Slashdot Mirror

Karl Marx said that the industrial revolution polarized the world into two groups: those who own the means of production and those who work on them. Today’s means of production aren’t greasy cogs and steam-spewing engines, but that doesn’t mean they don’t divide us. Industrial data is all around us, and search engines, governments, financial markets, social networks and law enforcement agencies rely on it. We willingly embrace this “Big Data” world. We share, friend, check in and retweet our every move. We swipe loyalty cards and enter frequent flyer numbers. We leave a growing, and apparently innocent trail of digital breadcrumbs in our wake. But as we use the Internet (Internet) for “free,” we have to remember that if we’re not paying for something, we’re not the customer. We are in fact the product being sold — or, more specifically, our data is. So here’s a tricky question: Who owns all that data?

Who Owns Your Data?

But what are we complaining about? It’s all free. Having to move our bookmarks is not really a huge problem, but we all seem appalled that large companies care about money. Since when is this an anomaly? Company sees something cool, hopes to make money, buys it, doesn’t make enough money, poof. Here’s a truth for you: most companies only care about your data insofar as this data can help them make money. They have this site and you fill it. You fill it.

"Death to web services. Long live web services!"

So to the extent you're locked in, that's the extent you are not on the open web. The perfectly open web has zero lock-in. The silos are totally locked-in and therefore not on the open web.

What I mean by "the open web"

Your site should be the source and hub for everything you post online. This doesn't exist yet, it's a forward looking vision, and I and others are hard at work building it. It's the future of the indie web.

Tantek Çelik

Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.

A. J. Liebling ("Do you belong in journalism?", The New Yorker, 14 May 1960)

HTML is plain old text.

No, its not. It has tags which are meant to convey data to a user agent and affect the rendering of the "plain old text" content, but not to be rendered as "plain old text".

what exactly is the need for this canonical business again?

The need for a mechanism of communicating the preferred and reliable short-form URL for an HTML document within the document is similar to the need to communicate a permalink within the document -- to provide something that can be stored or transmitted that the resource owner asserts will link back to the document reliably over an extended time. The particular need for the short-form URL is to support something that can easily be communicated in media that rely on a human reading and reproducing the URL -- SMS is one such medium, but print is also a medium which benefits from having reliable short-form URLs (and actually is more likely to be affected by whether those are durable over time than SMS.)

And why canonical, why not http://...?a=a or ...?a=b

I have no idea what you are trying to say with those http URL examples. As for why the particular use of the rev link attribute or the canonical value, since I said in the post you responded to that those were bad choices to fill this need, you probably shouldn't ask me why they are good choices. OTOH, you seem to be suggesting that you'd use something in the URL rather than a link attribute, which doesn't seem to make any sense. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you and you'd like to clarify what it is you are suggesting.

If ones twitter post requires several individual SMSezes all muxed up transparently by the phone, then in this day and age, it really needs to 'just work already'

The issue, which you seem to be missing entirely, is providing information in webpages identifying URL that can be used to access the page itself which is suitable for media where (1) hypertext is not supported, and (2) characters are at a premium for cost or other reasons, and (3) a human will need to transfer the link from that medium to a browser rather than relying on a computer to do it.

I'd prefer using tags with an appropriate rel attribute to using tags with a rev or rel attribtue, since tags are just as easy to harvest programmatically, and can be accessed by users with browsers with no special support, and because visibility is good.

The broken box model problem was where Internet Explorer 5.5 and below included padding in the width of content boxes when it should not. This brought about some of the earliest CSS hacks, for instance Tantek's box model hack, designed to feed Internet Explorer 5.5 and below one width, and other browsers another width.

Internet Explorer 6 introduced doctype switching, where pages using an up-to-date document type got a better rendering, and invalid pages got the Internet Explorer 5.5 rendering with all its associated bugs. Internet Explorer 6, in its better rendering mode, had the box model problem fixed. Unfortunately, there are legions of web developers who don't know what they are doing, and kept writing invalid code that kicked Internet Explorer 6 into its buggy backwards compatibility mode. And then complaining that widths weren't right.

When Microsoft was planning on releasing Internet Explorer 7, 5 years after they fixed the box model problem, they were still swamped by clueless web developers demanding that they fix the box model problem. Somehow it has passed into "common knowledge" that Internet Explorer 6 did not fix this bug. It's not true, you fallen for rumour and hearsay. Load up Internet Explorer 6, feed it a valid, HTML 4.01 Strict document, and test it for yourself. They fixed it in 2001, seven years ago - it's time to stop complaining about that particular bug.

And in digging up that link I discovered the tantek hack is apparently valid CSS, which rather undermines my original point! Still, see AvoidingHacks if you like the train of thought anyway.

• Be prepared to abandon hope of absolute pixel-level control over everything. Seriously, if you want that, go into print design, that's not how the web works.
• (Sometimes this one works as an OR to the above point...) Fix the box model by adding an extra non-semantic div. Simple as that. Voila, no more broken box model, but no invalid CSS full of Tantek hacks either. I don't know why more webdesigners are so against this. Banging on about favouring standards, yet they'd rather deliberately break (invalidate) their own CSS than add a single non-semantic wrapper div? I never quite grasped that. The broken IE box model is responsible for the vast majority of places where pixel-accurate control breaks down between IE and, well, the rest. Of course, it doesn't help fix your 3-pixel jog (for example), but it certainly cuts out the biggest offenders.
• Be prepared to lose a few bells and whistles - for example, no :hover pseudoclass on arbitrary elements. So you can't have table cells that change color as you mouseover. This is pure candy though, so I'm prepared to "not support" IE in this regard. The overall layout/style is exactly the same, so it's not like I'm making IE degrade to "plain, unformatted hypertext" as you suggest - just they miss a few tiny "cherry on top" effects.
• (Again this is a bit of an OR to the previous point) - use javascript. For example, get the effect of arbitrary :hover by using suckerfish javascript techniques.

...was compliments of Tantek Çelik, standards evangelist, and main designer of the Tasman rendering engine which drove IE for Mac. In digging for his history with the project, I note a few things:

• Daring Fireball's archived recap of the history of IE for Mac leading up to its cancellation,
• A blog entry describing how after Tantek was finished with IE for Mac, Microsoft moved him over to ...WebTV (?!),
• An entry on the IE Blog where it looks like Microsoft is advertising for various open positions, and many people are responding with mixed emotions.

As for TFA... gah. Don't get me started on TFA. It doesn't mention IE for Mac at all (perhaps the Publications Coordinator who wrote TFA never heard of it?) and makes some innocent and half-assed assumptions about Web Standards—mostly their lack of existence.

And the marginalization of other browsers? Her argument basically runs that other browsers don't stand a chance against IE's installed base, while conveniently overlooking the fact that IE itself was once an "other" browser and citing ways that IE got the leg-up on Netscape without ever noting that those other browsers are doing the same things to IE. The argument basically runs "Yes, things changed in the past, but things will remain as they are now because they're the way they are now." Buh?

• Ahem?
• I said, "ahem?" (look at this page in IE, then in Firefox.)
• I said "AHEM," damnit! (note what computer the man in the hammock is using.)

...was compliments of Tantek Çelik, standards evangelist, and main designer of the Tasman rendering engine which drove IE for Mac. In digging for his history with the project, I note a few things:

• Daring Fireball's archived recap of the history of IE for Mac leading up to its cancellation,
• A blog entry describing how after Tantek was finished with IE for Mac, Microsoft moved him over to ...WebTV (?!),
• An entry on the IE Blog where it looks like Microsoft is advertising for various open positions, and many people are responding with mixed emotions.

As for TFA... gah. Don't get me started on TFA. It doesn't mention IE for Mac at all (perhaps the Publications Coordinator who wrote TFA never heard of it?) and makes some innocent and half-assed assumptions about Web Standards—mostly their lack of existence.

And the marginalization of other browsers? Her argument basically runs that other browsers don't stand a chance against IE's installed base, while conveniently overlooking the fact that IE itself was once an "other" browser and citing ways that IE got the leg-up on Netscape without ever noting that those other browsers are doing the same things to IE. The argument basically runs "Yes, things changed in the past, but things will remain as they are now because they're the way they are now." Buh?

• Ahem?
• I said, "ahem?" (look at this page in IE, then in Firefox.)
• I said "AHEM," damnit! (note what computer the man in the hammock is using.)

Everyone please remember that IE/Mac is a very different browser than IE/Win, and back in 1999/2000 it was one of the most standards-compliant browsers around.

According to The Web Standards Project it helped to start the "CSS layout revolution".

Back in the day when Netscape ruled and IE was struggling to gain marketshare, MS decided to make IE masquerade as Netscape, hence the "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE x.x)" opening.

This set a precedent for Opera presenting itself as IE, and Apple inserting "Gecko-like" into Safari's UA string. Nothing is compatible with Mozilla 4.0 anymore, and the only browsers that present a correct UA string are the Mozilla browsers.

Add to this that it is possible for the user to change the UA string in any browser (whether via a provided UI or by manually editing files), and the UA string has become completely devoid of purpose, leaving developers with no choice but to fish for internal features using Javascript to ID the browser.

XP SP2 fixed the parsing error which was the basis for the Tantek hack (probably the most widely-used CSS hack), but few developers who use it realize this. This is just one more example of MS creating needless work for developers. Obviously Ballmer's monkey dance (Developers, Developers, Developers!) only applies to those who only work in the vacuum that Microsoft tries to create.

IE7 is purely reactionary, and hopefully they sat on their ill-gotten throne long enough to be deposed by the standards they thumb their nose at. I'll certainly continue telling everyone I know not to use any version of IE.

The technology for social uses of the network will not belong to a single company - be it Orkut, Yahoo, MS or a startup. It will be built on top of the "lowercase semantic web" the same way that the old Internet was built on top of the open TCP/IP protocol.

This semantic web is the result of integrating lightweight, distributed metadata "miniformats" like the del.icio.us tagged bookmarks, the blog trackbaks, and other task-specific metadata like FOAF. Since nobody can control an open standard and users can easily flee from a centralized server and adopt rival ones, market forces will guarantee that not a single provider will hold all users' data.

the death of IE 5 support

I can't get to TFA at the moment to see if this is mentioned, but I did look at the stylesheet for the main page and found that they're using Tantek Celik's IE5 box model hack.

Does that count as "eating your own dog food"?

You might find the stuff Tantek and I have been writing about the 'lowercase semantic web' interesting:
Real World Semantics
Can your website be your API?

These outline the principles behind these new XHTML microformats we are building on at Technorati,

You might find the stuff Tantek and I have been writing about the 'lowercase semantic web' interesting:
Real World Semantics
Can your website be your API?

These outline the principles behind these new XHTML microformats we are building on at Technorati,

The problem with bookmarks is that they are tied down to one computer! I have to maintain two different lists at work and at home. Not to mention when I'm over at a friend's house and I'm trying to remember the url for one of them.

Agreed -- bookmarks must be machine-independent, internet-based.

I rolled my own solution, pretty easy:

* While browsing, click Favelet to pop up window with form, auto fill-in of URL/Title of browsed page.
* Form submits to database (PHP/ASP/JSP/CGI).
* Tweak database for cross-reference by topic, etc.
* PHP/ASP/JSP/CGI pages to get URL/Title back out of database.

Works like a charm, nicely searchable.

-kgj

bah

tables should be used for tabular data _only_. all layout should, and can, be done with CSS. there are a few hacks (box model, etc.) that you'll need to get it looking right cross-browser but it's really pretty easy. if you can't do it then YOU can't do it, there are TONS of sites out there doing it with only a handful of hacks (and they're almost ALL for IE...no surprise).

I don't understand. Why don't you make use of the IE5 filter? There are so few people using IE5, if I understand correctly, that they shouldn't be served CSS. If you just serve them plain HTML with a suggestion to upgrade, then they'll be better off because they'll be informed, & the HTML will render in a readable format. Have you heard of that filter that I describe?

Maybe I misunderstand you?

Why do they leave their CSS box model completely broken when it's obvious what needs fixing?

The box model has been fixed in IE6. Heck, that linked page looks better in IE6 than it does in Mozilla 1.7!

OTOH, this page doesn't render correctly in IE6 without serious hacking.

Why do they leave their CSS box model completely broken when it's obvious what needs fixing?

The box model has been fixed in IE6. Heck, that linked page looks better in IE6 than it does in Mozilla 1.7!

OTOH, this page doesn't render correctly in IE6 without serious hacking.

The problem with IE5 is that it uses the CSS1 method of calculating the size of the box model.

Explained in detail here

Don't forget to omit the xml prolog "<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>" if you are using a xhtml doctype. It'll knock IE back into quirks rendering mode.

I agree that the meyerweb example is a hack (slicing images? bleh).

THIS, on the other hand is some crazy magic and it hurts my head to look at the source. I still don't understand it.

How's that for diagonals?

-h3

The designer hardcoded a fontface because CSS doesn't automatically resize columns like tables do.

Er, 'fontface'? WTF is a 'fontface'?

As for CSS resizing automagically, resize in relation to what, pray tell? A box with width: 30%; resizes in relation to the viewport, a box with width: 15em; resizes in relation to font size, as of CSS 2.1 a box with float: left or float: right and no width resizes in relation to content (most browsers--including IE/Win--do this anyway) and table-layout will get you table-style layout with whatever tags you like. MS just didn't feel the need to support it in IE 5/Win or IE/Mac so people don't use it much. That's Microsoft's fault, not the W3C's

Because CSS was designed by doofus eggheads and not experts in solving real world web design problems.

Ian Hickson edited the CSS2.1 spec, and he's been 'solving real world web design problems' since at least 1998 when I worked with him at the Web Stanards Project. Hakon Wium Lie edited CSS 1, 2 and 2.1 and has been working on Opera since 1999, earned an MS in Visual Studies from MIT and wrote his thesis on electronic display of newspapers. TantekCelik is responsible for the widely-lauded Tasman rendering engine used in IE 5.x/Mac. These people do use this stuff in the real world, and if you don't like the directions they're taking your'e free to join the www-style discussion list and let them know.

Which then forces me to do a bunch of work

One line of CSS is 'a bunch of work'? I suppose you find tying your own shoes a pretty onerous task as well?

or accept undesirable browser settings

Let me get this straight: you're hacked because the site doesn't use your settings for font size and face, but setting your browser to override the site's settings with your choices is 'undesirable'? Huh?

If you design with straight CSS2 / XHTML Transitional for everything, and use all server-side components for handling anything that would require more (posting data, working with a database, etc.), then what's the big deal?

Of course, if you do that, then IE is the only one you have to actually worry about.

But they did technically update IE for Mac OS X. What would have been the next IE version was instead bundled into MSN for Mac OS X.

The sad part is that this new IE is now one of the most standard-compliant browsers around. Just look at this CSS Support Chart. Tantek (an IE:Mac developer) hints even more support. From the chart, it's better than Safari and comparable to Mozilla. But no one seems to have notice.

Which is a shame on Microsoft for hiding this great new browser under MSN. With all the fan-fare on the (not-free) MSN look and feel, the technically superiority of the new IE:Mac rendering engine gets lost.

If you actually look at the link (which compares CSS Support in a range of browsers) you gave, technically MSN for Mac OS X (which is basically the newest version of IE:Mac) clearly supports more "stuff" than WebCore/KHTML (and quite comparable to Mozilla's Gecko rendering engine as well). There's a lot of new work put into standards-support in Microsoft's new Mac browser based on the chart.

And too bad, no one has seemed to noticed.

Which is too bad considering how much work the IE:Mac crew put into this new browser. Check out Tantek's log (he's part of Microsoft's IE:Mac team) about his disappointment with the news.

IE:Mac was special in that it brought a lot of innovation to the browser arena: Find as you Type, Text Zoom, Doctype switching and many more.

The HTML rendering engine (code-name Tasman) in IE/Mac was the first browser to fully support CSS1 and DOM level 1.

To see just how proud the IE/Mac team was of their accomplishment, try typing "about:Tasman" in the IE location bar. Looks a bit like the notorious Acid Box Test page, doesn't it?

You're missing half the beauty of the design without grabbing the Toggle CSS Stylesheet favelet/bookmarklet and trying it out on the winning site.

Because of the use of proper HTML structure (Hx, Acronym tags) the site is still is very accessible and easy to read.

A minor quibble is the rampant usage of spans with a class named "none" to hide navigation divider pipes ("|") when CSS is on. Something like an unordered list might be better structurally... but that's more of a personal thing.

You're missing half the beauty of the design without grabbing the Toggle CSS Stylesheet favelet/bookmarklet and trying it out on the winning site.

Because of the use of proper HTML structure (Hx, Acronym tags) the site is still is very accessible and easy to read.

A minor quibble is the rampant usage of spans with a class named "none" to hide navigation divider pipes ("|") when CSS is on. Something like an unordered list might be better structurally... but that's more of a personal thing.

You're missing half the beauty of the design without grabbing the Toggle CSS Stylesheet favelet/bookmarklet and trying it out on the winning site.

Because of the use of proper HTML structure (Hx, Acronym tags) the site is still is very accessible and easy to read.

A minor quibble is the rampant usage of spans with a class named "none" to hide navigation divider pipes ("|") when CSS is on. Something like an unordered list might be better structurally... but that's more of a personal thing.

You're missing half the beauty of the design without grabbing the Toggle CSS Stylesheet favelet/bookmarklet and trying it out on the winning site.

Because of the use of proper HTML structure (Hx, Acronym tags) the site is still is very accessible and easy to read.

A minor quibble I have is the rampant usage of spans with a class named "none" to hide navigation divider pipes ("|") when CSS is on. Something like an unordered list might be better structurally... but that's more of a personal thing.

You're missing half the beauty if you don't grab the Toggle CSS Stylesheet bookmarklet/favlet and use it when you check out the winning entry.

Because of all the proper structure in the HTML (like proper usage of Hx, and Acronym tags), it still looks good and is easily readable without the CSS. It even unhides "skip to" links (see Dive Into Accessibility) for easier navigation at the top for non-visual browsers.

My only quibble is the repetitive usage of spans with a class called "none" to hide the navigation dividing pipes ("|") when CSS is enabled. Maybe a structure using unordered lists might read better semantically.

Serious Question: How much influence does our favorite pet, Microsoft, have in the W3C?

On an organisational level? Little, I believe, it certainly doesn't seem like Microsoft's participation in the w3c is putting forth the typical Microsoft nastiness.

On a specifications level? They were intimately involved in a couple of crucial recommendations, I believe, including CSS (which of course, originated within Opera).

On a day-by-day basis? Tantek Ãelik is usually found hanging around the w3c mailing lists and commenting on current affairs in his blog. He seems like a smart guy, he worked on IE5/Mac, which was one of the first decent CSS1 implementations.

Microsoft is part of the W3C, and help make many of these standards. If you look at the acknowledgments [w3.org] you'll see Microsoft is actually a member of the working group responsible for these guidelines.

Haahahaa (sorry, I couldn't help myself). This explains why hugely respected accessibility expert Mark Pilgrim slated the MS site redesign in October then (as did Zeldman)? See the news post over at the Web Standards Project (scroll to the bottom of the page).

In summary: Invalid. Inaccessible. Undecipherable in a text-only browser.

Don't get me wrong, Microsoft have some fantastic employees such as Tantek Çelik (who's site kicks major ass BTW) who care passionately about standards, but MS doesn't seem to want to listen most of the time...

"...it was headed up by a guy at Microsoft who pays attention to the standards set by the W3C..."

You're thinking of Tantek Celik.