CSS Working Group Published First Working Draft of Grid Layout!
Oh boy is my co-worker (he's a designer) going to be super-excited. Published just yesterday, the CSS Working Group has finished the first working draft of Grid Layout, yep, designers start rejoicing!
For those that don't "get-it"...a grid layout is when you create a canvas and place horizontal and vertical lines evenly, creating a "grid-like" layout. Then, it makes the designers life so much easier to line-up elements and such to produce superb document/interface layouts. This, up until now, has been accomplished using a hodge-podge of techniques, from controlling an HTML table with JavaScript to careful measurements of floated elements...needless to say some pretty complicated things needed to go on in order to simply create a grid layout, let alone use one.
Well, since I'm running out of time I have to cut this short. Check out the CSS Working Group's Official CSS3 Grid Layout Working Draft for in-depth information about this beauty!
Starting A Startup
So here we are. We have an idea. We want to see this idea come to life and be able to live and breathe with the rest of the monster ideas out there. But, how do we go about that?
#1 Make sure the "idea" you have in mind is unique.
I don't know how many times I've heard someone else's idea and thought to myself, "Hmmm, I've already seen a website with that feature or concept." Research your niche, make sure it's unique enough to make a difference, then invest your time, efforts, and money if need be.
#2 Implement the Idea into a public interface.
This, is possibly the toughest part of the bunch. Is your idea "enterprise worthy" or are you just testing the waters? What will your system require? Dynamic scripting language? Database? There's a lot of questions which need to be answered here.
#3 Follow Through.
Make sure your idea is coming across to the masses as you like it to, otherwise this is the time to modify your idea to make it. This part can take some extreme aesthetic decisions to the software process area of your business model for your "idea."
#4 Rinse and Repeat.
Repeat the steps above over, and over again. All the while paying attention to what works and what doesn't. And then implement sparingly to those respected areas to enhance their respective productivities.
In the very near future I'll be discussing in detail the above steps with a real-world example.
STAY TUNED!!!
HOT New Web Service, SquareLeaf
I'm going to make it a regular thing here of me writing about a new web site or service which I find useful or interesting from the web. For the first of such articles I'm going to write about a new web service which I find very useful called SquareLeaf.
In the most simplest sense, Square Leaf is Post-It Notes in a web interface. You're basically given a white-board in which you can place different colored notes on it with whatever you like. Laundry list, errands, shopping list, etc etc. Whatever you'd like.
I'm a big fan of efficiency and project management and by utilizing SquareLeaf the right way makes handling those two very much easier.
It's missing a lot of features I wish it had (like, text colors, sizes, fonts, etc etc), and I hope they're at least working on these, but it's very useful already, indeed.
Bottom line:
SquareLeaf is the Post-It Notes I always wished I had.
AOL Leak Exclusive Links to Online Searchable Databases!!
Originally Posted: Aug. 8, 2006
I'm sure many of you heard about the whole "AOL Releasing Personal Search Queries" fiasco by now. Well, if you haven't I'll sum it up here. Yesterday, it was reported that AOL stupidly released over 20 million search records from over 500,000 AOL users. This of course violates several privacy laws and caused a huge outbreak of hesteria and mayham across the internet yesterday.
Well, what's so "exclusive" about this post I'm writing to you right now you ask? Many people and developers got their hands on that data which AOL released, of course...and a lot of them have already produced mechanisms to search through the data and analyze it for seo purposes. Drooling yet?? Want to see a few of the sites made already?? Well, I'm not selfish so I'll release a few. ENJOY!!
"This is the web interface to AOL's 500K user search logs which was released, and later retracted."
AOL Search Database
Web Search Data [AJAX Version]
I'll link you to more as I find them. Say thank you now! 
[Links removed due to recent 404.]