There question is, "Is your approach the same as all the other design companies out there?" If so, that's not much of a business plan. If you really want to do this, because every man and his dog is doing it also, you have to offer far more than there average WD out there.
When clients ask your advice, your knowledge in this area is a major asset, do you have real knowledge in this area? If so, give them real estimates of what sites and strategies really cost, now, in the near future and down the track, and show them how much time THEY will have to invest into the site. If they value you honesty and integrity, they are also clients worth keeping and working with, if they are just out for the cheapest solution, you can't help them when they get burnt (or maybe you can, when they come back to you realising what your expertise is really worth).
That means really learning Markup, HTTP, and server side management, and programming.
Don't just learn Dreamweaver or some Web Publishing Tool. Learn the ins and outs of Markup, learn the W3C standards, how to implement them, where to implement them, and where not to implement them. You have to learn this stuff to set yourself apart or be a class above the rest.
You should know what is happening on the server side and manage it best of practice and HTTP so you know how to best deliver and work with content.
PHP and MySQL are good to learn. One of the benefits is you can find hosting easily. But if you have a growing client base you should think seriously of planning to lease your own dedicated server in the near future. This way you can configure the server, offer more services, better services, niche services. Offer a Control Panel, etc. This also developing expert knowledge in Linux/BSD, or hiring someone to manage your server.
Find one or two CMSs that you can work with and offer this expertise and way to manage content for you clients.
Find other good Open Source products and work with them.
Keep an eye on Apache/Cocoon/Lenya and learn that way of delivering content. This will allow you to build specialist knowledge and offer far better solutions than most clients have access too. You'll need you own server for this. But take a look at this when thinking advanced open source CMS.
Take all the other advice here, even the ones that say, "Don't do it!", Think about it at least and write a good business plan that allows you to grow in a way that offers more than the average WD.
I've had the good fortune to work with some great tech writers, great programmers and great IT managers, and yes, I have also seen the clueless versions of each. I've written some good tech manuals, etc, but when a professional comes along, well its just like watching a very good programmer do his/her stuff, I am in awe of how they turn complex issues into clear easy to read expression. It just amazes me. For me it is usually, very, very rough draft, very rough draft, rough draft, rewrite, rough draft, etc, I get there, but it doesn't flow out of my being like it does for someone who is in their zone doing this stuff. Actually, I'm doing a lot more of it now.
Another thing is there are more positions now for tech people involved with content, such as Content Managers, Content Architects, Content Strategists, etc. They are not just jobs titles, they are real job functions in Enterprise level organisations.
Just as a side note, have you ever seen an enterprise level structure of content? I doubt it exists in the modern world. What I am talking about is some sense of a documents sections being nodes or branches in a tree, as SGML was meant to address? I do of know XML being used to some extent in this area, but it seems to me that while this was supposed to be one of the saving graces of XML, very little use of it has been made in sharing data between documents. I think large organisations have a huge problem with this issue and they are nowhere near finding a solution. I'd be happy if people could point me to places this is being address (I think maybe some of the Open Source initiatives are trying to address this).
Tech writing is something that you can make a career of.
I worked in the Systems User Documentation group at Telstra for 2 years as a contract web developer. There were 3 web developers and 18 tech writers in that group, when we were all on basically the same pay and all out sourced, most of the tech writers found work just as easily, and in some cases more easily, that the developers. (actually the whole department (660) were outsourced).
I worked at GE as a tester for a short while, and you need tech writing skills for that.
Just look at any job board, especially in the contracting area, it's a valid career path, if you really know both your tech and writing.
Other options are;
Writing Tech Books
Writing Tech Articles
Editing Tech Publications
Translator (Geek speak to understandable English, whatever)
The programmers that are also good writers appreciate clear syntax and grammar that both disciplines require.
The better programmers also appreciate that others are going to have to read their code, and they engineer programs in a sane and efficient architecture, where the code, the structure, the modules and everything is almost self documenting.
Some people have little or no money but need a computer (for their kids to study, whatever). In such cases our Linux User Group get donated old 486s with 16Mg RAM and small hard disks and install a small distro of Debian Woody that is configured to look as Windows like as possible.
In some cases users require Windows. This is where this type of thing is useful.
I'd really appreciate it if someone could point to an article or site which gave an overview of all the different licenses, and in which cases to use which ones, the pros and the cons, etc.. It's just getting so difficult.
You may loose your normal view of page layout formatting, but if you structure your XHTML Strict logically, it will still be a readable and navigateable document.
If you structure your document well, with Strict DTD, you can apply different CSS to different media, and it takes very little editing and effort to do so.
You can create printer friendly pages, mobile device pages, etc CSS, from exactly the same XHTML markup by applying different styles and displaying or hiding different sections.
This also makes Strict more attractive to documents stored in XML and rendered through XSLT. It makes the target format more flexible, and also makes it much more easy to radically change the design (if need be), via some changes to the Style Sheets, which is no where near as easy when trying to attempt the same in Transitional DTDs.
That addresses CSS, but not HTML markup or programming the DOM, which put together unfortunately makes a Matrix so vast that even Neo couldn't master the knowledgebase
What to do, you can see by all the discussion here, that even when you follow standards, to get the most out of your efforts you have probably end up doing non standard things to trick the non standard compliant browsers into behaving in a standard type way.
It's a vicious cycle. But still, these days, there are far more benefits to being as standard compliant as possible
I think this is a legitimate strategy to serve documents in a correct manner because of browser bugs, especially as it is controlled in the server configuration, and especially as MS is too lazy to invest money to update IE. But maybe sticking to XHTML Strict DTD 1.0 is sufficient
What gets me more is the price most of these companies add to a monthly bill to increase the memory of a dedicated server (and I guess they keep the actual hardware chips too).
this is not unique to Buddhists. It's entirely up to the spirituality or approach of each individual.
There are also plenty of suffering Buddhists amongst us. Yet at the same time I do feel that there are teachings within Buddhism that are treasures of humanity.
I have found that studying and practicing Buddhism has given me a greater appreciation of other teachings, cultures, methods, ways of life, and the human spirit (in general).
At the same time, I feel it often cheapens and can be misleading and deceptive when any spiritual teaching presents itself to sell it as a means to happiness.
This may be the goal, but it can be misleading to say that the journey is full of happiness. Even if some experience this to be true, still, it is uncompassionate to present it in a general way like that.
Often what is involved in the path is a lot of reflecting, and discovery of the tyranny of self deception (on many levels). That may lead to happiness (through liberation from self deception), but that process may not necessarily be a happy one (but it can be).
An individuals path or journey through life is not always so smooth. It's how they learn from, deal with, and adapt to what happens to them that counts in the long run, and how they share their life with their community (and fellow beings) as a whole.
As HH Dalai Lama says, it is a good thing that there are so many paths to suit the diversity of human beings.
I'm 48, which makes me mostly redundant in the IT market. I don't mind. I was laid off a year ago, and moved back to the countryside to change lifestyle and live more cheaply.
I got a seemingly good job late last year as a J2EE portal developer. But really, it was the same old problem; management thought they had a solution, but anyone could see all they were really doing was being employed to develop something, without their input, which would not fulfill the real user world requirements, and the problem would go on, and on, and on (but it was a job).
I was also sick of a 40 hour week in an office cubicle.
So now I work for myself. I don't get much work at all in web accessibility (as I feel it's marketability / relevance (ROI) is pretty low.. at present). Instead I am developing strategies to run my own server and offer a business of Open CMS solutions, development, tech content, and other information services.
In the mean time, I break my day up between
Doing stuff to earn money
Tech writing for future books and web site publication
Working on the farm (its great to be able to just step out in to the fresh air and do something physical for a while, whenever I want)
Working on some Open Source projects to maintain skills
Working on a CMS that is based on Dublin Core/CVS (but I'm looking more and more at http://www.lenya.org/)
Emailing past colleagues around 11am saying I am either going for a swim in the mountain stream or like minded activities (knowing they are trapped in their cubicle)
Meditating... trying to reconcile my evil nature for delighting in doing the previous list item
Tai Chi
Walk with dogs
Helping the local Linux User Group assemble computers for poor and needy
Enjoying the peace and quiet
Enjoying the work I do, instead of hating it... even though it doesn't pay the bills anymore
It should really have been done in XHTML Strict DTD.
Pretty much anything can be designed well in Transitional DTD, but doing it in Strict is far more challenging (and this is the DTD that the W3C home page is done in, so it should have been the required DTD).
When doing it in Strict, as much of the design and layout, as possible, is moved away from the structural layout and into the CSS/XSLT, which is not the case with transitional. The full and real benefits of seperating markup are not gained using Transitional (making the design more portable and flexible between media).
This is the Black Art to markup coding and it's pay off is the flexibility and portability of the structured markup between media. Of course there are the down sides of decredation in various browsers, but there are now more and more good reasons to support using Strict than ever before. The improvement in browser support and the increasing use of other media and devices shows the change in this landscape.
There are some good references here already, but you need to do more than
just teach pure xhtml, you should give some history and context,
and reasons why xhtml exists. Cover both the benefits, limitations and user agent support.
It's important to put whatever you are teaching in context, not just teach it devoid of real life application and history.
Explain xhtml in terms of the main xhtml DOCTYPES/DTDs; strict, transitional and frameset.
Without understanding DOCTYPEs the context of markup can be lost. Focus on strict dtd, but be sure to cover it's dangers and limitations in user agents.
Getting students to work with strict will give them a better understanding of the whole process of trying to separate content from presentation,
develop real knowledge and skills and understanding the benefits of this in the long run.
If students use strict they will need to reject all use of deprecated tags, which is a good discipline to get into.
Learning xhtml is not as tough as learning good accompanying CSS practice, especially if you are trying to manage positioning in the design, and also design according to accessibility principles using relative units instead of absolute units.
You should also cover relevant material in W3C documents
There is plenty of evidence in IT history to support this, but it is not that easy to cast such a blanket observation. I also feel I have seen plenty of evidence of usability specialists designing over technical user interfaces.
One phenomena that has not been adequately researched is the user interfaces designed by the developer/techies themselves. I know a lot of people are going to say this is the problem, but I ask this question, why is it that of the many web sites out there, the ones that are designed by developer/geek/hackers, the blogs, etc, these seem to have much more clean, elegant and easy to understand functionality than the majority of other sites? I know this is an over generalisation, but I do feel there is a strong point here.
Also, I could go on and on about how developers have been too typecast in this position. How many of us have told management and business analysts of the problems inherent in changing the product, but you learn to keep your mouth shut if you want your job. Your opinion is not wanted, just shut up and sit in the corner and code.
If you can sell a new version of the product, with the training, this is how you make money. Without the upgrade path, there is no future in normal commercial software. You have to produce product, which requires new marketable features. And the shit comes back on the developer, who is often the one person who is very aware of the problems with this whole process.
I could write essays about all this... but that is for another place and time.
HTTP is a very primitive protocol. I don't know when or if it will be overhauled or superseeded, but if it is, it needs more than this suggestion, much more, lot's of work, planning, forsight, architecture and engineering.
Are there any books that are up to date on these techniques, related to php 4.2 and greater? What are the best sites and references to avoid the short comings associated with older versions referenced in books?
It's no Silver Bullet, and I agree it can have all the problems you mentioned (and others as well). This comment says it can be done well.
Every Technologies has +/-s. Just be aware of them
on
SVG On the Rise
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I feel developers should always try to be as aware as possible about the technologies they use, without bias. Sometimes a client may request something be done in Flash, other clients may require that everything be as XML conformant as possible. Whatever the request, the developer needs to be aware of the pluses and minuses of each, and inform the client where need be. Flash has it's place, especially as Macromedia is putting in effort with MX to get it to address accessibility issues.
There is another possible advantage to SVG, being XML compliant, that I have not seen addressed here, and that is SVG media/documents can be formatted on the fly, using XSLT for various media. CSS addresses media types for (I know the support for all is not there yet, but it is getting there)
screen
print
projection
handheld
tty
tv
aural
braille
emboss
I saw Dean Jackson's presentation at the OzeWAI 2002 Conference. From what I could see, he was using Mac OSX, and Python XSLT tools to produce his PowerPoint like SVG slides. In this format, one should be able to configure completely different behaviour, look and feels for any of the desired end media formats. Without a file format based in structured markup, this becomes much more difficult to address. For this purpose, this is far more flexible.
I do feel that as/if SVG is eventually built into browsers natively, there will need to be some user configurability to control the behaviour of the SVG, (and other media) in the browser. If there are animations the user needs to be able to easily turn them off (if they want too), or allow the user to turn them off by default. Users obviously want this type of control as each user is different, some may love animated web pages, others may not. SVG and user-agents need to be easily configurable and controllable. This should be pretty obvious given Mozilla's and Opera's preferences to allow the user to manage the DOM, and the market in Popup blockers for IE that manage the DOM and http refreshes and the like.
As a side note, I really do not think the W3C is trying to box in/out developers.
I try to follow most of the discussion groups associated with Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
I can see how it would be easy to form the mistaken opinion that this bunch of people basically want a web driven by Lynx (or some really bland HTML).
I ask those of you here that find the process of the W3C draconian, to just follow any of the active W3C discussion lists. I find a community of people that, for one have taught me a lot about how to work as a collaboration of people with different views and agendas, that are working with everyone to try and find a way to present the web in the most universal and open standards. There is often very healthy debate, and many people trying and working very hard not to limit the standards. The W3C is not the Web Police, it's just a standards body trying to build an equitable, accessible web (Maybe I'm really naive).
Admittedly they do not do such a good job of marketing themselves and educating developers, but it is a democratic process, if you really don't like something and feel you have better solutions, or can improve, or help, join a working group and help improve the web.
If you do follow a discussion list for a few months, and do not find what I stated, well.. you can email me a tell me what a flamin idiot I am (you may not be far wrong).
I'm not pro-ms, but it's not as simple as that. MS has many apps, departments and policies. As for IE meeting standards, the Windows versions are still getting there, but are pretty good, but they do have some bugs, shortcomings in HTML, CSS, and especially DOM. But some credit must go to the Mac programmers at MS who built one of the most standard compliant versions of IE (5.5).
From what I can gauge, the adherence to standards in MS, or any large company often has a lot more to do with departmental leadership, agendas and politics, rather than overall company policy.
MS deserves credit for making their OS and API supportive of accessibility assistive technologies, but they still have a way to go. As a side note, their main accessibility page, (and probably all the rest of them) has nevervalidated.
Slashdot Mirror
There question is, "Is your approach the same as all the other design companies out there?" If so, that's not much of a business plan. If you really want to do this, because every man and his dog is doing it also, you have to offer far more than there average WD out there.
When clients ask your advice, your knowledge in this area is a major asset, do you have real knowledge in this area? If so, give them real estimates of what sites and strategies really cost, now, in the near future and down the track, and show them how much time THEY will have to invest into the site. If they value you honesty and integrity, they are also clients worth keeping and working with, if they are just out for the cheapest solution, you can't help them when they get burnt (or maybe you can, when they come back to you realising what your expertise is really worth).
That means really learning Markup, HTTP, and server side management, and programming.
Don't just learn Dreamweaver or some Web Publishing Tool. Learn the ins and outs of Markup, learn the W3C standards, how to implement them, where to implement them, and where not to implement them. You have to learn this stuff to set yourself apart or be a class above the rest.
You should know what is happening on the server side and manage it best of practice and HTTP so you know how to best deliver and work with content.
PHP and MySQL are good to learn. One of the benefits is you can find hosting easily. But if you have a growing client base you should think seriously of planning to lease your own dedicated server in the near future. This way you can configure the server, offer more services, better services, niche services. Offer a Control Panel, etc. This also developing expert knowledge in Linux/BSD, or hiring someone to manage your server.
Find one or two CMSs that you can work with and offer this expertise and way to manage content for you clients.
Find other good Open Source products and work with them.
Keep an eye on Apache/Cocoon/Lenya and learn that way of delivering content. This will allow you to build specialist knowledge and offer far better solutions than most clients have access too. You'll need you own server for this. But take a look at this when thinking advanced open source CMS.
Take all the other advice here, even the ones that say, "Don't do it!", Think about it at least and write a good business plan that allows you to grow in a way that offers more than the average WD.
I've had the good fortune to work with some great tech writers, great programmers and great IT managers, and yes, I have also seen the clueless versions of each. I've written some good tech manuals, etc, but when a professional comes along, well its just like watching a very good programmer do his/her stuff, I am in awe of how they turn complex issues into clear easy to read expression. It just amazes me. For me it is usually, very, very rough draft, very rough draft, rough draft, rewrite, rough draft, etc, I get there, but it doesn't flow out of my being like it does for someone who is in their zone doing this stuff. Actually, I'm doing a lot more of it now.
Another thing is there are more positions now for tech people involved with content, such as Content Managers, Content Architects, Content Strategists, etc. They are not just jobs titles, they are real job functions in Enterprise level organisations.
Just as a side note, have you ever seen an enterprise level structure of content? I doubt it exists in the modern world. What I am talking about is some sense of a documents sections being nodes or branches in a tree, as SGML was meant to address? I do of know XML being used to some extent in this area, but it seems to me that while this was supposed to be one of the saving graces of XML, very little use of it has been made in sharing data between documents. I think large organisations have a huge problem with this issue and they are nowhere near finding a solution. I'd be happy if people could point me to places this is being address (I think maybe some of the Open Source initiatives are trying to address this).
Tech writing is something that you can make a career of.
I worked in the Systems User Documentation group at Telstra for 2 years as a contract web developer. There were 3 web developers and 18 tech writers in that group, when we were all on basically the same pay and all out sourced, most of the tech writers found work just as easily, and in some cases more easily, that the developers. (actually the whole department (660) were outsourced).
I worked at GE as a tester for a short while, and you need tech writing skills for that.
Just look at any job board, especially in the contracting area, it's a valid career path, if you really know both your tech and writing.
Other options are;
I agree.
The programmers that are also good writers appreciate clear syntax and grammar that both disciplines require.
The better programmers also appreciate that others are going to have to read their code, and they engineer programs in a sane and efficient architecture, where the code, the structure, the modules and everything is almost self documenting.
Some people have little or no money but need a computer (for their kids to study, whatever). In such cases our Linux User Group get donated old 486s with 16Mg RAM and small hard disks and install a small distro of Debian Woody that is configured to look as Windows like as possible.
In some cases users require Windows. This is where this type of thing is useful.
One of my all time favorites; Monty Python's Ron Obvious of Neaps End attempts to jump the English Channel
Thanks
I'd really appreciate it if someone could point to an article or site which gave an overview of all the different licenses, and in which cases to use which ones, the pros and the cons, etc.. It's just getting so difficult.
You may loose your normal view of page layout formatting, but if you structure your XHTML Strict logically, it will still be a readable and navigateable document.
If you structure your document well, with Strict DTD, you can apply different CSS to different media, and it takes very little editing and effort to do so.
You can create printer friendly pages, mobile device pages, etc CSS, from exactly the same XHTML markup by applying different styles and displaying or hiding different sections.
This also makes Strict more attractive to documents stored in XML and rendered through XSLT. It makes the target format more flexible, and also makes it much more easy to radically change the design (if need be), via some changes to the Style Sheets, which is no where near as easy when trying to attempt the same in Transitional DTDs.
That addresses CSS, but not HTML markup or programming the DOM, which put together unfortunately makes a Matrix so vast that even Neo couldn't master the knowledgebase
.What to do, you can see by all the discussion here, that even when you follow standards, to get the most out of your efforts you have probably end up doing non standard things to trick the non standard compliant browsers into behaving in a standard type way.
It's a vicious cycle. But still, these days, there are far more benefits to being as standard compliant as possible
I think this is a legitimate strategy to serve documents in a correct manner because of browser bugs, especially as it is controlled in the server configuration, and especially as MS is too lazy to invest money to update IE. But maybe sticking to XHTML Strict DTD 1.0 is sufficient
What gets me more is the price most of these companies add to a monthly bill to increase the memory of a dedicated server (and I guess they keep the actual hardware chips too).
this is not unique to Buddhists. It's entirely up to the spirituality or approach of each individual.
There are also plenty of suffering Buddhists amongst us. Yet at the same time I do feel that there are teachings within Buddhism that are treasures of humanity.
I have found that studying and practicing Buddhism has given me a greater appreciation of other teachings, cultures, methods, ways of life, and the human spirit (in general).
At the same time, I feel it often cheapens and can be misleading and deceptive when any spiritual teaching presents itself to sell it as a means to happiness.
This may be the goal, but it can be misleading to say that the journey is full of happiness. Even if some experience this to be true, still, it is uncompassionate to present it in a general way like that.
Often what is involved in the path is a lot of reflecting, and discovery of the tyranny of self deception (on many levels). That may lead to happiness (through liberation from self deception), but that process may not necessarily be a happy one (but it can be).
An individuals path or journey through life is not always so smooth. It's how they learn from, deal with, and adapt to what happens to them that counts in the long run, and how they share their life with their community (and fellow beings) as a whole.
As HH Dalai Lama says, it is a good thing that there are so many paths to suit the diversity of human beings.
I'm 48, which makes me mostly redundant in the IT market. I don't mind. I was laid off a year ago, and moved back to the countryside to change lifestyle and live more cheaply.
I got a seemingly good job late last year as a J2EE portal developer. But really, it was the same old problem; management thought they had a solution, but anyone could see all they were really doing was being employed to develop something, without their input, which would not fulfill the real user world requirements, and the problem would go on, and on, and on (but it was a job).
I was also sick of a 40 hour week in an office cubicle.
So now I work for myself. I don't get much work at all in web accessibility (as I feel it's marketability / relevance (ROI) is pretty low.. at present). Instead I am developing strategies to run my own server and offer a business of Open CMS solutions, development, tech content, and other information services.
In the mean time, I break my day up between
It should really have been done in XHTML Strict DTD.
Pretty much anything can be designed well in Transitional DTD, but doing it in Strict is far more challenging (and this is the DTD that the W3C home page is done in, so it should have been the required DTD).
When doing it in Strict, as much of the design and layout, as possible, is moved away from the structural layout and into the CSS/XSLT, which is not the case with transitional. The full and real benefits of seperating markup are not gained using Transitional (making the design more portable and flexible between media).
This is the Black Art to markup coding and it's pay off is the flexibility and portability of the structured markup between media. Of course there are the down sides of decredation in various browsers, but there are now more and more good reasons to support using Strict than ever before. The improvement in browser support and the increasing use of other media and devices shows the change in this landscape.
Obviously the lights are on but no one home when this clown is in charge of security.
"we didn't expect people to do bad things like that"
There are some good references here already, but you need to do more than just teach pure xhtml, you should give some history and context, and reasons why xhtml exists. Cover both the benefits, limitations and user agent support. It's important to put whatever you are teaching in context, not just teach it devoid of real life application and history.
Explain xhtml in terms of the main xhtml DOCTYPES/DTDs; strict, transitional and frameset. Without understanding DOCTYPEs the context of markup can be lost. Focus on strict dtd, but be sure to cover it's dangers and limitations in user agents. Getting students to work with strict will give them a better understanding of the whole process of trying to separate content from presentation, develop real knowledge and skills and understanding the benefits of this in the long run. If students use strict they will need to reject all use of deprecated tags, which is a good discipline to get into.
Learning xhtml is not as tough as learning good accompanying CSS practice, especially if you are trying to manage positioning in the design, and also design according to accessibility principles using relative units instead of absolute units.
You should also cover relevant material in W3C documents
Also briefly address xhtml2 (xforms etc), XML and XSL/XSLT.
There is plenty of evidence in IT history to support this, but it is not that easy to cast such a blanket observation. I also feel I have seen plenty of evidence of usability specialists designing over technical user interfaces.
One phenomena that has not been adequately researched is the user interfaces designed by the developer/techies themselves. I know a lot of people are going to say this is the problem, but I ask this question, why is it that of the many web sites out there, the ones that are designed by developer/geek/hackers, the blogs, etc, these seem to have much more clean, elegant and easy to understand functionality than the majority of other sites? I know this is an over generalisation, but I do feel there is a strong point here.
Also, I could go on and on about how developers have been too typecast in this position. How many of us have told management and business analysts of the problems inherent in changing the product, but you learn to keep your mouth shut if you want your job. Your opinion is not wanted, just shut up and sit in the corner and code.
If you can sell a new version of the product, with the training, this is how you make money. Without the upgrade path, there is no future in normal commercial software. You have to produce product, which requires new marketable features. And the shit comes back on the developer, who is often the one person who is very aware of the problems with this whole process.
I could write essays about all this... but that is for another place and time.
Homer: "Quick someone, what's the number for 911"
CNNNN had better watch out, they'll be next. It's a spoof on ABCTV in Oz.
- Next Generation Internet
- Large Scale Networking
- The Xanadu model
- Common HTTP Implementation Problems
- Web Services Architecture Requirements
- etc, etc, etc
HTTP is a very primitive protocol. I don't know when or if it will be overhauled or superseeded, but if it is, it needs more than this suggestion, much more, lot's of work, planning, forsight, architecture and engineering.Are there any books that are up to date on these techniques, related to php 4.2 and greater? What are the best sites and references to avoid the short comings associated with older versions referenced in books?
It's no Silver Bullet, and I agree it can have all the problems you mentioned (and others as well). This comment says it can be done well.
I feel developers should always try to be as aware as possible about the technologies they use, without bias. Sometimes a client may request something be done in Flash, other clients may require that everything be as XML conformant as possible. Whatever the request, the developer needs to be aware of the pluses and minuses of each, and inform the client where need be. Flash has it's place, especially as Macromedia is putting in effort with MX to get it to address accessibility issues.
There is another possible advantage to SVG, being XML compliant, that I have not seen addressed here, and that is SVG media/documents can be formatted on the fly, using XSLT for various media. CSS addresses media types for (I know the support for all is not there yet, but it is getting there)
I saw Dean Jackson's presentation at the OzeWAI 2002 Conference. From what I could see, he was using Mac OSX, and Python XSLT tools to produce his PowerPoint like SVG slides. In this format, one should be able to configure completely different behaviour, look and feels for any of the desired end media formats. Without a file format based in structured markup, this becomes much more difficult to address. For this purpose, this is far more flexible.
I do feel that as/if SVG is eventually built into browsers natively, there will need to be some user configurability to control the behaviour of the SVG, (and other media) in the browser. If there are animations the user needs to be able to easily turn them off (if they want too), or allow the user to turn them off by default. Users obviously want this type of control as each user is different, some may love animated web pages, others may not. SVG and user-agents need to be easily configurable and controllable. This should be pretty obvious given Mozilla's and Opera's preferences to allow the user to manage the DOM, and the market in Popup blockers for IE that manage the DOM and http refreshes and the like.
As a side note, I really do not think the W3C is trying to box in/out developers. I try to follow most of the discussion groups associated with Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). I can see how it would be easy to form the mistaken opinion that this bunch of people basically want a web driven by Lynx (or some really bland HTML). I ask those of you here that find the process of the W3C draconian, to just follow any of the active W3C discussion lists. I find a community of people that, for one have taught me a lot about how to work as a collaboration of people with different views and agendas, that are working with everyone to try and find a way to present the web in the most universal and open standards. There is often very healthy debate, and many people trying and working very hard not to limit the standards. The W3C is not the Web Police, it's just a standards body trying to build an equitable, accessible web (Maybe I'm really naive).
Admittedly they do not do such a good job of marketing themselves and educating developers, but it is a democratic process, if you really don't like something and feel you have better solutions, or can improve, or help, join a working group and help improve the web.
If you do follow a discussion list for a few months, and do not find what I stated, well.. you can email me a tell me what a flamin idiot I am (you may not be far wrong).
I'm not pro-ms, but it's not as simple as that. MS has many apps, departments and policies. As for IE meeting standards, the Windows versions are still getting there, but are pretty good, but they do have some bugs, shortcomings in HTML, CSS, and especially DOM. But some credit must go to the Mac programmers at MS who built one of the most standard compliant versions of IE (5.5).
From what I can gauge, the adherence to standards in MS, or any large company often has a lot more to do with departmental leadership, agendas and politics, rather than overall company policy.
MS deserves credit for making their OS and API supportive of accessibility assistive technologies, but they still have a way to go. As a side note, their main accessibility page, (and probably all the rest of them) has never validated.
Improved standards compliance for IE6 (they seemed to have missed the new support for DTDs in this list).