John Beales

Last year when I was working on the redesign of BonzoBox I used HTML5 for the first time. The specification is being developed by two groups, and consists of a bunch of different modules, each with a different level of readiness, and the actual specifications, (yes, both of them!), are meant more for people who build web browsers than people who build websites. This led to some confusion. While I eventually wrapped my head around HTML5 I never felt that I had as good a grasp of the language as I would have liked to, so when I heard about Introducing HTML5 I added it to my to-read list. I finally had a chance to read it a couple of weeks ago.

Introducing HTML5 is the overview that I was looking for when I first started learning about HTML5. While I wish I had found it then, (although it wasn’t published at that point), and I learned a lot from it now. One thing that I had completely missed in my self-directed HTML5 studies was the outlining module, (if you’ve missed it too it dictates how an outline of an HTML5 document would be created, which allows you to figure out how important each element is in relation to each other element on the page). I also learned about some new elements that I hadn’t yet stumbled across, (like <mark>), and learned more about HTML5 form elements than I already knew, (although I was fairly familiar with those from the 24ways article).

There’s a chapter about the <canvas> element in Introducing HTML5. I was scared of the canvas element but the canvas chapter changed me from afraid to excited. It’s not so hard as it looks to work with and there’s a lot of really cool stuff that can be done with it. It’ll be fun to play with when I get a chance.

There’s also a chapter about using HTML5 apps offline. It’s possible to tell the browser to cache most, even all, of a website or webapp so that it’s completely usable offline. This cache seems to be a lot stickier than the normal browser cache and I wonder if it would be possible to also use it to drastically speed up online apps. This could lead to some real pain when updating websites, but if it’s planned well enough it might work really well.

Finally, websockets look great. They look fast, to the point that maybe we could make some stuff lightning fast on the web. Unfortunately a security problem was discovered in the websockets protocol so it was disabled in Firefox 4 and the latest Opera, and apparently Google Chrome is set to disable it if any attacks are carried out. I really hope that the security issues will be ironed out quickly so there can be wide adoption of websockets. I’m having problems finding out what the current status is of the security issue, I can’t find any articles more recent than those from December, so if anyone knows what’s going on please post a link.

I learned a lot from Introducing HTML5, and I’m excited to redesign a website, (or a few), using it, plus some CSS3, (I’ll be reading up on that soon).

Want to read it yourself? Get it from one of these places and I’ll receive a small kickback:

Amazon.com (USA) Amazon.ca (Canada) Amazon.co.uk (UK)

Bringing my reading back into the world of web design is Khoi Vinh’s book Ordering Disorder: Grid Principles for Web Design, which with Khoi’s grid-based layout and ample whitespace on each page I spent an unexpectedly short single day reading!

The slim book contains a mixture of information that is new to me and things I’ve seen before, but since I’m no grid master I have to right to say that I’m familiar with anything in the book. I appreciated the reminder that I should figure out what I want a website to do before I start writing code and the peek into Khoi’s design process was enlightening.

The book contains a brief history of grids then focuses on creating a grid and the obstacles that need to be overcome to do so. It is not a technical book that delves into the code required to make grids come to life on the world wide web. Once I realized this I appreciated the way it was written as a springboard to allow me to seek out more information on my own.

I think that I was in exactly the right place for Ordering Disorder to help me. I have read a bit about grids in the past, and have tried to use them in my projects with limited success, but reading Ordering Disorder improved my knowledge of grid principles to a level where I feel they can be much more useful when designing a website, even if I don’t take advantage of the springboard effect to launch my grid knowledge into the stratosphere and beyond.

Want to read it yourself? Get it from one of these places and I’ll receive a small kickback:

Amazon.com (USA) Amazon.ca (Canada) Amazon.co.uk (UK)

I’m working on a project now were we’ve decided to go with as pure HTML5 as posible, and it’s a breath of fresh air. Things work more or less how they should, and Internet Explorer is even playing along, with a little help. Getting started was a bit of a trick, though, as it can be hard to find information on how HTML5 works without diving into specification documents, which is never fun, or easy, (if you don’t want to read the story, skip straight to the resources).

I hadn’t been following the development of HTML5 with more than a passing interest. I figured that when it was ready, then I would start using it. I also understood that there were different parts that may reach completion at different times, and was keeping my eye open for some sort of “completion” signal. 2009′s 24 Ways was that signal for me. There were several articles on using HTML5 features along with their CSS3 counterparts, and enough evidence that browser support is there to start my investigation.

Here’s the deal: Basic HTML5 support is pretty good in webkit-based browsers, alright, (read usable), in Gecko, and kind of lacking in Internet Explorer. However, if you can rely on Javascript being present, (which I can in my project), there’s an HTML5 Shiv Javascript by Remy Sharp that makes it so that you can style HTML5 in Internet Explorer. Add it using a conditional comment and you’re good to go.

So, we have useable cross-browser support, but where do we turn to learn about which tags are in, which are out, the correct doctype and mime-type, and all that? We could read the specification, (and we will have to read a bit, at least), but it would be nice if there was an introduction to HTML5 somewhere. It turns out that Robert Nyman has written an Introduction to HTML5. It’s detailed enough to get you started, but not so detailed that you get lost, (like the spec), and if you’re looking to be convinced of the value of HTML5, check out HTML5: Tool of Satan, or Yule of Santa?, Have a Field Day with HTML5 Forms, and Breaking out the Edges of the Browser from 24 Ways 2009.

Once you dive a little deeper you’ll find that there are elements of HTML5 that you need more in-depth information for, so it’s time to turn to the spec. However, there are 2 groups, (W3C and WHATWG), working on HTML5, and therefore 2 spec documents, (fun!). Fortunately, the two groups have the same editor, so they’re more or less working on the same thing. I find the WHATWG HTML5 document easier to read, but if you prefer the W3C version, go nuts.

Finally, the whole content-type debate that’s been going on for what seems like centuries is still a mess. In HTML5 you’re supposed to include a Document Type Definition and there should be no namespaces on the HTML element if you’re serving as text/html, and you’re supposed to serve in application/xhtml+xml if you want to use namespaces, or force XML validation, or anything like that. The problem is that Internet Explorer really doesn’t like application/xhtml+xml, (it shows the raw XML document), so if you need a namespace for some reason, (for example, you want to use Facebook Connect on the site), you can’t serve valid markup.

So, that’s it. HTML5 has arrived, or at least parts of it. If you can rely on Javascript being present, or rely on IE users not using your web app, you can go ahead and start using it. Here’s a quick recap of the resources:

• Introduction to HTML5 by Robert Nyman
• HTML5 Shiv Script by Remy Sharp
• HTML5 Spec from WHATWG and the W3C
• From 24 Ways 2009:
  • HTML5: Tool of Satan, or Yule of Santa?
  • Have a Field Day with HTML5 Forms
  • Breaking Out the Edges of the Browser, (also by Remy Sharp)

Yesterday, I went out on Rue St-Denis to see the Olympic Flame pass by for the second time in my life, and I hope to see it again at some point. I also hope that next time it will be much easier to find out where to go to find the flame.

The 106-day torch relay for the 2010 Olympic games in Vancouver is a big deal here in Canada. It is on the news every day and is travelling 45,000 kilometres making a great loop around the country. Right now, with the games approaching but not right on our doorstep, the torch relay is the most important part of the olympics to me, probably to many Canadians. However, when I went looking on vancouver2010.com to see where I could find the torch I was thoroughly confused. It is easy to find out about every sport that will be played in 63 days time, but learn about the torch relay happening right now I had to dive deep into a pop-down menu, then take a guess at which icon would lead me to a map or description of the torch route.

These are the choices I had:

Which icon gets us to a map of the torch route?

And this is the right choice:

Apparently this means "Map"

The map should have been simple to read, after all, it’s a map with a route drawn on it. Just zoom in to see what’s going on near you. Well, good luck, when you zoom in too much the route disappears! It turns out that you have to choose your “community” then you can see a detailed map of what’s happening in that community. I’m not sure why this is, and it’s quite confusing. Once you’ve got your community selected, you may have to select different routes in your community, (the relay is less like a relay around the country and more like a travelling roadshow with some stops where people get out and run than I had thought), and you can see what time the flame will be in different places, in the HTC timezone, whatever that is.

I hear the games are over budget, but it would be a wise investment to put a direct link on the vancouver2010.com homepage to the map. There are lots of links to videos of previous days, and in truth they do sometimes link the Latest News block on the page to the map, but for me, when I went to the site, I was looking for a more permanent link to the torch relay information. After all, the torch relay is on for 6 times as many days as the games themselves.

I was lucky, I found where the torch would be, and was there at the right time, (for me HTC was Eastern Standard Time, but I don’t know if it is everywhere, maybe it just means Local Time). I hope everyone else who is looking for the map can find it.

In case you’re having trouble, here’s a link to the map.

And here is the torch, (I didn’t have a camera with me, so this is from Flickr:

I fired up my feed reader this morning and saw one sole new item on A List Apart — weird, since they usually publish stories in pairs.

It turned out to be the 2008 Survey for People who Make Websites. You may remember last year when a ridiculously huge number of people took the survey, well, let’s make that number even more ridiculous this year!