heisel.org

Woe, woe is me

Tuesday | February 24, 2004 | 11:12 am  

I haven’t been charmed by the snake for long, but oh how it’s charmed me.

Right now, I’d really, really, really like to have Python’s slice operators in PHP.

Once you’ve started using Python, you’ll never want to go back. I’ve learned C, moved on to PHP, and am now using/learning Python for some projects, but I occasionally have to dip back into PHP.

It’s like being torn away from a warm, comfortable, productive world and being yanked into a cold, harsh, world where }’s and )’s watch over a programmer chain-gang.

I’ve been debating whether to learn Java or Perl next, but I don’t want to leave the world of Python… what’s a coder to do?

Permalink | Comments (7) | Categories: Technology, Web design

Countin’ down your favorites

Sunday | February 22, 2004 | 5:09 pm  

Just when you thought it couldn’t get any better…

I’m not sure when they rolled it out, but Apple added Billboard’s Hot 100 and Top R&B charts from 1946 to present to the iTunes Music Store.

This is a really nice way to go back through the one hit wonders from days-gone-by (especially for folks like me who can’t seem to find much new music they like…).

Bravo, Apple!

Permalink | Comments (0) | Categories: Technology

It’s stupid, on purpose

Friday | February 20, 2004 | 3:31 pm  

Anyone who works in the Internet biz, especially us newspaper types, should check out World of Ends.

This is a great article by Doc Searls and David Weinberger, that really gets at what the Internet is and what stupid (not in a good way) mistakes companies keep making.

One that’s particularly applicable to the online newspaper industry is this:

Perhaps companies that think they can force us to listen to their messages — their banners, their interruptive graphic crawls over the pages we’re trying to read — will realize that our ability to flit from site to site is built into the Web’s architecture. They might as well just put up banners that say “Hi! We don’t understand the Internet. Oh, and, by the way, we hate you.”

I’ve talked before about how easy it is for your users to leave your site. One click of the close button and… poof!

It takes more effort to take the newspaper and drop it on a stack, that I’ll recycle once it falls on my fiancee and I hear her cries for help, than it does to close a browser window.

It’s about the users, stupid!

Give them what they want, when they want, how they want. Whatever your business model, this is the key to success.

For the newspaper business, happy users means more return visits, users who are more likely to pay attention to ads (if they’re ads that users want, when they want them, and how they want them…), which means more revenue.

Permalink | Comments (0) | Categories: Business, Management, Technology, Web design

It’s my browser, not yours

Friday | February 13, 2004 | 2:30 pm  

And I’ll decide when to open links a new window, thank you very much.

E-media Tidbit’s Steve Outing gets it wrong when he suggests that papers should send readers to off-site links in a new window.

His suggestion that the new window be sized small enough to indicate that the original site is underneath is a valiant effort to combat the usability problem of breaking the back button, but it introduces another.

To open a window with a specified size, you’d have to use Javascript, which would mean the href would probably point to “#”, while an onClick event would be set.

For users who have grown tired of windows opening out of nowhere and who probably now open links in new windows (via context-menus) or in new tabs, they’ll get a blank window and be forced to go back and use the Javascript link provided.

Remember, it’s my browser, not yours.

By not linking off-site, or by doing so with annoying new windows, sites are merely generating ill will among their users.

Consider how little effort it takes to copy an off-site link and paste it into the URL field if I want to leave your site (or the even smaller amount of effort it takes to close the browser).

To those digital naysayers who are now plotting to remove any off-site URLs from their content, (linked or unlinked), consider how little effort it’ll take me to leave your page, go to Google and search for the company or site you mentioned but didn’t provide a URL for.

So ask yourself, if it’s so easy to leave your site when you’re making it difficult then why try and stop them from leaving? Instead, provide plain ol’ simple “a href’s” and generate some goodwill among your users.

Happy users means more users, which means happy advertisers.

Permalink | Comments (2) | Categories: Web design