wax ideal » web

Fixing z-index object problems in Google Chrome using wmode

sarandi — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 09:18:33 +0000

Turns out that using z-index on html objects doesn’t work in Google Chrome! Luckily, there’s a quick fix – just add the following param to the object, add the z-index, and you should be good to go:

User Testing Websites

sarandi — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 21:56:04 +0000

A few user testing websites – know of any others?

http://www.loop11.com/pricing/
http://www.optimalworkshop.com/chalkmark.htm
http://www.usertesting.com/
http://www.userzoom.com/

How to trigger a jQuery Plugin (fancybox) if URL match

sarandi — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 21:42:05 +0000

I currently work for a venue – often times we have shows with multiple acts, so we need to list set times for each artist. Easy enough: I can write a modal-type pop-up window using fancybox that opens when the user clicks a link (“DJ Showtimes here“, for example). But say you want to send an email that links to that list? Since most email clients, web- or desktop-based, don’t allow javascript, I needed to trigger the click based on the URL. Here’s my solution (using a custom jQuery function to avoid conflicts with other libraries in use):


$j('#various2').fancybox({'hideOnContentClick': true, 'hideOnOverlayClick': true, 'showCloseButton': true, 'scrolling': 'auto'}); /* use id of link for fancybox selector */

/* necessary to set if-statement within page ready or load event */

$j(document).ready(function() {
if(document.location.href.indexOf('#various2')>-1){ /* check for anchor text in URL */
$j('#various2').fancybox().trigger('click'); /* chain click trigger on to previously written fancybox declaration */
}});
$j('#fancybox-wrap').css({'margin':'20px auto'}) /* set css for wrapper; safari was centering the inline element to the position of the #various2 element, which was at the top of the page. This resets to 20px top/bottom and in the middle horizontally */

My link looks like this:

DJ Set Times Here

and my content is wrapped with:


CONTENT HERE

Easy, peasy.

Google Analytics Links & Resources

sarandi — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 13:46:43 +0000

gleaned from http://appsumo.com/googlevid/ (must sign up to gain access to [temporarily free] video!

Campaign Tracking Overview:
http://cutroni.com/blog/2006/11/10/google-analytics-campaign-tracking-pt-0-an-overview/

Google Analytics URL Builder:
http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55578

Goals & Funnels:
http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?answer=55515&hl=en

Site Search:
http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=75817

Google Analytics: Power User Guide:
http://blog.vkistudios.com/index.cfm/2009/6/5/The-Google-Analytics-Power-User-Guide

50 Resources for Getting the Most Out of Google Analytics
http://blog.kissmetrics.com/50-resources-for-getting-the-most-out-of-google-analytics/

The Huge Collection of Google Analytics Tips
http://www.searchenginejournal.com/the-huge-collection-of-google-analytics-tips/7426/

Google Analytics YouTube Channel
http://www.youtube.com/googleanalytics

Blogs about Google Analytics

The Official Google Analytics Blog
http://analytics.blogspot.com/index.html

Advanced Web Metrics
http://www.advanced-web-metrics.com/blog/

Google Analytics Results
http://www.googleanalyticsresults.com/

Luna Metrics Blog
http://www.lunametrics.com/blog/

Analytics Talk
http://www.cutroni.com

Eric Meyer’s CSS Reset

sarandi — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 22:25:28 +0000

For rapid xhtml/css development, this is invaluable:

http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2011/01/03/reset-revisited/

Especially when you pair it up with this:

http://960ls.atomidata.com/

Testing for IE6

sarandi — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 02:16:12 +0000

I recently got a new laptop and needed to get my machine ready for web development . I’d previously been using MAMP on my Mac and running Parallels for testing in the IEs. After some deliberation, I decided on XAMPP for Windows – I’m running 7. XAMPP installs Apache, MySQL, PHP, Perl, ASP, Mercury, FileZilla, and a slew of other daemons/services. There are some potential conflicts with the PHP/MySQL versions used for Drupal, but after testing, I haven’t run into any issues. Even if it becomes problematic, I can always manually configure a different version of either PHP or MySQL.

After getting my testing server up and running, I needed a way to test for IE6. Yes, I’m on Windows – but Windows 7 never shipped with IE6 or 7, unlike Vista – so standalone solutions no longer work. I just found a program that solves this issue – and is able to render pages simulating IE5.5-8. IETester v0.4.2 is the current version, though it has been out since March of 2009. Somehow, it entirely missed my radar – probably because I was still running XP and didn’t broaden my queries.

I should say this: IE6 support doesn’t come for free. Clients whose user-base is heavy in the IE6 department can’t afford to not support those users. So, while I can develop for such users – they won’t be getting the same experience – and certainly not without an increased cost. It is my job to push internet standards, including A-level, modern browsers; efficiencies in development/production cut costs over the long-run especially for larger clients. When I have to dick around making tweaks because one idiot browser still won’t die, it’s annoying. For all business owners, large and small: please entertain this suggestion:

Encourage your users to upgrade their browsers.

Obnoxious/semi-invasive design via javascript-based browser sniffing would do wonders to bump browsers into gear. Hell, even showing a simple survey that asks “Do you ride a dinosaur to work? Why do you use an ancient browser?” followed by multiple choices that lead back to a site that encourages browser upgrades.

This tangent is officially over.

I had been running Sun’s Virtual Machine with an XP installation to do IE6 testing, but this alternative has made things easier. The only real issue is sharing files between the host – Windows 7 – and the guest – Windows XP in the VM. That shouldn’t be too difficult, but time is important and I’d rather stick with what works for now.

With that said, my nose is back to the grindstone (though it won’t really move much at all).

Drupal Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted

sarandi — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 03:11:57 +0000

While installing the Calendar module for a Drupal site, I ran into the following error:

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 71 bytes) in /home/milwaul0/public_html/drupal/includes/theme.inc on line 729

Confounded, I searched the internet and found this:

http://drupal.org/node/283579

The first option (making a php.ini file in the root) appears to need a restart of the webserver, so I tried the second option, allocating more memory to php via drupal using:

ini_set(‘memory_limit’, ’64M’); in the sites/default/settings.php file

But before that, I had to change the permissions of the file, which had been set to 555 (default, by the site admin I assume).

I initially set the memory to 64M to make sure it would work, since 33554432 bytes is 32MB. After it worked, I noticed that the permissions for the file had been reset to 555, so I changed that again and allocated 32MB for php. It worked. If ever any problems arise, I’ll know what to do.

What’s weird is that this error was triggered while allocating 71 bytes. I don’t know why there was even an issue… anyone?