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24 ways to impress your friends

2009

A year when books were winning (Five Simple Steps published A Practical Guide to Designing for the Web by Mark Boulton and Designing with Web Standards by Jeffrey Zeldman and Ethan Marcotte reached its third edition) and the web was losing (Yahoo! closed Geocities). Significant progress was made with web fonts and HTML5, and 24 ways delivered the Christmas gifts again.

  1. Make Your Mockup in Markup

    Meagan Fisher

    Meagan Fisher tackles the issue of designing in the browser head on by looking at some of the practicalities of ditching Photoshop and setting your foundations markup. Sorry Photoshop, it’s not me, it’s you.

  2. Ignorance Is Bliss

    Andy Clarke

    Andrew Clarke shares a case study highlighting the benefits of progressively enhanced web design. Ever wondered how to convince your clients to let you use cutting edge web techniques? It may be simpler than you think.

  3. Make Out Like a Bandit

    Jina Anne

    Jina Anne encourages us to stop and take stock and make sure that we’re getting the most out of all the work we’re putting in. Does your work make you happy, and if not, how do we change things for the better?

  4. Spruce It Up

    Jonathan Snook

    Jonathan Snook picks up our theme of font embedding with some ideas on how to reduce font download sizes and load time to lessen the impact of the Flash Of Unstyled Text. The less flashing the better, if you ask me.

  5. Designing For The Switch

    Mark Boulton

    Mark Boulton uncovers some ugly truths about font embedding on the web, but being the nice chap that he is, doesn’t leave without teaching us all how we can overcome them through careful typeface selection.

  6. CSS Animations

    Tim Van Damme

    Tim Van Damme continues our advanced CSS theme by introducing what can be done in Webkit browsers when things start to get animated. Get ready to put some motion in your ocean.

  7. Rock Solid HTML Emails

    David Greiner

    David Greiner offers invaluable insight into building HTML emails. Just like HTML for the web, email requires an intimate understanding of the software used to view your work. Allow Dave to share from his wealth of experience.

  8. Incite A Riot

    Jeremy Keith

    Jeremy Keith issues a call to arms over how passages of dialogue are marked up in HTML, and more specifically, in HTML5. Stand firm, good designers and developers of the web, and don’t let poorly worded specs lead the people astray!

  9. A New Year's Resolution

    Mike Kus

    Mike Kus get us fired up with some ideas on how to think beyond the web when embarking on a new project. Inspiration is often hard to come by – learn how not to fall into the trap of churning out another identical web design.

  10. Type-Inspired Interfaces

    Dan Mall

    Dan Mall shows us one technique to combat blank-page syndrome by demonstrating how design inspiration can be taken from the typefaces we use. So put down your pencils, reach for your composing stick and let the type do the talking.

  11. Working With RGBA Colour

    Drew McLellan

    Drew McLellan kicks off our 2009 season with a look at some of the tools CSS3 provides for applying levels of transparency to colour values, enabling you to avoid weighing down a site design with heavy PNG images.