May 6, 2008
On-Site SEO Best Practices
How to Bake Tasty Googlebot Snacks
Search engine optimization (SEO) can be defined in two categories: on-site, and off-site. On-site is the kind of SEO that is directly under your control through your web site files or CMS. Whereas off-site optimization takes place on other web sites. This article deals primarily with the on-site portion of SEO; that which is usually handled by site designers and developers. But I think it’s important to define both types in more detail for the context of this article.
May 5, 2008
IBM Model-M Keyboard
Timeless Tools
Flash back to the 1960s for a moment. IBM was a major manufacturer of typewriters with their Selectric line. It was a simpler time … typewriters were judged on how well they typed. The way to sell lots of typewriters was to give you an extremely satisfying experience typing on them, both in feel and speed. The keyboard was a make or break proposition for the typewriter, and IBM had an amazing product in this respect. At no other time in history have so many resources been put towards the typing experience.
Now flash forward from the 1960s to 1981. IBM is still making great Selectric typewriters, but they’ve got a new product: The IBM Personal Computer. With such a large base of Selectric customers, the PC was a natural upgrade path. The PC can do so much more than the typewriter, and the keyboard—no longer center stage—is just one of many parts of that whole.
April 30, 2008
VIM
Timeless Tools
To the best of my knowledge, there aren’t many full-time web developers that use tools like Dreamweaver, GoLive, FrontPage, and so on, to create web sites. Instead, web developers work directly with the XHTML and CSS code. Not just by choice, but by necessity as well. I won’t get into the reasons why that is so important here, but I will say that working directly with the code is something that’s not likely to change in the future, given the nature and purpose of markup.
To work with code, a text editor becomes your key tool. Everyone has their favorite text editor. Mine is VIM, which is essentially a newer version of the unix classic, VI. I get chastised for using a text editor that came from the 1960s. While it may be an old tool, made for a different time, it’s a great tool that I could not do without.
April 21, 2008
PHP
Timeless Tools
PHP is at the top of my list as a timeless tool for web development. Microsoft .NET developers make more, and Ruby and Python may have a nicer name, but PHP is by far the most important, longest lasting and widely adopted web programming language out there. Sites not powered by PHP tend to be the exception. Yahoo, Flickr, and Digg are powered by PHP, and the most widely used CMS products (like Drupal, Joomla, WordPress, etc.) are likewise powered by PHP.
PHP 5.x brought the language into the enterprise-level, many years ago. PHP is far from perfect, and it does have its quirks. In fact, it’s a little bit dangerous in the hands of an inexperienced developer … really, what language isn’t? But it’s hard to dispute the positive impact and importance this language has in the web development world.
© 2008 by Ryan Cramer Design, LLC • 