Webdoor

Future Vision

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 15:28:00 +0000

9 Beautiful web Headers

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 13:36:00 +0000

Today i would like to share with you some very nice header which attract me so i collect these header from different site just to share the new and creative ideas with you. hope you like it.

Ellis Lab

Marc Handdetrucs

Mosaiko

One Button Mouse

Stephen Fry

The Great Bearded Reef

Vectips

Web Burza

XHTML IT

10+ Best Photoshop Brushes

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 12:01:00 +0000

Metal Brushes

Fantsy Butterfly

Floara Astral

Crack & Cut Brush

Cs4 Brushes

Line Brushes

Smudge Brushes

Industrial Brushes

Tribal Tatto brushes

Floral Brushes

Download

if you like this post then leave some comments so i can come up with some more photoshop Brushes.

Which is The Best Screen Size For Website?

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 09:33:00 +0000

Your pages should work at any resolution, from 800x600 to 1280x1024 and beyond.

Optimize for 1024x768, which is currently the most widely used screen size. Of course, the general guideline is to optimize for your target audience's most common resolution, so the size will change in the future. It might even be a different size now, if, say, you're designing an intranet for a company that gives all employees big monitors.

Do not design solely for a specific monitor size because screen sizes vary among users. Window size variability is even greater, since users don't always maximize their browsers (especially if they have large screens).

Use a liquid layout that stretches to the current user's window size (that is, avoid frozen layouts that are always the same size).

Optimizing for 1024x768 Screen Sizes

When we say "optimize" we mean that your page should look and work the best at the most common size. It should still look good and work well at other sizes, which is why I recommend a liquid layout using percentage widths to control layout. But it should be its best at 1024x768.

The three main criteria in optimizing a page layout for a certain screen size are:

Web Page Initial visibility: Is all key information visible above the fold so users can see it without scrolling? This is a tradeoff between how many items are shown vs. how much detail is displayed for each item.

Web Page Readability: How easy is it to read the text in various columns, given their allocated width?

Web Page Aesthetics: How good does your page look when the elements are at the proper size and location for this screen size? Do all the elements line up correctly -- that is, are captions immediately next to the photos, etc.?

You should also consider all three criteria at the full range of sizes, continuously resizing the browser window from 800x600 to 1280x1024. Your page should score high on all criteria throughout the entire resolution range.

Your page should also work at even smaller and bigger sizes, though such extremes are less important. Fewer than half a percent of users still have 640x480. Although such users should certainly be able to access your site, giving them a less-than-great design is an acceptable compromise.

As the first criterion implies, scrolling is always a key consideration. Users generally don't like to scroll. So, when you design, you should consider how much users can see if they scroll only a screen full or two. Any more than five screen full's should be an indication to you that there is two much copy on the page.

Both scrolling and initial visibility obviously depend on screen size: Bigger screens show more content above the fold and require less scrolling. This is where you have to optimize for 1024x768: present your most compelling material above the fold at this resolution (while ensuring that the absolutely critical information remains visible at 800x600).

So, what about tiny screens, such as those found on mobile devices? A liquid design should scale all the way down to a phone, but don't assume that this is how you should deliver your company's mobile user experience. Mobile environments are special; to optimize for them, you must design a separate service that provides fewer features, is written even more concisely, and is more context aware.

Remember to build a website to the size you expect most visitors to be using - some research can help you with this, but always aim to please the visitors you seem to attract!

Panoramic Stitching, Stacking and Blending in CS4

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 19:18:00 +0000

Simple 5 Steps to Draw Jerry from Tom & Jerry

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 12:15:00 +0000

My Last post was how to draw tom and you know Tom is incomplete without Jerry so Today you will learn how to draw Jerry from the animated cartoon series Tom and Jerry. Follow some simple steps and Enjoy. I am using Corel Draw 14 you can use even Adobe illustrator, Freehand or any other Vector based Tool.

Step 1.
Start this first step by drawing the guidelines and shapes of Jerry. You will first make a big circle for his head and then add his facial guidelines in. You will then make a dash of a line for his ear and then draw a semi oval shape for his belly. From the belly shape you will attach the guidelines for his limbs, feet and hands.

Step 2.
Now in this step you will start shaping out his face which includes his forehead and oval eyes. You will then shape out the arms and then his little legs. As you seen in the finished picture you will start drawing out the block of cheese he is holding in his hands.

Step 3.
Now that you have made it this far, I'm sure you already know what is next? That is right begin sketching out the face and then draw out the big rounded ear. Give Jerry eyebrows and two pupils. You will then make his cute little cheek and then a nice smile. Draw the rest of the cheese block and then his hand. Add his other arm and then the shape of his left leg. Add some toes and move on.

Step 4.
Since this is your last step I think you know what you will be doing? Finishing off Jerry that's right. Start by Drawing the other ear shape and then add his pieces of hair on top of his head. You will next detail the inside of the right ear as shown. Detail his eyebrow and then add some whiskers. Make some holes in the mouse cheese and then give him a nice mousey tail. after you are don you can then erase all the guidelines and shapes that you drew in step one.

Step 5.
When you are done you will end up with something like the Jerry you see here. Color in his eyes and that is it color him in. That is it you are done. You have just finished this tutorial on how to draw Jerry the mouse from Tom and Jerry. I will be back in a while with some more.

Final Result

Simple 6 Steps to Draw Tom from Tom & Jerry

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:05:00 +0000

After lots of web design tutorials, Today you will learn how to draw Tom the cat from the animated cartoon series Tom and Jerry. Follow some simple steps and Enjoy. I am using Corel Draw 14 you can use even Adobe illustrator, Freehand or any other Vector based Tool.

Step 1.
In this first step you will start by drawing out the guidelines and shapes. First make a circle for his head and then add the facial guidelines. You will then add the ear shapes along with the big circle shape for his body. You will then add the guidelines for the arms, legs, feet and hands. See easy right?

Step 2.
Now you will start sketching in Tom's face starting with the eye and then make the rounded lining for his nose. What is the next thing you will add to his face? That is right his mouth. Once you finish that you will begin shaping out the arms and back along with the thigh and hands.

Step 3.
What you will do next here is add the eyeballs and then the inner lining of inside of his mouth. After you do that start shaping out Toms head and make sure you add the hair pieces. Start shaping out his arms and hands along with his legs and feet. Make a few nubs for his fingers as well.

Step 4.
Detail the inside of his ear by drawing the inside line. Add a few pieces of hair in his ears and then add his eyebrows which happen to be a bit bushy. Give Tom his cute button nose and then his right cheek. Add a tongue and then detail his chest by making his belly and then add his toes. You will end this step by adding his fingers and wrist hair. How hard do you think this tutorial is? Not hard at all huh.

Step 5.
Yay guess what this is? You r last drawing step. You will end this step by first erasing all the guidelines and shapes that you drew in step one. Then color in his nose and finish drawing out the match and firecracker along with the fingers.

Step 6.
When you are done this is what your Tom should come out looking like. Now that you are done you can color the drawing. You have just finished this tutorial on how to draw Tom the cat from Tom and Jerry.
hope you like this tutorials if yes then leave some comments.

You can not delete anything on Internet

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Thu, 28 May 2009 14:04:00 +0000

It's always fun to write about research that you can actually try out for yourself.

Try this: Take a photo and upload it to Facebook, then after a day or so, note what the URL to the picture is (the actual photo, not the page on which the photo resides), and then delete it. Come back a month later and see if the link works. Chances are: It will.

Facebook isn't alone here. Researchers at Cambridge University (so you know this is legit, people!) have found that nearly half of the social networking sites don't immediately delete pictures when a user requests they be removed. In general, photo-centric websites like Flickr were found to be better at quickly removing deleted photos upon request.

Why do "deleted" photos stick around so long? The problem relates to the way data is stored on large websites: While your personal computer only keeps one copy of a file, large-scale services like Facebook rely on what are called content delivery networks to manage data and distribution. It's a complex system wherein data is copied to multiple intermediate devices, usually to speed up access to files when millions of people are trying to access the service simultaneously. (Yahoo! Tech is served by dozens of servers, for example.) But because changes aren't reflected across the CDN immediately, ghost copies of files tend to linger for days or weeks.

In the case of Facebook, the company says data may hang around until the URL in question is reused, which is usually "after a short period of time." Though obviously that time can vary considerably.

Of course, once a photo escapes from the walled garden of a social network like Facebook, the chances of deleting it permanently fall even further. Google's caching system is remarkably efficient at archiving copies of web content, long after it's removed from the web. Anyone who's ever used Google Image Search can likely tell you a story about clicking on a thumbnail image, only to find that the image has been deleted from the website in question -- yet the thumbnail remains on Google for months. And then there are services like the Wayback Machine, which copy entire websites for posterity, archiving data and pictures forever.

The lesson: Those drunken party photos you don't want people to see? Simply don't upload them to the web, ever, because trying to delete them after you sober up is a tough proposition.

Photoshop: Advertising Banner Design For website

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Thu, 28 May 2009 11:14:00 +0000

In this tutorial I’ll teach you how to make a nice, sleek and professional advertisement banner. It’s really quite easy, but you will need previous Photoshop knowledge to successfully complete this tutorial.

Step 1:

First step is to make the document in Photoshop. File > New, use a size of 468 x 60 pixels.
Now fill the background with a nice orange gradient, the colors I used for my gradient were #e14d0f and #4d1805.

Note that you’ll need to use the Gradient Tool to fill the background with the gradient. You can find the gradient tool on the same button as the fill bucket tool.

Step 2:

Next thing to do is create a new layer. Now using the Polygonal Lasso Tool, make a selection like mine in the left section of your document.

Be sure you’re on a new layer, then fill your selection with a nice, bright gradient, the colors for the gradient I used were #0084e6 and #003967.

Right-click your layer and go into the Blending Options, apply the following layer styles for your blue gradient layer:

After you applied those two layer styles, your thing should now look like this:

Lastly for this step, add a nice glossy highlight to your blue gradient layer, you can do this by following these few simple steps:

1. Start by making a new layer, now select the blue gradient layer by holding ctrl and clicking the layer’s thumbnail.
2. Using the Gradient Tool, drag a white gradient inside of your selection.
3. After making your gradient, nudge your selection down 30 pixels (hold shift and press the down arrow key three times) then press delete.
4. Change the layer mode for your shine layer to Soft Light, and lower the opacity to about 30-55%.

Step 3:

How about adding some nice details?
Start by using the pen tool to make a nice, smooth path in the background on the right. After you made a nice selection, do a little soft brushing inside then change the layer mode to Soft Light and lower the opacity if needed.

Step 4:

Write out your description text in the left section using the Horizontal Type Tool, write your text out in white (#FFFFFF.)

The font used above is called RockWell, you can find it for free on DaFont.
After writing out your text, apply the following layer styles:

That will have made your text stand out a bit more nicely.

Step 5:

Next thing to do is add in some thumbnails or something else on the right side, or you could use some descriptive text. I added in 3 thumbnails from tutorials from PhotoshopSpot, then applied this Inner Glow and this Stroke.

You should have something like this:

Step 6:

Lastly you’ll want to add in something that will attract the users’ eye, so I added in a little star badge with the text: “GO!”

Firstly I made the star badge by using the Polygon Tool, then I added in the following layer styles:

And you should have a badge that looks like this:

Lastly I added in the text for the badge, I then applied the following layer styles:

And now you should have text that looks like this:

Step 7:

Last thing you will want to do is add in the border, I guess it depends what sort of website it will be going on to choose the color. If it’s going on a black website, you should use white as the border, if it’s going on a white website, you should use a black border.

Photoshop:Learn Logo Design Steel Cup Effect

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Fri, 22 May 2009 11:04:00 +0000

Today I am telling you about How to Create Photoshop Steel Cup Logo Icon. Please follow the steps mentioned below.

1-First of all Open New Document of Custom Size,Height & Width 450×450 pixels,Resolution 72 & Mode RGB Color

2-Now Open New Layer & then create the following shape with the help of ‘Pen Tool’ right
click select ‘Make Selection’

3-In Make Selection ‘Feather Radius’ should 0 pixels,Tick on New Selection & then ok & your
image should look like as shown below

4-Now fill the selection with ‘bbbcbc’ color & then create the following selection with the
help of ‘Pen Tool’

5-Now select ‘Burn Tool’ & create the following shading

6-Now select ‘Dodge Tool’ & Highlight the some parts & after that press Ctrl+Shift+I &
create the some shading

7-Now go to Blending Options,select Drop Shadow & use the following settings
Photoshop Technique-How to use the Drop Shadow feature
8-Now your image should look like as shown below
9-Now select ‘Smudge Tool’ & create the following shading

10-Now Open New Layer & then create the following selection with the help of ‘Pen Tool’
11-Now fill the selection with same color & create the following shading with the help of
‘Burn Tool’
12-Now select “Dodge Tool” & use the following settings

13-Now Highlight the some parts with the help of ‘Dodge Tool’ & your image should look like
as shown below

14-Now create the following shape with the help of ‘Pen Tool’ right click select ‘Stroke Path’

15-Now use the following settings in Stroke Path

16-Now like this Highlight the other parts & your image should look like as shown below

17-Now Open New Layer & then create the following selection with the help of ‘Elliptical
Marquee Tool’

18-Now fill the selection with any color & then go to Blending Options,select Inner Shadow
& use the following settings Photoshop Technique-How to use the Inner Shadow feature

19-Now select Gradient Overlay & use the following settings
Photoshop Technique-How to use the Gradient Overlay feature

20-Now Open New Layer & then create the following selection with the help of ‘Elliptical
Marquee Tool’

21-Now fill the selection with same color & create the following shading with the help of
‘Burn & Dodge Tool’ & after that create the following selection with the help of ‘Pen Tool’
22-Now Open New Layer & then fill the selection with same color & create the following
shading with the help of ‘Burn & Dodge Tool’

23-Now create the following selection with the help of ‘Pen Tool’ & then fill with ‘000000′ color

24-Now Make the Duplicate Layer with the help of Ctrl+J & then press Ctrl+T,right click
select ‘Flip Horizontal’ & then press ENTER

25-Now Open New Layer & then create the following selection with the help of ‘Pen Tool’

26-Now fill the selection with ‘fffffa’ color & then go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur & use
the following settings

27-Now your image should look like as shown below

28-Thanks for read this Photoshop Tutorial.I hope this is a good tutorial & u can use these
Photoshop Techniques in your Graphics Design Project

Css Browser Compatibility Tips & Tricks

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Wed, 20 May 2009 11:14:00 +0000

CSS can be complex, and as each new browser version is released, you may well find yourself struggling to keep up with the latest tips and hacks. But those tips and hacks will save your sanity! Here, I've put together the Some useful tips that I find most helpful, to save you the hassle of scrounging around the Web for solutions when time is tight.

1. Block vs. Inline Level Elements

Nearly all HTML elements are either block or inline elements. The characteristics of block elements include:

* Always begin on a new line
* Height, line-height and top and bottom margins can be manipulated
* Width defaults to 100% of their containing element, unless a width is specified

Examples of block elements include <div>, <p>, <h1>, <form>, <ul> and <li>. The characteristics of inline elements, on the other hand, are the opposite of block elements:

Begin on the same line

Height, line-height and top and bottom margins can't be changed Width is as long as the text/image and can't be manipulatedExamples of inline elements include <span>, <a>, <label>, <input>, <img>, <strong> and <em>

To change an element's status, you can use display: inline or display: block. But what's the point of changing an element from being block to inline, or vice-versa? Well, at first it may seem like you might hardly ever use this trick, but in actual fact, this is a very powerful technique, which you can use whenever you want to:

* Have an inline element start on a new line
* Have a block element start on the same line
* Control the width of an inline element (particularly useful for navigation links)
* Manipulate the height of an inline element
* Set a background colour as wide as the text for block elements, without having to specify a width

2. Another Box Model Hack Alternative

The box model hack is used to fix a rendering problem in pre-IE 6 browsers on PC, whereby the border and padding are included in, rather than added onto, the width of an element. A number of CSS-based solutions have been put forward to remedy this; here's another one that I really like:

padding: 2em;

border: 1em solid green;

width: 20em;

width/**/:/**/ 14em;

The first width command is read by all browsers; the second by all browsers except IE5.x on PC. Because the second command comes second, it takes precedence over the first: any command that comes second will always override a preceding command. So, how does all this work?

By placing empty comment tags (/**/) before the colons, we instruct IE5.0 to ignore the command. Likewise, if we place empty comment tags after the colon, IE5.5 will ignore the command. Using these two rules in conjunction with each other, we can hide the command from all of IE5.x browsers.

3. Minimum Width for a Page

A very handy CSS command that exists is the min-width command, whereby you can specify a minimum width for any element. This can be particularly useful for specifying a minimum width for a page.

Unfortunately, IE doesn't understand this command, so we'll need to come up with a new way of making this functionality work in this browser. First, we'll insert a <div> under the <body> tag, as we can't assign a minimum width to the <body>:

<body>
<div class="container">

Next, we create our CSS commands, to create a minimum width of 600px:

#container
{
min-width: 600px;
width:expression(document.body.clientWidth < 600? "600px": "auto" );
}

The first command is the regular minimum width command; the second is a short JavaScript command that only IE understands. Do note, though, that this command will cause your CSS document to become invalid; you may prefer to insert it into the head of each HTML document to get around this.

You might also want to combine this minimum width with a maximum width:

#container
{
min-width: 600px;
max-width: 1200px;
width:expression(document.body.clientWidth < 600? "600px" : document.body.clientWidth > 1200? "1200px" : "auto");
}

4. IE and Width and Height Issues

IE has a rather strange way of doing things. It doesn't understand the min-width and min-height commands, but instead interprets width and height as min-width and min-height -- go figure!

This can cause problems, because we may need boxes to be resizable should we need to fit more text into them, or should the user resize the text. If we use only the width and height commands on a box, non-IE browsers won't allow the box to resize. If we only use the min-width and min-height commands, though, we can't control the width or height in IE!

This can be especially problematic when using background images. If you're using a background image that's 80px wide and 35px high, you'll want to make sure that the default size for a box using this image is exactly 80 x 35px. However, if users resize the text, the box size will need to expand gracefully.

To resolve this problem, you can use the following code for a box with class="box":

.box
{
width: 80px;
height: 35px;
}

html>body .box
{
width: auto;
height: auto;
min-width: 80px;
min-height: 35px;
}

All browsers will read through the first CSS rule, but IE will ignore the second rule because it makes use of the child selector command. Non-IE browsers will read through the second one, which will override the values from the first rule, because this CSS rule is more specific, and CSS rules that are more specific always override those that are less specific.

5. Text-transform Command

One of the lesser known, but really useful CSS commands is the text-transform command. Three of the more common values for this rule are: text-transform: uppercase, text-transform: lowercase and text-transform: capitalize. The first rule turns all characters into capital letters, the second turns them all into small letters, and the third makes the first letter of each word a capital letter.

This command is incredibly useful to help ensure consistency in style across an entire Website, particularly if it has a number of content editors. Say for example your style guide dictates that words in headings must always begin with capital letters. To ensure that this is always the case, use text-transform: capitalize. Even if site editors forget about the capitalisation, their mistake won't show up on the Website.

It's also preferable to use text-transform: uppercase to capitalise words, as screen readers may pronounce shorter words in capital letters as acronyms. A great example of this is 'CONTACT US', which is pronounced as 'contact U S' by some screen readers.

6. Disappearing Text or Images in IE?

IE exhibits a very strange bug whereby text or background images sometimes disappear from sight. These items are still actually present and, if you highlight everything on screen or hit refresh, they'll often re-appear. Kind of strange, huh?

This problem mostly occurs on background images and on text positioned next to a floated element. To remedy the problem, simply insert position: relative into the CSS command for the disappearing element, and for some bizarre reason, that'll usually fix the problem. If this doesn't work (and sometimes, it doesn't), assign a width to the offending element in the CSS -- that should fix the problem.

7. Invisible Text

Sometimes, you may actually want to make text invisible. Invisible text can be especially useful for screen reader users, perhaps to assign a label to a form item, or insert a heading ahead of a section. Don't want to change the visual appearance by inserting these elements? Make them invisible, and no one using a visual browser will know they're there.

You may also want to make text invisible if using a print or handheld CSS file, as some information may not need to be displayed on either of these mediums (see below for more on this).

To make text invisible, you can use display: none -- easy! This works fine for hiding text from handhelds (if CSS is supported) and printed Web pages, but isn't so great for many screen readers. Screen readers are now becoming too clever for their own good, and some will actually ignore any text that has the rule display: none assigned to it.

Therefore, for screen readers users, a new approach is needed: position: absolute; left: -9000px. This basically takes the text and positions it 9000px to the left of the left edge of the screen, essentially making it invisible.

8. CSS Document for Handhelds

A separate CSS document can be created for PDAs and mobile phones, and activated only when one of these devices is being used to access your site. More and more Websites are creating separate CSS documents for printing, so Web pages automatically become print-friendly when users choose to print them. You can do the same for handheld devices.

The following command is used to call up the CSS document for handhelds:

<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="handheldstyle.css" media="handheld" />

CSS commands in the handheld CSS file override any equivalent commands in the main CSS document. So, what commands should you place in this file?

Ideally, you want users of handheld devices to avoid having to scroll horizontally.

To test this, open up your Website in a regular browser window and resize it to 150px in width. Then, open up your main CSS file and insert some new commands at the very bottom of the document. The commands you place here should adjust the layout of the Website so that it doesn't require horizontal scrolling at a width of 150px. Then, open up a new document, cut and paste these new commands over, and save it as handheldstyle.css (or whatever name you want to give it).

Your Websites offering to users of handheld devices should be quite different to its offering to traditional Web browsers, as the user experience is quite different on a handheld device. For further information, a book such as Handheld Usability, by S.W. Weiss, is a great read.

9. 3-D Push Button Effect

Back in the early days of the Web, 3-d buttons that appeared to become pushed in when moused over were all the rage. At that time, this could only be achieved through images and JavaScript, but now, with the advent of CSS, we can go retro and re-create this 3-d effect.

The main CSS commands you'll need are:

a {
display: block;
border: 1px solid;
border-color: #aaa #000 #000 #aaa;
width: 8em;
background: #fc0;
}

a:hover
{
position: relative;
top: 1px;
left: 1px;
border-color: #000 #aaa #aaa #000;
}

Aside from these commands, you can insert other commands to achieve the desired presentation effect -- the only limit is your imagination!

10. Same Navigation Code on Every Page

Most Websites highlight the navigation item relating to each user's location within the Website, to help users orientate themselves. This is a fundamental requirement for basic usability, but it can be a pain: we need to tweak the HTML code behind the navigation for each and every page. Can we have the best of both worlds? Is it possible to have the navigation highlighted on every page, without having to tweak the HTML code on every page? Of course it is!

First of all, you'll need to assign a class to each navigation item:

<ul>
<li><a href="#" class="home">Home</a></li>
<li><a href="#" class="about">About us</a></li>
<li><a href="#" class="contact">Contact us</a></li>
</ul>

You'll then need to insert an id into the <body> tag. The id should be representative of where users are located in the site, and should change when users move to a different site section. When on the 'Home' page, it should read <body id="home">, in 'About Us', it should read <body id="about">, and in 'Contact Us', <body id="contact">.

Next, you create a new CSS rule:

#home .home, #about .about, #about .about, #contact .contact

{
commands for highlighted navigation go here
}

This basically creates a rule that only takes effect when class="home" is contained within id="home", and when class="about" is in id="about" and class="contact" is in id="contact". These situations will only occur when the user is in the appropriate section of the site, seamlessly creating our highlighted navigation item.

Simple Way to Create Newsletter with HTML & CSS

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Tue, 19 May 2009 13:38:00 +0000

HTML emails are widely used for all kinds of professional correspondence. Beyond email newsletters they're used for all sorts of application-generated messages, such as receipts and confirmations. Styled messages have lots of appeal for marketers, designers and consumers -- but for coders, it's a real headache to create them properly.

Creating an HTML email that looks right to every reader is a job that makes cross-browser testing look easy. What can go wrong? After reaching its final destination, an email could be read using any of a number of standalone email clients (such as Outlook, AOL, and Eudora), and even more Web-based clients (Yahoo, Hotmail, and Gmail to name a few). Each of these email clients displays your HTML email message a little bit differently, so ensuring that your message displays correctly can be a daunting task.

How are coders coping with this mess? Some say the only solution is to go retro -- by ditching CSS and using old-school HTML for formatting, but what about serious CSS coders who can't even type a font tag with a straight face? Fortunately, we have options.

Stylesheets that Stick

When you're coding an HTML email with CSS, make sure that you don't use linked CSS files (.css files attached using link or @import). These are the stylesheets most widely ignored by email clients.

CSS style declarations in the head of an HTML document (using style tags) are ignored by some email clients, such as Gmail, so they should be avoided for styles that are key to the email design. I sometimes use a style tag for styles that are "expendable" -- for example, when making all the links green instead of blue isn't crucial, it's a good style to define in a style tag.

The most reliable way to include CSS in an HTML email is to use inline styles. They aren't pretty, but few email clients ignore them. These styles are defined within the HTML tags in the body of the document, like this: p style="color:green;font-family:sans-serif;"> green and arial text

. Using span tags to apply inline styles also works well.

Layout Techniques

Most people suggest using table, tr, and td tags for page layout within an HTML email. Tables are the most stable option, especially if you're creating email messages that require a more complicated multi-column layout. Gmail simply removes div tags, and coverage in other clients like Hotmail is spotty. Also, floating div tags don't work in several email clients, so any floating elements can be placed in a table (using table align="left">, for example).

Using a div tag for a layout or background color is a better option when you're working with a single-column layout. Applying styles to div tags using inline styles versus a style tag will help keep that style in place when the email ships out to the masses.

On the bright side, you can scale back on div tags if they're causing problems, and use the almost universally supported table, tr, and td tags for anything you can't accomplish reliably with a div.

Formatting Text

The best way to make sure your text formatting sticks is to use inline styles, but applying an inline style to every bit of text is tedious and may add too much extra weight to the HTML. If you aren't especially picky about details like the exact pixel size of your text, whether your "black" text shows up dark gray, and how your links are underlined, you'll probably be happier applying text formatting with a style tag rather than inline.

One place where inline styles may make a real difference is in the headings and special notes within your email. When you want to ensure that a certain notice is always red, or that headings are the same shade of orange as your logo, you should use inline styles for that formatting.

Some email clients are notorious for changing text in strange ways that can only only be overridden with inline styles. Hotmail, for example, always displays links in small blue Verdana, regardless of the appearance of the rest of the email. If this is a problem for you, you should use inline styles on each link tag to override it.

Images and Backgrounds

The ability to include images a key advantage to HTML email -- they allow you to show as well as tell, plus they're often used to track email open rates. Like most perks, they have their downfalls. Spammers frequently abuse HTML images, so some email clients don't display them at all without the user's permission. Some email clients display images that are included in an img tag, but not images that are included with CSS, or as a background image, or both.

When creating HTML emails, you should also avoid using dark background colors, especially in the background of your email. If one of your lighter background colors is ignored by an email client for some reason, users may see the email as black text on a dark blue background and ignore the message or, even worse, report it as spam.
General Do's and Don't's for HTML/CSS Emails

To wrap up, here are some do's and don't's:

Do ...

Use inline style declarations for the most important styles.
Declare styles in a style tag when they're not absolutely necessary.
Use table tags for multi-column layouts and floating elements.
Test your email in multiple standalone and Web-based email clients.

Don't ...

Use external stylesheets.
Use floating div tags for multi-column layouts.
Expect CSS background images to show up in most email clients.
Rely on images showing up, especially background images.

Use CSS for Search Engine Optimization(SEO)

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Tue, 19 May 2009 11:13:00 +0000

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a language that permits Web designers to attach styles such as spacing, color, font, etc. to HTML documents. Cascading style sheets are similar to a template, permitting Web developers to label styles for an HTML element and then apply it to the number of Web pages required. Thus, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are collections of formatting rules, which control the appearance of content in a Web page. With CSS styles you have great flexibility and control of the exact page appearance; from precise positioning of the layout to specific fonts and styles.

There are many benefits of using CSS. Maintenance of a Web site made with CSS is much easier compared to the ones which are table based. Aside from being able to make extensive changes with one CSS file, the code it generates makes it simpler to update. With CSS, when you decide to craft a change, you simply alter the style and that element is updated automatically anywhere it appears in the site, saving you an enormous amount of time. Without CSS you'd have edit each page independently. CSS generally requires less code compared to a table based layout, making your code lighter, cleaner and easier to maintain.

Cascading Style Sheets Benefits and Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Another major benefit of CSS is that it makes your Web site SEO friendly. The reason behind this is simple. Search engines spiders are actually lethargic. They don't go through the bundles of HTML code to get to the indexed codes. Font tags and tables make HTML code cumbersome, and thus reduce the accuracy of the results. If you use external CSS files to determine the design attributes, the HTML code will be clean and will create better search engine rankings. With some knowledge of CSS you can change the code without destroying the visual layout. For instance, you could easily make the main content of your site to show up above the header or navigation menu in the code of your Web site; this will help to show search engine crawlers the importance of your content. I personally saw a huge boost in rankings in fully functional CSS Web sites. When I look at someone’s Web site that was built using old school HTML code with tags such as: TABLES, TD, TR, FONT and so on, I convert that site to a CSS layout. There are many tools on the Internet that shows the actual code over text ratio weight of your site. Modern search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN love light-weighted Web sites. They want to see your content; the text, not the code. With CSS everything is possible. You can place excessive code into an external file, thus leaving the actual page clean and simple.

Web Site Accessibility

CSS makes your Web site more accessible. By 2008, it's estimated that one-third of the world’s population will be using hand held devices to access theInternet. It's important that your site is accessible to them also. You can make an additional CSS document particularly for handheld devices like cell phones, which will be called up in place of the regular CSS document; which is not achievable with a tabular layout. CSS benefits accessibility chiefly by separating document structure from presentation.

Increases Download Speed of Your Website

CSS code downloads faster than tables. Browsers read through tables twice prior to exhibiting their contents; first to work out their structure and then to determine their content. Moreover, tables are shown on the screen as a whole, no part of the table will be displayed until the entire table is downloaded and rendered. Tables support the use of spaced images to assist with positioning. CSS generally requires less code than tables. All layout code can be placed in an external CSS document, which will be called up just once and then stored on the user’s computer; while the table layout stored in each HTML document must be loaded up each time a new page downloads. Also with CSS, you can manage the order of the items downloaded. You have the control to make the content appear prior to images, which tend to load slower than text.

Cross Browser Compatibility

To summarize, CSS makes your Web sites load faster, it saves on time and labor, links can be more attractive and dynamic, and you can add rollovers without using JavaScript. Currently all the major browsers ( Firefox, Explorer and Netscape) recognize CSS.

Some Important Elements for Website Design

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Mon, 18 May 2009 11:25:00 +0000

Once you have defined what your web site's content should be, arranged it into a likely information architecture, and worked out where your content elements will sit on the page, you're ready to design the display layer.

The goal is to arrange various elements on the web page to maximize the web user's chance of using the site successfully.

There is a set of simple designer's tools available to help you help the user.

Clarity is all about the relationships between elements

The root factor of effective visual design is creating relationships to show:

what is part of what
what is different from what
how different elements relate to each other

One fundamental principle for clarity is economy: Don't use more techniques than necessary to differentiate. (For example, if you use bold text to differentiate one piece of text from another, ask if you really need to use a colon as well.)

Tools for designing the display layer

In conjunction with the layout tools already described (grouping, alignment etc.), these are further devices that have an impact over a design's attractiveness and ease of use.
This part of the course looks at each of the tools in turn, and discusses how we can use each one to further our design purposes.
The primary design tools include:

Contrast
Colour
Richness
Dynamism

Contrast

Contrast is the primary tool of eye control. Contrast attracts the eye, and it's the easiest surface mechanism to employ. In order to work, contrast needs to be balanced against areas of low contrast.

Colour

Colour can attract the eye. Use colour sensitively to make a page attractive and easy on the eye, and also to pick out items for special attention. Colours must balance with other colours and areas of low colour.

Richness

Richness can be created through use of colour, pattern, layering, and 3D effects such as gradients, shadows and highlights. The eye can linger on richer areas, so use specific areas of rich detail in key areas.

Dynamism

Movement is another factor that attracts the eye. This doesn't mean that an element must actually be animated - some shapes (such as diagonals) and busy patterns can suggest movement.

Approach

Before you design the actual visual interface, get clear on the relative priorities of the elements on screen. (If you've made an attention map, this is where it comes in really useful.)
Usually, the most important elements will be those that:

Identify the site/page (answer "Am I in the right place?")
Link on (many pages are stepping stones to others, rather than ends in themselves)
Provide content or feedback

These elements need to stand out most.

Other design elements may have softer purposes, but can still be important, such as:

Branding which creates a certain feel or personality
Subtle guides to help a user use a form or navigation interface effectively

Clearly, all these objectives are important. The trick to successful visual design is finding a balance that achieves as many of these (sometimes conflicting) objectives as possible.

Photoshop: Incorporate Hand Drawing in Image

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sat, 16 May 2009 19:37:00 +0000

In case you haven’t noticed yet, the hand drawn style is one of the hottest design trends. There are several ways to create hand drawn images — you can create it from scratch in Photoshop or you can scan an actual hand drawn sketch. Personally, I like to use a scanned drawing because you get a realistic drawing texture. Here is a quick tutorial to show you how to create a hand drawn design in Photoshop using the blending mode and alpha channel.

Create From Scratch in Photoshop

you can create the artwork in Adobe Illustrator and then imitate a hand drawing effect in Photoshop.

First draw a vector illustration. Then import it in Photoshop. Use a grungy brush and gently erase select parts of the image. Use the Blur tool to create the smug effect.

Scan Now

The easiest way — scan the drawing and set the layer blending mode to Multiply.

Invert Color

If you want to have a white color stroke instead of black — go to menu Image > Adjustments > Invert (or press shortcut Cmd+i) and then select Screen blending mode.

Create Color Gradients

What if you want more than just a black or white stroke (ie. colors gradients)? Then you will have to extract the drawing from the white background. A simple way to do this is by using alpha channel.

Copy (CTRL+C) the drawing.

In the Channels palette, create a new channel. Then paste the drawing in the new channel.

Invert (CTRL+i) the channel layer.

Go back to the Layers palette, create a new layer. Go to menu Select > Load Selection. In the Load Selection prompt box, select Channel: "Alpha 1" (which is the name of the alpha channel I created earlier).

Fill Selection

With the channel selection loaded, you can fill it with any color.

Using in Design

I’m going to show you how to incorporate your hand drawing on a female model.

1. First, cut out the model

2. Fill the background with some sort of light glowing gradients.

3. Paste the drawing on top of the model. Lock the layer transparency. Play around with the color gradients.

4. Duplicate the drawing in the background to add more details to the image.

Photoshop: How to Prominent Selected Pixels

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Fri, 15 May 2009 14:11:00 +0000

The life of a designer is often complicated by customer supplied photos. Many times there's little you can do to save them. One rule you can always count on is. . .

Isolation

One of the tricks I've always depended on is isolation. You can almost always add drama or focus the readers' attention by isolating the subject of an image. While there are many ways to do this, in some cases the best way is through depth of field.

In this image sent in by the client for a web page about an event, a guest speaker is quite helplessly lost in a field of people who were sitting behind the speakers podium. This not only makes the subject harder to pick out of the image, but makes the speaker less important than she should be.

I take the pen tool and create an outline around the subject to build a mask. You can do this with the Lasso or the Pen tool, either one gives basically the same results.

I happen to like the Pen tool better because it's much more flexible, more predictable, and more powerful.

Once I've isolated the subject, I simply Select > Invert the selection, and apply some careful blurring. Be careful with the blurring because you want the viewer to still understand what the background is. So don't blow it away. This is probably the most natural looking technique for isolating the subject without calling attention to itself.

The reader sees the subject unhindered, and continues with the story rather than wondering what was done to the background.

Doing this depends on the software you're using, but it can be accomplished in virtually all the image editing packages available on the market today.

In Photoshop you can

Use the Lasso or pen tool to select the subject
Go Select > Invert Selection
Feather Selection (amount is dependant on the size and resolution of the image, in this case since it was low-rez for the web, we only feathered 2 to get rid of the hard edge.)
Hide Selection (cmd/h)
Filter > Blur or Filter > Gaussian Blur and then set the amount of blure you need to make your point.

Presto, you've isolated the subject for greater interest, while softening those other faces so they won't be distracting or confusing. Note also that I included the microphone into that selection, and blurred it even more to take it out of visual recognition all together. The microphone is GONE and I didn't even have to cut it out!

At the same time, I again Select > Invert to make her the active selection and brightened her a bit.

Variations on this technique would be to darken/lighten the fore or background.

Here's a swell trick... while the background is selected, slide on up to the Hue/Saturation dialog, and de-saturate the background to grayscale. Wow! Now she'll really pop off the page.

Photoshop: Floral blog Header with Brushes

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Thu, 14 May 2009 20:24:00 +0000

A while ago I remember seeing this wordpress theme (sorry can’t remember where) with this type of header, the grass and vines creep in from the black darkness. I liked the idea and thought it would be nice to make a tutorial for it.

Let's Start......

Of course this tutorial wouldn’t be so simple with out the use of pre-made photoshop brushes i downloaded, so here they are

Sun Burst brush -by JavierZhX

you can try other floral brushes if you wish but i liked these two the best.

Suddenly Spring set 1
Suddenly Spring set 2

i also used the Grass brush that comes by default with photoshop cs3, but if you don’t have CS3 you can use this Photoshop Grass Brush set

Step 1

ok lets start with creating a new document. mine is 769×235. i suggest you chose something suitable if your going to use it as your blog header.

Step 2

With the gradient tool draw a linear gradient down using these two colours: #ff6c00 to #ffc662.

Step 3

Create a new layer. Draw an oval shape using the ellipse tool then go to Select>modify>Feather enter 20px for the radius. finally fill the selection with white.
We want to create different shades of orange so will repeat this technique a few times.

Step 4

new layer. this time draw a bigger oval shape and using 40px for feathering.

Step 5

again create a new layer and draw a bigger oval shape then the one in step 4 and feather at 80px. then change the layer mode to overlay and opacity to 60%.

Step 6

Now you should have the Sunburst brush i mentioned before. if not, go download them and select “Pincel muestreado 49″ and place it at the bottom just so we get the ray coming out from the centre. once you have it placed set mode to Softlight.

Step 7

Time to use our Brushes first will use the Grass brush. make sure your foreground and background is set to the colour black then paint some grass randomly at the bottom.

Step 8

Now change your brush to a Big soft brush and apply at the bottom

Step 9

Time to add those cool floral brushes, i mostly used brushes from the Suddenly Spring 1, but its up to you.here is what i came up with.

Step 10

finally add your blog name and your done ! preferably try using a very thin font, i used the font named “Steiner”.

Here was my 2nd try which i like better, in the example you can see how its nicely fits in with a black layout. Click on the image to enlarge.

if you like this tutorials dont forget to leave some comments.

solution: Css menu hide behind Flash movie

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:30:00 +0000

Sometimes pages have objects such as select boxes, flash objects, iframes, applets, etc. These objects always have a higher z-order, so DHTML objects (e.g. submenus) are shown under them.

Flash Layer Overlap Menu can drop down submenus over all the objects of the page. If for some reasons a submenu can't drop down over an object the latter will be hidden for a time when the submenu is shown.

To enable checking of intersection with selects, iframes, movies, set the following menu parameter:

var dmObjectsCheck = 1;

Fix for flash in Firefox!
If you don't want the flash to hide under submenus in Firefox you should do the following things:

1) You should use engine files v2.4 or higher.
2) See, how you should install flash on your pages.

You should add "opaque" parameter for and tags.

3) Set
var dmObjectsCheck=1;

4) Add the following function in the beginning of your data file

function dm_ext_ruleObjectHide()
{
return false;
}

If for some reasons a submenu doesn't overlap flash on Safari correctly you can hide your flash object for a time when the submenu is shown. To do it you should write this function in the following way:

function dm_ext_ruleObjectHide()

{
// Safari detect
if ((parseInt(navigator.productSub)>=20020000) && (navigator.vendor.indexOf('Apple Computer') != -1) && (navigator.product=='Gecko'))
return true;
else
return false;

Facebook now at Windows Mobile

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sun, 10 May 2009 11:30:00 +0000

Back in March, Microsoft promised the world, and especially Windows Mobile 6 owners, a native Facebook application for Windows Mobile phones. On Thursday, Redmond delivered. OK, so Facebook for Windows Mobile 6 was forecast for April instead of May, but we're willing to overlook its tardiness because the app not only works quite well, but it also adds some unique and useful functionality tailored to this platform.

It's striking that Facebook on Windows Mobile is recognizable, but doesn't look like the spitting image of the site, unlike Facebook on BlackBerry, Palm, and iPhone, which retain the site's very strong look and feel. That said, it matters little. The core features are there--the news feed, status, and photo updates, notifications, and friend requests. Also your personal wall, info, and photos, your friends list, and so on.

It's noteworthy that the phone's form factor may affect how you navigate. On the tall, thin Samsung Omnia, flipping the screen horizontally showed the full width of the app, but not the depth. The vertical view condenses the navigation icons up top, but truncates the secondary navigation bar just below, so you'll need to scroll to the right to see the photo tab, for instance.

Here's one example that it's not Facebook as usual on these phones. Instead of following a link to update your status within the app window, you either press a soft key (from your profile page) or a menu item (from the Status Updates screen) to tell your circle what you're up to.

Facebook for Windows Mobile also includes a few mobile-only features that make use of the operating system's characteristics. As with Facebook on other mobile platforms, you're able to upload a photo from your album, or take a new one. You'll be able to do the same for video, assuming your phone has that capability. In addition, the app uses the Windows Mobile menu metaphor that pops up activities when you tap your finger or stylus to the touch screen. For instance, tapping a friend's status message produces a list of three options: view their profile, write on the wall, or leave a comment.

The best and most original new feature is the phone book, which neatly gathers the names and numbers of buddies who have populated their profiles with their digits. With this list, you can call, text, or send a message to their Facebook in-box. (Note: Texting didn't work with my Omnia during testing, but did work with a Windows Mobile 6 Palm Treo Pro.)

Somewhat similar address book tie-ins have been very recently implemented on Facebook for BlackBerry, but the goal was more to port Facebook photos to the address book and give users a quick way to start writing to a Facebook contact, rather than to give social networkers quick access to a secondary address book. I, for one, hadn't realized I had so many of my contacts' phone numbers at my fingertips. Now if only Microsoft or RIM could mash up their ideas to create a new record in the native address book for these Facebook contacts, and pull in their photos in the process.

A secret address book awaits. Call, text, or send a Facebook message.
Once again, it's interesting to note Facebook's strategy of collaborating with developers from Microsoft, as they have done with those at RIM, Palm, and others, to let the platform-providers roll out these apps themselves on the BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, and Palm. It makes sense--Facebook's team is relatively small, but demand for Facebook is globally high. Rather than wrestle with programming for separate platforms, Facebook can get Palm's engineering corps to work with Facebook, using APIs or other tools in the development arsenal.

As a result, these multiple versions of Facebook vary in their ancillary feature sets, but keep the marrow of the app the same--feeds, photos, and so on. The design of Microsoft's Facebook app isn't nearly as crisp or beguiling as is the iPhone's, for example, and it could use some work making tasks like searching for names from within the phone book much smoother. However, Microsoft rose to the occasion with the substance of this app, and the effort shows.

Photoshop:- Balance Lighting in Night Scenes

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sat, 09 May 2009 18:07:00 +0000

The human eye often plays tricks under different kinds of lighting. Although it looked 'gray' and cool, Trees like the daylight lighting, but obviously digital cameras don't.

But let's see if we can bring this photo back to the way I saw it by using some of Photoshop's tricks. One thing I can do very little about, and that's the grain of the photo. This Olympus automatically raises the ISO / ASA number in darker shots to make the camera more sensitive to subtle light and to shorten the exposure time. It was probably not a good idea. This looks like Ecktachrome film pushed to about 1200 ASA. Lots of grain I can do nothing about.

The shot is obviously dark. Perhaps it was this dark, but for the sake of the photo I'll want to lighten it up. For this I add a Levels Adjustment Layer. (Open the Levels dialog now.)

I moved the White point slider (far right) to the left just slightly. This brightens the overall image. In order to bring out more detail in the shadow areas, and raise the mid-tones, I'll also move the "Mid-Tones" slider (middle) very slightly to the left. Now, the shot seems more realistic and balanced light wise.

But the color is tragically off. The lights have made it way too yellow. Those sidewalks were gray, event hough bathed in yellowish light. Whites and lighter colors were decidedly blue or blue-gray. You might be tempted to use a color adjustment layer, or start futzing with curves. But this night scene was affected by two overall forces: first it was dark. Secondly, the entire scene was covered in artificial light attempting to simulate daylight. So rather than taking a long, tedious ordeal of adjusting specific color ranges, I felt an overall cooling effect was needed.

I first tried a Photo Filter layer. But the "cool" settings did little to overcome the extreme color shift. I would need something stronger, so I selected Layer > New Fill Layer > Solid Color. As above, you can see I selected a darker, ultramarine blue. But also note I set the Layer Blending mode to "HUE" and then moved the Opacity slider until the scene looked right. (Around 35%.)

Remember -- keep it simple! I saved a lot of time playing with color balances by recognizing the nature of the shot -- and what overall forces were causing the problems.

Online Publishers got another way to make money

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Sat, 09 May 2009 14:33:00 +0000

Newspaper and content providers on the Internet are getting increasingly antsy about how to make money. Kachingle announced its solution in February, and it has gained so much interest, the founders say, that the launch is being delayed while the team builds out the service so it can support what they think will be a popular offering.

Here's the basic idea of Kachingle: Users contribute a small amount, currently $5.00 per month, voluntarily. On registration, they indicate which content sites they like and want to support. At the end of the month, their monthly fee is distributed to their sites, based on how much time they spent on each site.

Founder Cynthia Typaldos created the idea five years ago, but says it was too early. "Content providers weren't desperate enough," she says. They are now, but Kachingle isn't yet ready. It should launch in July. At the moment, some parts of the original product don't scale, Typaldos says.

Kachingle has had over 250 unsolicited inquires to use its service, of which 75 percent are from the U.S. and Canada, and 25 percent from the rest of the world, according to Typaldos. So far 80 percent of the queries are from bloggers and 20 percent from other content sites like newspapers, some of which have multiple sites and millions of users.

Some useful Css Hacks for webdesign

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Fri, 08 May 2009 17:18:00 +0000

1. Browser-Specific Selectors

These selectors are very useful when you want to change a style in one browser but not the others.

IE 6 and below
* html {}

IE 7 and below
*:first-child+html {} * html {}

IE 7 only
*:first-child+html {}

IE 7 and modern browsers only
html>body {}

Modern browsers only (not IE 7)

html>/**/body {}

Recent Opera versions 9 and below

html:first-child {}
Safari
html[xmlns*=""] body:last-child {}

To use these selectors, place the code in front of the style. E.g.:

#content-box {
width: 300px;
height: 150px;
}

* html #content-box {
width: 250px;
} /* overrides the above style and changes the width to 250px in IE 6 and below */

2. Transparent PNG’s in IE6

An IE6 bug which causes a great deal of hassle is that it doesn’t support transparent PNG images.
You will need to use a filter which overrides the CSS.

* html #image-style {
background-image: none;
filter:progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.AlphaImageLoader(src="filename.png", sizingMethod="scale");
}

3. Removing Dotted Links

Firefox produces a dotted outline that appears around links when you click on them.

This is simple to stop. Just add outline:none to the a tag

a {
outline: none;
}

4. Applying a width to inline elements

If you apply a width to an inline element it will only work inIE6. This is actually a fault of IE6 - inline elements shouldn't need to have a width assigned to them. However it is often useful for example if you wanted all labels in a form to be the same width.
All HTML elements are either a block or an inline element. Inline elements include span, a, strong and em. Block elements include div, p, h1, form and li.
You can’t change the width of an inline element. A way around this is to change the element from inline to block.

span {
width: 150px;
display: block
}

Applying display: block will turn the span into a block element, allowing you to change the width. One thing to note however is that block elements will always start on a new line, so you might have to use floats as well.

5. Centering a fixed width website

To centre your website within the browser, add relative positioning to the outer div, then set the margin to auto.

#wrapper {
margin: auto;
position: relative;
}

6. Image Replacement Technique
It is always best to use text rather than an image for headings. On the odd occasion when you must have an image it is best to use a background image with hidden text within a div. This is extremely useful for screen readers and SEO as it is still using regular text, with all the benefits associated with this.

HTML:
h1 Main heading one /h1

CSS:

h1 {
background: url(heading-image.gif) no-repeat;
}

h1 span {
position:absolute;{
text-indent: -5000px;{
}

As you can see we are using regular HTML code for the h1 tag and using CSS to replace the text with an image. Text-indent pushes the text 5000px’s to the left, making it invisible to the user.
Try turning off your CSS style on your website and see how the heading looks.

7. Min-width

Another bug in IE is that it doesn’t support min-width. Min-width is extremely useful, especially for flexible templates that have a width of 100%, as it tells the browser to stop contracting. For all browsers apart from IE6 all you need ismin-width:Xpx;. e.g.:

.container {
min-width:300px;
}

Getting this to work in IE6 takes some extra effort! To start you will need to create 2 divs, one embedded in the other.

Then you will need the min-width which goes on the outer div.

.container {
min-width:300px;
}

Now this is where the IE hack comes into play. You will need to include the following code.

* html .container {
border-right: 300px solid #FFF;
}

* html .holder {
display: inline-block;
position: relative;
margin-right: -300px;
}

As the browser window is resized the outer div width reduces to suit until it shrinks to the border width, at which point it will not shrink any further. The holder div follows suit and also stops shrinking. The outer div border width becomes the minimum width of the inner div.

8. Hide Horizontal Scrolling

To remove the horizontal scrolling bar, insert overflow-x: hidden; into the body

body {
overflow-x: hidden;
}

This is useful if you decide to have an image or flash file which has a larger width than the browser.

Never go to HR for salary Increase:- HR(High Risk)

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Thu, 07 May 2009 13:23:00 +0000

Read and realize

After 10 years of selfless service, a man realized that he has not been promoted, no transfer, no salary increase no recommendation and that the Company is not doing any thing about it. So he decided to walk up to his HR Manager one morning and after exchanging greetings, he told his HR Manager his observation. The boss looked at him, laughed and asked him to sit down saying;

Myfriend, you have not worked here for even one day.
The man was surprised to hear this, but the manager went on to explain.

Manager:- How many days are there in a year?
Man:- 365 days and some times 366

Manager:- how many hours make up a day?
Man:- 24 hours

Manager:- How long do you work in a day?
Man:- 8am to 4pm. i.e. 8 hours a day.
Manager:- S! o, what fraction of the day do you work in hours?
Man:- (He did some arithmetic and said 8/24 hours i.e. 1/3(one third)

Manager:- That is nice of you! What is one-third of 366 days?
Man:- 122 (1/3x366 = 122 in days)

Manager:- Do you come to work on weekends?
Man:- No sir

Manager:- How many days are there in a year that are weekends?
Man:- 52 Saturdays and 52 Sundays equals to 104 days

Manager:- Thanks for that. If you remove 104 days from 122 days, how many days do you now have?
Man:- 18 days.

Manager:- OK! I do give you 2 weeks sick leave every year. Now remove that14 days from the 18 days left. How many days do you have remaining?
Man:- 4 days

Manager:- Do you work on New Year day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager! :- Do you come to work on workers day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- 2 days sir!

Manager:- Do you come to work on the (National holiday )?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- 1 day sir!

Manager:- Do you work on Christmas day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- None sir!

Manager:- So, what are you claiming?
Man:- I have understood, Sir. I did not realise that
I was stealing Company money all these days.

Moral - NEVER GO TO HR FOR HELP!!!

HR=HIGH RISK

You won't boost your salary with these 5 IT skills

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Thu, 07 May 2009 10:12:00 +0000

Technical skills may never die, but areas of expertise wane in importance as technology advances, forcing companies to evolve and IT staff to forsake yesterday's crafts in favour of tomorrow's must-have talents.

"There is less need for system-side knowledge. In the past, IT folks had to understand a lot about memory, drivers and address locations, and what used which interrupt, but nowadays that stuff is plug-and-chug even on many Unix systems," says Brian Jones, manager of network engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University's Tech Communications Network Services unit. "I feel like all the skills I have picked up along the way are valuable and help shape my thinking and troubleshooting abilities. I don't know how to value or devalue these skills; it's like they have taken on new value now."

Industry watchers would be hard pressed to name specific IT skills as entirely dead or completely useless, but some skills are well on their way to being considered a thing of the past -- as reflected by the declining pay associated with them. As hot skills like virtualisation rise to the top of company must-have lists, high-tech talents in certain operating systems and specific vendor products fall to the bottom. Here are five high-tech skills that don't demand the pay they once did.

Plain old HTML

As companies embrace Web 2.0 technologies such AJAX, demand for skills in HTML programming are taking a back seat. According to Foote Partners, pay for skills in technologies such as Ajax and XML increased by 12.5 percent in the last six months of 2008, while IT managers say they don't see a demand for technology predecessors such as HTML. "I'm not seeing requirements for general Web 1.0 skills -- HTML programming skills," says Debbie Joy, a lead solution architect for CSC.

Legacy programming languages

Skills in programming languages such as Cobol, Fortran, PowerBuilder and more don't rate like they once did.

"Certainly the Cobol people that had a resurgence with the Y2K bug aren't in demand," says John Estes, vice president of strategic alliances of Robert Half Technology, an IT staffing consultancy. "Certain other applications such as Delphi and PowerBuilder, [which were] very big in the '90s, are no longer in demand."

IT work-force and compensation research conducted by Foote Partners revealed that Cobol, PowerBuilder and Jini noncertified skills were among the lowest-paying skills in the second half of 2008. David Foote, CEO and chief research officer at Foote Partners, says the research shows not that such skills aren't in use today but that companies aren't willing to pay for them. "There is still a lot of C and Cobol around, though these skills are worth very little paywise," Foote says.

NetWare

Operating system know-how continues to be in top demand among hiring managers, but expertise in Novell's network operating system NetWare isn't keeping up with other technologies in the same area. "Networking software such as NetWare isn't near what it was in the '90s," Estes says. And Foote adds, "Windows Server and Linux skills have replaced, or are replacing, NetWare skills" in terms of demand.

Non-IP network

IP and Internet skills usurped non-IP network expertise and know-how in technologies such as IBM's System Network Architecture (SNA) continue to rank among the lowest-paying skills. "For networking, IP skills have replaced SNA skills," Foote says. According to Foote Partners' research, SNA skills accounted for just 2 percent of base pay in the fourth quarter of 2007, while security skills made up 17 percent of base pay.

"Mainframe computing skills, including network components such as SNA, are no longer required in a server-based IP networking environment," says Martin Webb, manager of data network operations at the Ministry of Labour and Citizens' Services in British Columbia.

PC tech support

The US Computer Technology Trade Association (CompTIA) reports that hardware skills and knowledge, including expertise with printers and PCs, are on the decline in terms of demand. CompTIA surveyed 3,578 IT hiring managers to learn which skills would grow in importance over time and the industry organisation found: "The skill area expected to decline the most in importance is hardware."

Foote Partners research separately showed an 11.1 percent decline in pay over the last six months of 2007 for ITIL skills, which are often put in place to streamline IT service management and help desk efforts.

"The 'move, add and changes' PC tech function isn't quite what is used to be," Robert Half Technology's Estes says.

Photoshop: How to Read Histograms

noreply@blogger.com (Webdoor) — Tue, 05 May 2009 08:53:00 +0000

I will be outlining some of the information you can read straight off a histogram with very little understanding of what it is showing. It is a very underused tool, mainly because most people using digital cameras do not under and what to look for and so they ignore it.

Most digital cameras come with a histogram display, but what exactly is a histogram?

Simply put - it is a representation of the colours within your image. On the left, black, on the right, white; with every colour in between. The vertical height of any column shows how many pixels of that exact colour there are in your image at each brightness setting.

Now that you know what you are looking at, I'll show examples of some common things you can see.

Exposure

Ok - It can be hard to tell on your small LCD display whether an image is exposed correctly. Just take a look at the histogram and you will see quickly.

Overexposure

There is a clear bias here towards the white end of the spectrum - unless your image is of something which is supposed to have a lot of near-white and pure white, it's almost certainly overexposed and any details in the picture will be lost to highlights.

Underexposure

There is a clear bias here towards the black end of the spectrum - unless your image is supposed to be of something dark, it's almost certainly underexposed and any details in the picture will be lost to shadows and will be very hard to recover properly on your computer.

Contrast

Over-contrasting

A histogram like this shows that you have failed to capture the dynamic range of the subject matter, with no distinctly obvious spikes in colour.

Under-contrasting

A lack of contrast will make your picture look hazy and flat. This histogram, for example, has no shadows or highlights and would have no depth. I will conclude with an example of what your histogram should look like if exposure and contrast are correct.

Defined spikes of some colours, no overwhelming shadows or highlights and a full spectral range.

This concludes, I hope this simplfied look at histograms will help you understand and use them more.