Oct282007

Identifying HTML-document Capabilities

Published by rocjoe at 2:52 PM under Sofware Development

I've been dabbling with search-engine-optimization lately so document metadata has been on my mind lately. That got me to thinking that identifying "document capabilities" could be made easy with better use of the metadata in the document.

We Built this City on <meta> Tags

Metadata is already used extensively in the <head> section of your HTML documents and have been fundamental in building the web. For example, the <meta> tag played a significant role in how search engines ranked your website stretching back to the pre-bubble days of the nascent Internet. Back in the day, I spent many hours trying to load up meta tags with relevant keywords for whomever's website I was working on.

Fifteen years later, and the <link> tag and the "rel" attribute are helping to make RSS and ATOM feeds easily discoverable (that's not to say it didn't appear until the 2000's it had actually been languishing within the HTML spec for years but was under-utilized in the mainstream web). Probably what really brought the presence of this metadata to the forefront was the conspicuous inclusion of the RSS logo in the address bar of popular browsers like Firefox and Internet Explorer. For example, you probably see the RSS logo in the address bar when visiting this site (hint, hint...).

But we want more, don't we?

Well, I do, or I wouldn't be writing this post! So where do we begin? What we're talking about really is metadata so its up to the <meta> tag to fill these shoes. The important part is to establish conventions and patterns to follow so Joe Google out there can parse your HTML documents to present the most useable/relevant pages to the user. Try this:

ADA Compliance and Search Engines

Example: <meta name="ADA" content="1" />

ADA-compliance has 3 levels, so it would be worthwhile to indicate more than just compliance, but also which level is attained and now visitors will be aware of what ADA compliant features they can access in a document. Those interested in providing accessible websites could determine their level of compliance using Bobby, and include their compliance level in the metadata.

Most special-capability browsers are playing a guessing-game with every web-page they display because all they can do is open the document, parse it and make the best use of the ADA features that are indicated in the markup.

But as many of us who've worked with <label> and <legend> know, most documents on the web are lacking even this simple and useful tags.  So really the guessing-game just wastes the time and energy of a user who may require usability features to properly access a document but rarely finds websites that provide these basics.

If a browser could tell right away that the document is not going to meet the compliance needs of the browsee(?), it could notify the user that the document may not be accessible, or even better, kick in to a "smart-mode" browser that will try to re-process the HTML document into something that really is accessible.

Beyond visiting web pages first-hand, when HTML documents declare what level of compliance they intend to support in the <meta> tag, it would be possible for search engines to build indices of accessible documents, even partitioning the results based on the user's compliance needs! Hmmmm! That's good metadata!

For my Next Trick...

Yet there's plenty of other things we could support, it's metadata after all so it could be anything. For example, how handy would it be for Grandma to search only for documents that offer a large print version of their website's pages, or the author has prepared a printable version. The day is already upon us where we might prefer to know that a site is using AJAX/jQuery/Rails/Scriptaculous before we get there, so we don't have to watch our browser choke on the Javascript poundage, or your browser could reconfigure check available resources to warn you of potential trouble before you even click the link!

Really, we're only limited by our imagination... and the willingness of the search engines to use our metadata. But we could be making the web a much more useful place with a little forethought.



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Oct242007

The Filter

Published by rocjoe at 11:35 PM under Sofware Development

Every programmer requires a special filter at their disposal that will block them from revealing technical details to other people-- even (or especially) when they're an employee of the same company as you.

We techies have our heads buried in the sand when it comes to "looking out for #1", the people who pretend to require answers from you have no problem on this angle and believe me, to them, you are not the "one" they are looking look out for.

But isn't Honesty the Best Policy?

Oh, hell no!

So if you're not going to use that filter in your head to stop you from saying too much, even when and especially if they demand a more and more replies, be prepared to have them fire back at you one day with your own ammo, i.e. the things you spoke of today with the wrong person.

Bust who are the "wrong people"?

Everyone. Though you may come to work to cut some code, the average office-worker is there to pull in the biggest paycheque they can wrangle and if it means stepping on your balls to reach it, they will.

That's Pretty Bleak-- What the Hell Am I Going To Do?

Principally, its hard to spare extra cycles for "the filter" when you're sifting through millions of transactions in a database wondering why your columns don't total or combing through thousands of lines of code to squash a really small (as in hard-to-find) bug.

Awareness is half the battle, knowing that a filter is required not just on the phone with clients but also around the office, then you've taken a big step forward.

Even some planning ahead is appropriate, the next sit-down meeting with your boss or (shudder) a sales executive, make sure to stop doing any mentally taxing work at least 15 minutes before the appointment, so your brain has a chance to warm up "the filter".

Also, its best not to attempt to anticipate specifically how they will attack-- just assume everything they say is an attempt to gather ammo. No need to be defensive about it. Be lame instead and remember that the rolling-of-their-eyes is a far better outcome than having someone ambush you weeks or months later with some quote attributed to you! As long as you keep handing over wet fish instead of live ammo, they will eventually give up and find someone else as their doormat.

Last: don't take it personally.

Do you really think people are that nasty for real? I don't. If these people considered they are interacting with other human beings instead of jockeying for advantage within a competitive field, shame would stop them long before they ever got started.



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Oct192007

Windows 7 and MinWin - Where Have You Been Hiding?

Published by rocjoe at 8:27 PM under Tech

Eric Traut talks (and demos) Windows 7 and MinWin - istartedsomething

At last! Someone at Microsoft must have heard about this refactoring jazz all the kids are talking about these days.

That is, they're finally getting around to stripping down the Windows kernel to its nuts-and-bolts. Instead of trying to secure a 4Gb kernel (i.e. Vista) they can work around securing a 25Mb kernel (yes, twenty-five). Not that this kind of kernel can do everything, heck, it doesn't even have a graphics subsystem, even the Windows logo is done in ASCII art (somewhere, a Commodore 64 is spinning in its grave). But this means when they specialize the kernel (e.g. a desktop kernel, a database kernel, etc) they will just add the parts that they need.

What a good decision to make. Actually, the decision was probably to follow the path set down by the Linux kernel-- it too is modular, you only compile what you need into the kernel, making it only as large as it needs to be to get the job done. This keeps footprints small, and un-necessary background tasks to a minimum. I expect no less from the MinWin kernel when it sees light of day (and by 'expect' I mean 'will accept nothing less').

Windows Programs That MUST Be Left Out of Windows7 -- the un-official list.

Now we just have to pass this news on to the desktop OS teams, and get them to go on a diet. For starters, I'm thinking:

  1. Windows Movie Maker - just leave it for the 3rd party guys, please!
  2. WordPad - this was irrelevant once it fell behind the Word document format-du-jour
  3. Notepad - please, please, just give us something slightly better, like regex search-and-replace, and no crashing on large files
  4. Paint
  5. Synchronize - invented for dial-up internet users, who uses dial-up these days?
  6. Hyperterminal
  7. Address Book -- so many other address books, who's really going to miss this one?
  8. Messenger - this will never be a "must have" because it really depends on what the user's friends use-- there's like 10 choices here, only one of them is Microsoft
  9. MSN - IE or MSN, not both
  10. Windows Speech services - seriously, this is only a diversion from getting the OS ready on time
  11. Windows Table services - ditto!

...Ok, we'll stop there. If you must, go back to the "Plus" pack, and include the above items in there-- but if people are going to pay extra for them they'd better than what they are today.

Be the fastest, be the one that is effortless to get online with, be the one that is the most secure. Just don't be the one full of lame, half-assed software.



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Oct192007

Canada's Copyright Board Hates Law-Abiding Canadians

Published by rocjoe at 6:30 PM under Entertainment

I just don't get it. I skip getting the music for free, even though I could. I acquiesce on the presumption that because I buy blank CDs I must be pirating (you know you're actually paying extra on blank CDs bought in Canada).

But now, now they're telling me that my COMPLETELY LEGAL MUSIC DOWNLOADS must be taxed, then that money gets "distributed to the artists"? What the hell was I paying for before this tax came into being? This just makes no sense! NO SENSE!

If that's the way its got to be, then I don't see any point in buying music ever again. From now on, I hum totally random notes for entertainment. Screw the money sluts in the Canadian recording industry.

Copyright Board of Canada? You're on my list. ... And so's your ugly friend SOCAN-- the people who get to pocket this "tax".

I will spend the rest of my life making sure you never get your grubby hands on my wallet.

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Oct162007

That's What I've Been Trying to Tell You!

Published by rocjoe at 8:40 PM under Pondering | Sofware Development

To the "Product Director" of "Company ABC":

I've been trying to tell you for years. Your additions are merely subtracting simplicity from the product, they're not improvements. Just because you see design as a complex issue, your product design does not (must not!) be as complex. Your job should be to master the issue, not get buried under it.

I could go on, but here is what I'm really trying to say: Strive to be an old-style microwave oven

It doesn't get any simpler than that. Please grasp this message as soon as possible and we'll all be more happy and productive!



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