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TechEssence has an interesting topic on Librarians and technical projects. The article itself sounds interesting and well thought out, but the article was purposefully vague. Technology or technical projects can take up an enormously broad range of qualities and specifications, and I believe they were simply realizing there's a barrier with many librarians when it comes to anything technical, or technology related.

Now, what about those of us with the job of, oh...completely revamping a website and having all the staff who know about web-related things but don't understand the complexity in creating them. They know enough to be dangerous, but I'm not entirely sure I can educate them on exactly all the work that goes in to it -- and I am the only one behind the web development, web server control, etc...plus I run around helping people clear out their junk/bulk mail folders. So, perhaps there's more problem here than meets the eye, but...this seems like the article assumes or presumes there's a team behind all of this, not just a single person with a team of people coming at him or her.

Oh, the article really is well written. You should go read it and see what you get from it as it can be useful for any organization, not just libraries but any team with non-technically minded individuals.

Posted by Brendon Kozlowski

• Print a selective portion of a web page with CSS and the DOM
• A really old article, but a goodie: Typography: The trouble with EN n' EN (and other 'shady' characters)
• Some interesting CSS tips/links
• From the same source as above, but some AJAX tips and tricks
• Linked to from the interesting CSS tips, Got API.com is a web-based developers reference to a VAST amount of documentation
• Also linked from CSS links/tips -- CSS Positioning Lesson
• Dynamically loading Charts (bar, graph, line, pie, etc...) using XML/PHP (or CFML, ASP(.NET), Perl, etc...) and Flash

Posted by Brendon Kozlowski

I've come across the "Golden Section" (in its various forms) for web-development quite a bit recently -- okay, well twice...but I need to use it for work now and in the coming weeks. For those of you unfamiliar with the Golden Section, you have a few places for reading. There's a brief introduction to Fibonacci and the Golden Section/Rule/Mean/Ratio, the PhiCalculator to determine proper pixels, the power of the rule of thirds, and pretty much all of Mark Boulton's site, but potentially his articles on grid systems for the web. So...I want a piece of paper that is something like graphing paper, but not only am I too cheap and lazy to go out and get some, there's plenty of regular paper here, and the tools I need to create graphing (or quadrille) paper here at work (and at home).

Continue reading "The Golden Section"

Posted by Brendon Kozlowski

For a long time I've wanted to start using Subversion. I see all the benefits of using such a system, but I haven't taken the time to learn it. I've installed it (v1.3.2) a long time ago, but I never really did anything with it -- it was simply so I could interact with SmartSVN (a SVN client) to download others' repositories. I think it's about time I start using it in a more meaningful way on my own projects. In order to do this, I thought it would be best to start from scratch (and therefore uninstalled all previous, remotely related software). (For further learning on SVN, please visit Red-Bean's SVN Book online.)

So, it had been so long since I've done anything with Subversion, where was I to begin? I've read about all the great and wonderful things SVN can offer, but...how do I get it, how do I install it, and then how can I access it?

Continue reading "Installing and Setting up Subversion (SVN) Under Windows XP"

Posted by Brendon Kozlowski

This isn't a "What do you want to do when you grow up" question, because you have the power, the ability to do what you want now and today! Or, at least that's the spin that the wonderful folks over at "Creating Passionate Users" are saying. Boy, they really do have a wonderful sense for writing to inspire! Their articles are longer than most blogs, and they create new entries with a dedicated fervor, but the content is almost always interesting and thought provoking!

So, what do you want to be?

Continue reading "What Do You Want to Be?"

Posted by Brendon Kozlowski