? Make your web pages more accessible.

Andy had this "Road to Damascas" moment after editing his website to comply with most W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

• Read Andy's full article

Yahoo! gets hybrid maps

Yahoo has scrambled to adopt the satellite and hybrid maps that Googled has offered for a while. Here's a Yahoo! hybrid map of Avondale Pattillo UMC . Personal opinion -- I like Google Maps better.

Code stylin' tips

• LinkTips blog (links to CSS, color, ...)
• Flow text around image using CSS
• Sample revised blog CSS
• Fluid CSS with extra info in footer ... "Arkanoid" design of SimpleBits
• Dave Shea's CSS Crib Sheet at MezzoBlue has great pointers -- guidelines for web developers.
• CSS crib sheets - Andy Bludd
• CSS-Discuss Wiki has been gathering great tips since 2002. Chek it oiut for tips and explanations.
• CSS Formatter and Optimiser. Based on the free csstidy app, this online code optimizer works well. You get options and code layout choices.

The Terror of Feed Readers

Bryan says that he has kicked the Feed Reader habit and visits blogs he likes via his web browser. Why? Reading all the feeds he had subscribed to was like a black hole sucking up the hours of his week.

So, OK ... maybe you shouldn't subscribe to this feed. Just check back a couple of time a week to see what's new. It's your choice. Just go blaming me if you start down the path leading to Feed Subscribers Anonymous!

Free Google organization email accounts

Google is now beta testing organization email accounts and administration. You have to have a domain address already, but Google lets organizations sign up for and administer email accounts within their own domain. It's free.

So, let's see ... you can now get for free:

• your own domain name and web from Microsoft,
• organization email from Google,
• blogs from Blogger (Google), and
• photo albums from Flickr.

There's no longer any excuse for churches not to have their own web site, email, and more. These online offerings and related tools are easy to use and the price is unbeatable. These are all simple to use and attractive.

CSS tips from NetMechanic

The NetMechanic site is a great one with tons of tips. If you want to learn more about Cascading Style Sheets or just troubleshoot a current challenge, you can find a lot of information in the "CSS Tip" pages.

Check out the latest Usability, HTML, and CSS Tips at the newsletter index.

General principles for church web sites

• Each hour of planning saves 12 hours of changes later.
• Web site visitors mostly "scan" pages
. They don't really "read" all the nice text web designers and content people put there. So plan on it and design based around that.
• Less is more. That goes for design as well as content. A big block of text is visually discouraging. Tons of clip art or small photos is distracting and gives pages a "circusy" look -- not exactly what your church has in mind, I'm sure.
• Use Cascading Style Sheets, which will make site-wide changes much easier and faster to accomplish.
• Aim for a strict HTML 4.01 code. If you can't get there, make as much meet the strict standard as possible. That will save time later, when recoding might be required due to web browsers becoming more standards-oriented.
• Start small in both scope and content. Let the site grow naturally. If your site seems to have a ton of information but not a great organization, consider cutting back content as you think through site organization.Don't post what you can't maintain. There's nothing worse than an obviously outdated site to give your web site visitors a negative impression.
• The only thing constant is change. Go with the flow; expect changes. The web you have in one year should not resemble what it looks like now unless nobody is maintaining it. Every few years, plan on a change in "looks" and features.