Patrick Lee - One paper clip, a box of matches, and some JavaScript
A presentation given at at Web Directions Government, Old Parliament House, Canberra, May 19 2008.
Whoever you are, if you’re writing JavaScript, there’s some aspect of your development that you would love to change if you had the chance. But the reality is you’ll never find yourself working in this ideal environment: dealing with legacy browsers, platforms and content management systems will be your constant as a developer. Patrick Lee is going to show you some tools and techniques that will help you make your peace with this fact.
This session will explore how you can find ways to do the cool stuff you really want to do with JavaScript whilst working in the real world. And you won’t even have to sell your soul in the process.
It seems like there’s a new Ajax library or JavaScript framework coming out every week, and there probably is! Which is the best one to pick? Will you be up the creek without a paddle if you choose the wrong one?
When Version 2 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines is finally released, the status of Javascript will be quite different to that assigned to it in Version 1.0 back in 1999. Back then, Javascript was to “degrade gracefully”. Currently AJAX offers increased usability for visual users, but may detract from accessibility. In future, use of JavaScript will be encouraged but, of course, must enhance rather than detract from accessibility. During this presentation, Andrew and Grant will demonstrate how Javascript, when implemented well, offers enhanced accessibility. By way of balance, they will also present examples of scripting that causes problems. Importantly, they will provide corrections to the errant coding.
The Web is full of information that is presented inefficiently - both for machines and for humans. Adrian Holovaty shares philosophies and strategies for efficient data collection and information design, drawing from his experiences at data-heavy news sites lawrence.com, washingtonpost.com) and side projects such as chicagocrime.org.
Forms. We all have to make ‘em, but few of us love ‘em. Aaron Gustafson believes that this is because we don’t understand them. In this session, we will explore forms from top to bottom, examining how they work and how their components can be incorporated with other elements to maximize accessibility, improve semantics, and allow for more flexible styling. You’ll get to see the complete picture with forms, including error, warning and formatting messages, styling and its implications, as well as best practices for manipulation with Javascript and Ajax.
CSS level 2 became a standard in 1998. The last revision of HTML4 dates from 1999. That’s long time ago in Web years, but they aren’t forgotten: after several years of work, CSS is close to a revision and browser support is better than ever. It’s necessary, because CSS needs to grow: vertical text, columns, print support, complex layouts and much more is increasingly demanded. Likewise, there is a big effort to revise HTML. Interest is so high, the W3C is trying a new process, to let more people participate in the editing work. There are also new forms, standards for combining SVG and HTML and new work on the security of forms. Bert’s here to tell us: we haven’t seen the end of the Web page yet.
