{"id":2182,"date":"2008-08-27T19:26:11","date_gmt":"2008-08-27T19:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sunpig.com\/mt-entry-2182.html"},"modified":"2011-08-19T13:02:14","modified_gmt":"2011-08-19T13:02:14","slug":"got-to-get-rid-of-some-of-these-tabs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/2008\/08\/27\/got-to-get-rid-of-some-of-these-tabs\/","title":{"rendered":"Got to get rid of some of these tabs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve got 65 tabs open in Firefox right now.  Five years from now, that will seem like a light sprinkling of web dust.  Right now, it&#8217;s excessive. Time to dump some links:<\/p>\n<h4>JavaScript<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Anonymous functions, parentheses, scoping, and closures:  Peter Michaux &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/peter.michaux.ca\/article\/8117\">An Important Pair of Parens<\/a>.&#8221;  John Resig &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/ajaxian.com\/downloads\/books\/javascriptninja\/JavaScriptNinja_ch3_Article2.pdf\">Using (function(){})()<\/a>,&#8221; a chapter from John&#8217;s forthcoming book, <i>Secrets of the JavaScript Ninja<\/i> (courtesy of <a href=\"http:\/\/ajaxian.com\/archives\/secrets-of-the-javascript-ninja-a-sneak-peak-for-ajaxians\">Ajaxian<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>Stoyan Stefanov &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/yuiblog.com\/blog\/2008\/07\/22\/non-blocking-scripts\/\">Non-blocking JavaScript Downloads<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<li>Version 3 of the Yahoo! User Interface Library (YUI) is <a href=\"http:\/\/yuiblog.com\/blog\/2008\/08\/13\/yui3pr1\/\">on the way<\/a>.  Breaking changes ahead &#8211; take note now.<\/li>\n<li>If you&#8217;re using the Yahoo! CDN to serve up the YUI files for your project, make sure that you use the <a href=\"http:\/\/yuiblog.com\/blog\/2008\/07\/16\/combohandler\/\">combo handler service<\/a> to group the files into a single HTTP call.<\/li>\n<li>The conflict between the two camps trying to push JavaScript forward has been resolved.  The result is &#8220;Harmony.&#8221;  Comments by <a href=\"http:\/\/ejohn.org\/blog\/ecmascript-harmony\/\">John Resig<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/yuiblog.com\/blog\/2008\/08\/14\/premature-standardization\/\">Douglas Crockford<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/alex.dojotoolkit.org\/2008\/08\/thoughts-on-harmony\/\">Alex Russell<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/mail.mozilla.org\/pipermail\/es-discuss\/2008-August\/003400.html\">Brendan Eich<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>CSS<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Are &#8220;variables&#8221; in CSS harmful?  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/People\/Bos\/CSS-variables\">Bert Bos makes the argument<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/alex.dojotoolkit.org\/2008\/08\/css-variables-are-the-future\/\">Alex Russell destroys it comprehensively<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Browsers<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/37signals.blogs.com\/products\/2008\/07\/basecamp-phasin.html\">37Signals to phase out support for IE6<\/a>.  Given its industry position, 37Signals is a company that can get away with this move.  For most of us, though, IE6 is still very much a painful reality.  An announcement like this provides a hopeful glimpse of the future, but my own prediction is that after IE8 comes along IE7 will be dead and forgotten before IE6.<\/li>\n<li> Hallvord R. M. Steen &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/dev.opera.com\/articles\/view\/a-browser-sniffing-warning-the-trouble\/\">A browser sniffing warning: The trouble with Acid3 and TinyMCE<\/a>&#8221; (on <a href=\"http:\/\/dev.opera.com\/\">dev.opera.com<\/a>). Browser detection is bad.  Hallvord describes the <em>bug detection<\/em> technique in this article.  See also Hallvord&#8217;s earlier article &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/dev.opera.com\/articles\/view\/using-capability-detection\/\">Using capability detection<\/a>&#8220;, and PPK&#8217;s &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.quirksmode.org\/js\/support.html\">Object detection<\/a>.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Firefox 3.1 is going to run JavaScript <em>much<\/em> faster:  &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/shaver.off.net\/diary\/2008\/08\/22\/the-birth-of-a-faster-monkey\/\">The birth of a faster monkey<\/a>&#8221;\n<\/ul>\n<p>(With all the improvements going into JavaScript and browsers, client-side development is a great and interesting place to be right now, and the future is looking even better.)<\/p>\n<h4>User Experience<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Bill Scott &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/looksgoodworkswell.blogspot.com\/2008\/07\/anti-pattern-animation-gone-wild.html\">Anti-pattern: animation gone wild<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<li>Jeff Patton &#8211; &#8220;12 Best Practices for UX in an Agile Environment&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.uie.com\/articles\/best_practices\">part 1<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.uie.com\/articles\/best_practices_part2\/\">part 2<\/a> (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.uie.com\/\">UIE<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>Lisa Herrod &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.alistapart.com\/articles\/deafnessandtheuserexperience\">Deafness and the User Experience<\/a>&#8221; (A List Apart)<\/li>\n<li>Ryan Singer (37Signals) &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.37signals.com\/svn\/posts\/1128-learning-from-bad-ui\">Learning from bad UI<\/a>.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Mark Boulton &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.markboulton.co.uk\/journal\/comments\/dont_screw_with_conventions\/\">Don&#8217;t screw with conventions<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>&#8220;Mainstream Users&#8221;<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Jeremy Zawodny &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/jeremy.zawodny.com\/blog\/archives\/010453.html\">The Truth about Web Navigation<\/a>.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Marshall Kirkpatrick &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/will_mainstream_users_ever_learn.php\">Will Mainstream Users Ever Learn About The Browser&#8217;s Address Bar?<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.adpulp.com\/archives\/2006\/08\/typing_for_doll.php\">Case study 1<\/a>:  What happens when you rank highly in Google for the phrase &#8220;Typing for Dollars.&#8221;  Read the comments following the article on the page.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ok-cancel.com\/archives\/link\/2004\/09\/google-answers-hci-phd-program.html\">Case study 2<\/a>:  What happens when you rank highly for the phrase &#8220;cancel Google.&#8221;  Read the comments.  (Surely <em>some<\/em> of them must be taking the piss.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Software development, sexism therein<\/h4>\n<p>Note: this is one of my hot buttons.  When it comes to gender equality, software development is struggling to come out of the dark ages.  What&#8217;s worse, though, is that with a few notable exceptions (see below) it isn&#8217;t struggling <em>very hard<\/em>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Emma Jane Hogbin &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.archive.org\/details\/form_an_orderly_queue_ladies\">Form an orderly queue, ladies<\/a>&#8221; (video presentation)  (Also: <a href=\"http:\/\/geekfeminism.wikia.com\/wiki\/Form_an_Orderly_Queue_Ladies\">notes<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>Alex Russell &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/alex.dojotoolkit.org\/2008\/07\/the-price-of-anonymity-our-principles\/\">The Price of Anonymity: Our Principles?<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<li>Charlie Stross &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.antipope.org\/charlie\/blog-static\/2008\/07\/bechdels_law.html\">Bechdel&#8217;s Law<\/a>,&#8221; and &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.antipope.org\/charlie\/blog-static\/2008\/08\/bechdel_test_roundup.html\">Bechdel test round-up<\/a>.&#8221;  (Not software development, but related.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Conferences<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Jeremy Keith <a href=\"http:\/\/adactio.com\/journal\/tag\/aeasf08\">liveblogged large chunks of the An Event Apart 08 conference<\/a> in San Francisco last week.  Awesome work.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Business<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Steve Yegge &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/steve-yegge.blogspot.com\/2008\/06\/done-and-gets-things-smart.html\">Done, and gets things smart<\/a>.&#8221;  An alternative to Spolsky&#8217;s &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.joelonsoftware.com\/articles\/GuerrillaInterviewing3.html\">Smart, and gets things done<\/a>.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>David Weiss &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/unweary.com\/2008\/02\/finishers-wanted.html\">Finishers Wanted<\/a>&#8220;<\/li>\n<li>Matt Linderman (37Signals) &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.37signals.com\/svn\/posts\/1203-domenico-demarco-and-pizza-as-art\">Domenico DeMarco and pizza as art<\/a>.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Travel<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Edward Hasbrouck (The Practical Nomad) &#8211; &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/hasbrouck.org\/blog\/archives\/001497.html\">Foreigners now need USA permission to leave their home countries<\/a>.&#8221;  Over the last eight years, travel to the USA has become something to dread and fear, not to look forward to and enjoy.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/skyscanner.net\/\">Skyscanner<\/a> has just rolled out a new design and front-end architecture.  Yes, I had a small hand in this. \ud83d\ude42<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Phew.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve got 65 tabs open in Firefox right now. Five years from now, that will seem like a light sprinkling of web dust. Right now, it&#8217;s excessive. Time to dump some links: JavaScript Anonymous functions, parentheses, scoping, and closures: Peter Michaux &#8211; &#8220;An Important Pair of Parens.&#8221; John Resig &#8211; &#8220;Using (function(){})(),&#8221; a chapter from &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/2008\/08\/27\/got-to-get-rid-of-some-of-these-tabs\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Got to get rid of some of these tabs&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2182\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}