Month: September 2007

Web Directions South (wds07) is over for another year and I feel a bit like old Juan Antonio Samaranch when I say it was definitely the best one ever!
Everyone was left buzzing with excitement by the closing keynote, Mark Pesce, whose inspirational speech had an effect like a coaches address at half time in today’s AFL grand final. To focus on Mark’s piece though doesn’t do justice to the rest of the stellar line-up and the generous way they gave their knowledge and made themselves available during the breaks and social events. A the other end of the spectrum ,I chatted over breakfast with the charming and quietly spoken Bert Bos – acknowledged as the ‘inventor’ of css. I work with his baby every day and there I am being asked for any ideas that might be incorporated in future versions… pinch me! In between these two remarkable bookends there were at least a half a dozen other brilliant presentations that I hope will make a difference to the way I work: Andy Clarke, Brian Fling, Scott Berkun, Adrian Holovaty, George Oates… the list goes on!

If you missed it, well, that’s a shame, but it doesn’t mean you won’t feel the effects. Most of the presentations will be available on slideshare, presumably tagged with wds07, there will be podcasts available on the Web Directions site. I’m sure there will also be plenty of photos on flickr, blog posts via technorati and loads of other stuff.

the spoiler

Even if you don’t follow up on anything else, I feel have to give the plot away. Each of the three conferences I’ve attended has accurately predicted the web landscape. ’05 was all: ‘here are these wonderful standards and tools finally coming to maturity, get out there and do good stuff with them’. ’06 was: ‘standards is going mainstream, focus, refine and extend’. This year: ‘mobile’. That’s it! when I get back home, I’m going to check my notes and see if the mobile web was even mentioned at 06. This year, I think it occupied at least 30% of the airtime… amazing! I mean, I knew it was coming, but this isn’t a quiet little wedge creeping into the pie chart of our webstats… this is a whole new pie!

So, dear reader, the message is clear. Think standards, think small, move fast or miss out.

First workshop session at WDS07 Andy Clarke’s ‘Transcending CSS’. Not bad either.

To be honest, I was pleasantly surprised by how little CSS I learned. It tells me I’m at least across the stuff, even if I’m not using it fully in the University environment. And that is the nub of Andy’s message. It’s time we started using it. We can’t very well complain about the shortcomings of CSS if we’re not even using the capabilities we have available.

The biggest thing holding us back? IE6 again! I know I avoid css that doesn’t work in IE6, but it’s now and old browser as well as a buggy one. I for one will be trying to adjust my design-to-code process to take advantage of a few more CSS tricks, who cares if IE6 users miss out?

A trip to a Sydney shouldn’t be this hard! The signs were not good at Melbourne Airport when I arrived at 11:20 yesterday morning. The longest queue I have ever seen stretched from one end of the QANTAS domestic terminal to the other… broken baggage conveyer. Half an hour in the queue and my flight gets called out for special treatment, I check in, but they don’t take my bag, I have to queue again to place my bag on a pile in the terminal.

In the plane now, and waiting again – the captain says they’re putting in the last containers of luggage. Uneventful flight and then we’re waiting on the tarmac at Sydney Airport while they find us an airbridge. Delay after delay – people are starting to get tetchy.

Now waiting at the baggage carousel – waiting, waiting. 40 minutes later the crowd starts to thin as some people catch on that they need to see Baggage services. Mass exodus – now everyone’s waiting in a queue for paperwork for missing baggage. An hour after the plane lands there is finally an official announcement that passengers should see Baggage services.

They take our details – too many people to be dealt with by the counter staff, so we just fill out forms and leave on a promise. That was more than a day and a half ago – still no bag, still no word. Phone calls to QANTAS are fruitless – they tell you nothing, simply referring you to Sydney Baggage Services, who in turn fail to answer the phone. I tried ringing the airport general number, but as soon as I mentioned baggage, I was cut off. Incredulous, I decided it was an unfortunate coincidence, so I rang again… once again, as soon as baggage is mentioned, the nice man hangs up on me.

I find it frustrating, expensive and inconvenient, but there were people on that flight bound for international connections, I feel sorry for them.

I don’t know how widespread this problem is or if there’s something the Australian government isn’t telling us, but this morning when I visited Google Australia for a search, I got this, which appears to be the Indonesian localisation.

C’mon guys – jokes over!