Discover how you can interact with Lotus Domino databases from Web applications created in the PHP programming language. Learn how to access Domino applications from PHP pages using a COM object, the Lotus Notes API, and XML.

Lotus Notes/Domino 7 application performance: Part 1: Database properties and document collections
No Lotus Notes/Domino developer wants to hear the following comment: “Beautiful application, too bad it’s so slow!” In this two-part article series, we explain how you can avoid this embarrassment by building Notes/Domino applications optimized for performance.

Exploiting IBM DB2 in your Lotus Domino 7 application
In this article, we discuss how you can work with the new IBM DB2 integration features offered in Lotus Domino 7.

Tip: xsd:any: A cautionary tale
xsd:any is a popular feature for people designing XML schema. But it’s often more trouble than it’s worth. Explore some of the shortcomings of xsd:any, both in XML itself and in the JAX-RPC Java language binding, so that, even if you decide to use xsd:any, you will be more prepared to deal appropriately with it.

Single Sign-on in a Multi-directory World: “Never say login again” Part 1
Learn all about Single Sign-on (SSO) in Notes/Domino from that international man of mystery, Jim Bland. In this first installment of a two-part series, we examine SSO basics and look at issues that arise in multi-directory, multi-identity environments.

Troubleshooting Lotus Domino hangs and crashes
Quick — what’s the difference between a server hang and a crash? More important, how do you go about fixing them? In this article, we explain how you can identify Lotus Domino server hangs and crashes, and what you can do to analyze and correct them.

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA): an interview with IBM Workplace and Lotus developers
Service Oriented Architecture, better known as SOA, has gotten a lot of press lately. But what does it mean, and what can it do for you? In this interview, three members of IBM development talk about SOA, and how IBM and Lotus products are incorporating its concepts.

New Rooms and Resources features in Lotus Notes/Domino 7
In this article, we look at all the new Rooms and Resources features introduced in Notes/Domino 7.

Adding social bookmarking tags to Lotus QuickPlace
Implement social bookmarking tags in Lotus QuickPlace and let users classify their own content for easy retrieval of information. This article shows you a simple solution to enable users to add and to share tags with each other.

New features in Lotus Notes 7 mail
People use Notes/Domino in all sorts of different ways, and one of the most popular is email and messaging. With that in mind, Notes/Domino 7 offers significantly enhanced mail functionality, including expanded calendar and scheduling. This article reviews some of the more important and useful of these new features.

Single Sign-on in a Multi-directory World: “Never say login again” Part 2
In this conclusion to our two-part series, we look at several different scenarios you may encounter when implementing single sign-on (SSO) functionality at your site.

Understanding the Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook Notes.ini file
Following in the footsteps of Professor INI, Nathan Barry highlights some of the settings of the Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook Notes.ini file to help you troubleshoot common issues and to enable new features in the software.

Lotus Notes/Domino 7 application performance: Part 2: Optimizing database views
In part two of this article series, we explain how you can build views that are optimized for performance in your Notes/Domino applications.

Taking a tour of the new features and technology in IBM Lotus Sametime 7.5
Examine the architectural and design changes planned for IBM Lotus Sametime 7.5, including a new Connect client, a new Web conferencing UI, policies, click to call, click to chat, A/V integration, and a new SIP solution to connect to external communities, including AOL and Yahoo.

Integrating Lotus QuickPlace with Lotus Domino Document Manager in real time
This article describes a way to integrate IBM Lotus QuickPlace with IBM Lotus Domino Document Manager (Domino.Doc) in real time. This will allow you to use Domino Document Manager s revision controls on QuickPlace content.

Lotus Notes Out of Office Agent, revisited: Part 2
We conclude our two-part series on the Lotus Notes Out of Office agent with a look at Out of Office agent administration, using Out of Office features with Domino Web Access, and troubleshooting Out of Office issues.

Best practices for large Lotus Notes mail files
Learn how you can manage the ever-growing mail files of your Lotus Notes users, conserving your system resources while ensuring your Notes users continue to enjoy high performance and reliability.

Using Ajax to manipulate Lotus Notes documents
Giving users instant feedback instead of the time-consuming page reloads they re used to is simple when you use Ajax. Discover how a view and an agent can help you build Ajax-driven applications and learn how to define an API for getting the client and the Domino server to collaborate.

Configuring a redundant ClearCase backup server
If ClearCase availability is critical to your organization, maintaining a redundant replica enables your organization to restore normal operations faster with less data loss.

Working with application layouts in the IBM Workplace Managed Client
Learn how to control the way in which your application is displayed in the IBM Workplace Managed Client by understanding the RCPML parameters that control how the application is displayed.

Building a Lotus Sametime bot for language translation
Build an IBM Lotus Sametime bot that works with IBM WebSphere Translation Server to translate text strings on-the-fly. Use the Lotus Sametime Java toolkit, the WebSphere Translation Server Java API, IBM’s public Sametime server, and the IBM Community Tools client for development and testing.

Creating hierarchy objects in Lotus Domino Designer
This tip shows you how to create a hierarchy of related objects, using design elements in Lotus Domino Designer. It applies to Domino Designer 6.5 and later.

Under the hood of IBM Workplace Collaboration Services
Take a peek under the hood of IBM Workplace Collaboration Services and learn about the layers that make up Workplace Collaboration Services, including IBM WebSphere Application Server and IBM WebSphere Portal.

Implementing notifications in Web applications using Lotus Sametime
Learn how to add event-driven notification functionality to your Web applications with Lotus Sametime.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 3
In the conclusion to our three-part article series, we look at test results we obtained by running the new Server.Load Enterprise Mail workload, introduced in Domino 7.

The History of Notes and Domino
Notes and Domino began in the work of Ray Ozzie, Tim Halvorsen, and Len Kawell, first on PLATO Notes at the University of Illinois and later on DECNotes. Lotus founder Mitch Kapor saw the potential in Ozzie’s collaboration project and the rest is history.

The requester side caching pattern specification: An overview
Learn how the requester side caching pattern mediates the interaction between one or more clients and one or more data providers and how it can speed access to the data while reducing costs.

Lotus Domino Web Access client performance improvements
See how significantly your Domino Web Access client performance can improve with the release 6.5.3 hotfix (included in Domino Web Access 6.5.4 and later). Administrators and users learn tips to increase performance and to improve user satisfaction.

Tip: Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes interoperability: I want my doclinks!
What could be more useful than Lotus Notes doclinks? This tip explains how you can extend Notes doclink functionality to Microsoft Outlook.

Managing IBM Workplace Managed Client applications
Ever wonder what the ‘managed’ means in IBM Workplace Managed Client? Read this article and learn how to manage Workplace Managed Client applications through both the Web browser and XMLAccess interfaces.

Introducing IBM Lotus Notes access for SAP solutions
Lotus Notes access for SAP solutions is a new feature in Lotus Notes 7.0.1 that integrates Lotus Notes and SAP, so you can perform some common SAP functions from within Lotus Notes, such as time reporting, vacation and leave requests, and so on. Developers can extend this new feature even further.

Manipulating data in Domino Web Access
Read this article to learn how you can customize Lotus Domino Web Access to adapt to the specific requirements of your Notes/Domino data. We describe how Domino Web Access determines the appropriate scene to play for a form type, how data is reflected within the scene, and how updated data is validated.

Building a JSR 168 portal application for Domino
In an earlier article, we described creating a DXL framework for working with a Lotus Domino database over the Web. We now turn our attention to building a JSR 168 portal application as a frontend to a Domino database.

Controlling spam: Advanced SMTP settings in Lotus Domino
Find out how to control spam mail using the Server document and Notes.ini variables. Then preview the anti-spam controls in Lotus Notes/Domino 7 and see what s ahead. This article is part two in a series about Lotus Domino methods of spam control.

Name resolution and searching: Comparing Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access
In this article, we compare how Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access interact with address books to find and resolve mailing addresses.

The DigestSearch method for Lotus Domino databases
This article introduces DigestSearch, an alternative solution for working with IBM Lotus Notes Profile documents and for performing simple, high-speed searches. For searching server-based databases from a Notes client, DigestSearch is twice as fast as any other search method available, outperforming both full-text search and LotusScript’s GetDocumentByKey method.

New workloads and features in Lotus Domino 7 Server.Load
Learn about all the new features we’ve added to the Lotus Domino 7 version of the Server.Load performance testing and planning tool.

New serviceability features in IBM Lotus Notes/Domino 7
Enhancements to the automatic diagnostic collection feature and the new fault analyzer feature make Lotus Notes and Domino 7 more serviceable. See how these improvements can help you with your next server or client crash.

Lotus Notes Out of Office Agent, revisited: Part 1
The Lotus Notes Out of Office agent is one of the most widely-used and useful agents in Notes. In this first of a two-part article series, we take a detailed look at how the agent works and how you can customize it.

Lotus Domino 7 performance in production at IBM on pSeries servers
In this article, we review the performance improvements we achieved by deploying Domino 7 on pSeries servers in a live IBM production environment.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 1
How does Lotus Notes/Domino 7 perform compared to its previous release? In this first of a three-part series, we discuss testing we performed to determine how the various Domino 7 platforms stack up against the previous release of Notes/Domino.

Lotus Domino on AIX memory usage explained
Learn about IBM AIX segment layouts for the Lotus Domino server and how to configure the Notes.ini file settings ConstrainedSHMSizeMB and PercentAvailSysResources to alter your server memory allocation. Find recommendations for configuring the server.

Wikis, blogs and other community tools in the enterprise
Wikis and Web logs (blogs) make a big impact on the Web, but they can also be useful in an enterprise. A community is a group of people with common interests, goals, or responsibilities, such as a project team or an interest group. Combine wikis and blogs with existing collaborative tools to enhance the productivity and effectiveness of enterprise teams.

Creating Mail policies in Lotus Notes/Domino 7
Learn how policies, first introduced in Lotus Notes/Domino 6, have been enhanced to include the powerful new Mail Settings policy document that lets you administer calendar and mail settings for your users.

Tip: Validating a rich text field in Lotus Notes
This tip offers three ways that you can validate rich text input fields in Lotus Notes.

Lotus Domino 7 on the IBM zSeries
In this article, we look at IBM’s own implementation of Lotus Domino 7 on the IBM zSeries platform. We focus on the performance improvements we’ve seen, which should bring a smile to the face of all Domino administrators.

Discover the power of Calendar Delegation in Lotus Notes
Learn how to setup and use the Calendar Delegation feature in the Lotus Notes client to grant another Notes user access to your mail file and act on your behalf.

Building RSS feeds for Lotus Domino Document Manager
Set up an RSS feed for your binders in Lotus Domino Document manager, so users are notified when content is added or modified. Using a new view and modifying existing design elements in the database, you can easily create an RSS feed.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 2
In this second of a three-part article series, we review the results of tests we performed to determine how Domino 7 compares with Domino 6.5 for supporting Domino Web Access users.

Configure IBM WebSphere Information Integrator to access a Lotus Notes database
This article introduces the capabilities of IBM WebSphere Information Integrator for integrating and updating data in IBM Lotus Notes databases. You’ll learn how to set up access to the Lotus Notes data sources from IBM DB2 federated database using the DB2 Control Center.

This tip offers three ways that you can validate rich text input fields in Lotus Notes.

Creating Mail policies in Lotus Notes/Domino 7
Learn how policies, first introduced in Lotus Notes/Domino 6, have been enhanced to include the powerful new Mail Settings policy document that lets you administer calendar and mail settings for your users.

The History of Notes and Domino
Notes and Domino began in the work of Ray Ozzie, Tim Halvorsen, and Len Kawell, first on PLATO Notes at the University of Illinois and later on DECNotes. Lotus founder Mitch Kapor saw the potential in Ozzie’s collaboration project and the rest is history.

Wikis, blogs and other community tools in the enterprise
Wikis and Web logs (blogs) make a big impact on the Web, but they can also be useful in an enterprise. A community is a group of people with common interests, goals, or responsibilities, such as a project team or an interest group. Combine wikis and blogs with existing collaborative tools to enhance the productivity and effectiveness of enterprise teams.

Building RSS feeds for Lotus Domino Document Manager
Set up an RSS feed for your binders in Lotus Domino Document manager, so users are notified when content is added or modified. Using a new view and modifying existing design elements in the database, you can easily create an RSS feed.

The DigestSearch method for Lotus Domino databases
This article introduces DigestSearch, an alternative solution for working with IBM Lotus Notes Profile documents and for performing simple, high-speed searches. For searching server-based databases from a Notes client, DigestSearch is twice as fast as any other search method available, outperforming both full-text search and LotusScript’s GetDocumentByKey method.

Implementing notifications in Web applications using Lotus Sametime
Learn how to add event-driven notification functionality to your Web applications with Lotus Sametime.

Taking a tour of the new features and technology in IBM Lotus Sametime 7.5
Examine the architectural and design changes planned for IBM Lotus Sametime 7.5, including a new Connect client, a new Web conferencing UI, policies, click to call, click to chat, A/V integration, and a new SIP solution to connect to external communities, including AOL and Yahoo.

Introducing IBM Lotus Notes access for SAP solutions
Lotus Notes access for SAP solutions is a new feature in Lotus Notes 7.0.1 that integrates Lotus Notes and SAP, so you can perform some common SAP functions from within Lotus Notes, such as time reporting, vacation and leave requests, and so on. Developers can extend this new feature even further.

Controlling spam: Advanced SMTP settings in Lotus Domino
Find out how to control spam mail using the Server document and Notes.ini variables. Then preview the anti-spam controls in Lotus Notes/Domino 7 and see what s ahead. This article is part two in a series about Lotus Domino methods of spam control.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 2
In this second of a three-part article series, we review the results of tests we performed to determine how Domino 7 compares with Domino 6.5 for supporting Domino Web Access users.

Working with application layouts in the IBM Workplace Managed Client
Learn how to control the way in which your application is displayed in the IBM Workplace Managed Client by understanding the RCPML parameters that control how the application is displayed.

Discover the power of Calendar Delegation in Lotus Notes
Learn how to setup and use the Calendar Delegation feature in the Lotus Notes client to grant another Notes user access to your mail file and act on your behalf.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 1
How does Lotus Notes/Domino 7 perform compared to its previous release? In this first of a three-part series, we discuss testing we performed to determine how the various Domino 7 platforms stack up against the previous release of Notes/Domino.

Lotus Notes/Domino 7 application performance: Part 2: Optimizing database views
In part two of this article series, we explain how you can build views that are optimized for performance in your Notes/Domino applications.

Tip: xsd:any: A cautionary tale
xsd:any is a popular feature for people designing XML schema. But it’s often more trouble than it’s worth. Explore some of the shortcomings of xsd:any, both in XML itself and in the JAX-RPC Java language binding, so that, even if you decide to use xsd:any, you will be more prepared to deal appropriately with it.

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA): an interview with IBM Workplace and Lotus developers
Service Oriented Architecture, better known as SOA, has gotten a lot of press lately. But what does it mean, and what can it do for you? In this interview, three members of IBM development talk about SOA, and how IBM and Lotus products are incorporating its concepts.

Building PHP-based UIs for IBM Lotus Domino
Discover how you can interact with Lotus Domino databases from Web applications created in the PHP programming language. Learn how to access Domino applications from PHP pages using a COM object, the Lotus Notes API, and XML.

Tip: Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes interoperability: I want my doclinks!
What could be more useful than Lotus Notes doclinks? This tip explains how you can extend Notes doclink functionality to Microsoft Outlook.

Single Sign-on in a Multi-directory World: “Never say login again” Part 2
In this conclusion to our two-part series, we look at several different scenarios you may encounter when implementing single sign-on (SSO) functionality at your site.

New Rooms and Resources features in Lotus Notes/Domino 7
In this article, we look at all the new Rooms and Resources features introduced in Notes/Domino 7.

Manipulating data in Domino Web Access
Read this article to learn how you can customize Lotus Domino Web Access to adapt to the specific requirements of your Notes/Domino data. We describe how Domino Web Access determines the appropriate scene to play for a form type, how data is reflected within the scene, and how updated data is validated.

Understanding the Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook Notes.ini file
Following in the footsteps of Professor INI, Nathan Barry highlights some of the settings of the Lotus Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook Notes.ini file to help you troubleshoot common issues and to enable new features in the software.

Integrating Lotus QuickPlace with Lotus Domino Document Manager in real time
This article describes a way to integrate IBM Lotus QuickPlace with IBM Lotus Domino Document Manager (Domino.Doc) in real time. This will allow you to use Domino Document Manager s revision controls on QuickPlace content.

Building a Lotus Sametime bot for language translation
Build an IBM Lotus Sametime bot that works with IBM WebSphere Translation Server to translate text strings on-the-fly. Use the Lotus Sametime Java toolkit, the WebSphere Translation Server Java API, IBM’s public Sametime server, and the IBM Community Tools client for development and testing.

Lotus Notes Out of Office Agent, revisited: Part 1
The Lotus Notes Out of Office agent is one of the most widely-used and useful agents in Notes. In this first of a two-part article series, we take a detailed look at how the agent works and how you can customize it.

Configuring a redundant ClearCase backup server
If ClearCase availability is critical to your organization, maintaining a redundant replica enables your organization to restore normal operations faster with less data loss.

Lotus Domino 7 server performance, Part 3
In the conclusion to our three-part article series, we look at test results we obtained by running the new Server.Load Enterprise Mail workload, introduced in Domino 7.

Lotus Domino 7 performance in production at IBM on pSeries servers
In this article, we review the performance improvements we achieved by deploying Domino 7 on pSeries servers in a live IBM production environment.

Using Ajax to manipulate Lotus Notes documents
Giving users instant feedback instead of the time-consuming page reloads they re used to is simple when you use Ajax. Discover how a view and an agent can help you build Ajax-driven applications and learn how to define an API for getting the client and the Domino server to collaborate.

New features in Lotus Notes 7 mail
People use Notes/Domino in all sorts of different ways, and one of the most popular is email and messaging. With that in mind, Notes/Domino 7 offers significantly enhanced mail functionality, including expanded calendar and scheduling. This article reviews some of the more important and useful of these new features.

Lotus Domino Web Access client performance improvements
See how significantly your Domino Web Access client performance can improve with the release 6.5.3 hotfix (included in Domino Web Access 6.5.4 and later). Administrators and users learn tips to increase performance and to improve user satisfaction.

Troubleshooting Lotus Domino hangs and crashes
Quick — what’s the difference between a server hang and a crash? More important, how do you go about fixing them? In this article, we explain how you can identify Lotus Domino server hangs and crashes, and what you can do to analyze and correct them.

New serviceability features in IBM Lotus Notes/Domino 7
Enhancements to the automatic diagnostic collection feature and the new fault analyzer feature make Lotus Notes and Domino 7 more serviceable. See how these improvements can help you with your next server or client crash.

Lotus Notes Out of Office Agent, revisited: Part 2
We conclude our two-part series on the Lotus Notes Out of Office agent with a look at Out of Office agent administration, using Out of Office features with Domino Web Access, and troubleshooting Out of Office issues.

Configure IBM WebSphere Information Integrator to access a Lotus Notes database
This article introduces the capabilities of IBM WebSphere Information Integrator for integrating and updating data in IBM Lotus Notes databases. You’ll learn how to set up access to the Lotus Notes data sources from IBM DB2 federated database using the DB2 Control Center.

Single Sign-on in a Multi-directory World: “Never say login again” Part 1
Learn all about Single Sign-on (SSO) in Notes/Domino from that international man of mystery, Jim Bland. In this first installment of a two-part series, we examine SSO basics and look at issues that arise in multi-directory, multi-identity environments.

Best practices for large Lotus Notes mail files
Learn how you can manage the ever-growing mail files of your Lotus Notes users, conserving your system resources while ensuring your Notes users continue to enjoy high performance and reliability.

Exploiting IBM DB2 in your Lotus Domino 7 application
In this article, we discuss how you can work with the new IBM DB2 integration features offered in Lotus Domino 7.

Lotus Notes/Domino 7 application performance: Part 1: Database properties and document collections
No Lotus Notes/Domino developer wants to hear the following comment: “Beautiful application, too bad it’s so slow!” In this two-part article series, we explain how you can avoid this embarrassment by building Notes/Domino applications optimized for performance.

Managing IBM Workplace Managed Client applications
Ever wonder what the ‘managed’ means in IBM Workplace Managed Client? Read this article and learn how to manage Workplace Managed Client applications through both the Web browser and XMLAccess interfaces.

Name resolution and searching: Comparing Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access
In this article, we compare how Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access interact with address books to find and resolve mailing addresses.

Creating hierarchy objects in Lotus Domino Designer
This tip shows you how to create a hierarchy of related objects, using design elements in Lotus Domino Designer. It applies to Domino Designer 6.5 and later.

Adding social bookmarking tags to Lotus QuickPlace
Implement social bookmarking tags in Lotus QuickPlace and let users classify their own content for easy retrieval of information. This article shows you a simple solution to enable users to add and to share tags with each other.

Under the hood of IBM Workplace Collaboration Services
Take a peek under the hood of IBM Workplace Collaboration Services and learn about the layers that make up Workplace Collaboration Services, including IBM WebSphere Application Server and IBM WebSphere Portal.

The requester side caching pattern specification: An overview
Learn how the requester side caching pattern mediates the interaction between one or more clients and one or more data providers and how it can speed access to the data while reducing costs.

Lotus Domino 7 on the IBM zSeries
In this article, we look at IBM’s own implementation of Lotus Domino 7 on the IBM zSeries platform. We focus on the performance improvements we’ve seen, which should bring a smile to the face of all Domino administrators.

Lotus Domino on AIX memory usage explained
Learn about IBM AIX segment layouts for the Lotus Domino server and how to configure the Notes.ini file settings ConstrainedSHMSizeMB and PercentAvailSysResources to alter your server memory allocation. Find recommendations for configuring the server.

Building a JSR 168 portal application for Domino
In an earlier article, we described creating a DXL framework for working with a Lotus Domino database over the Web. We now turn our attention to building a JSR 168 portal application as a frontend to a Domino database.

New workloads and features in Lotus Domino 7 Server.Load
Learn about all the new features we’ve added to the Lotus Domino 7 version of the Server.Load performance testing and planning tool.

Love him or hate him, John C. Dvorak has written an article concerning the topic of this blog. John is bugged by CSS. The idea is great, it just falls apart in practice noting how Firefox displays CSS differently from Internet Explorer, which displays it differently from Opera he says.

"Everyone loses here, from users who can't under?stand why things look screwy, to developers who can't get CSS to do the job right, to baffled content providers.And what's being done about it? Nothing! Another fine mess from the standards bodies."

If we could get atleast two of the popular browsers on the same page, than we would be set. Imagine if IE and Firefox rendered code the same way. Every other browser would be forced to follow or die a slow and miserable death.

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While we're on the subject of new browsers...

• Firefox 2 beta 1 is now available as a developer preview, for testing purposes only. (I guess that's a little redundant, isn't it?) Its features include: support for Javacsript 1.7; inline spell checking in text boxes; and the ability to reopen accidentally-closed tabs (I definitely need that one, with my command-W-happy fingers).
• Opera 9 has been released, with a lot of cool new features. To name just a few, it boasts built-in BitTorrent, thumbnail site preview, and one-click ad blocking. And there's more, so much more!
• All the cool kids are talking about Flock, with its built-in blog integration and photobar. If that doesn't have "Web 2.0" written all over it, I don't know what does.

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Check out this Slashdot interview with H?kon Wium Lie, the originator of the CSS idea. (Can you believe it's been over 10 years since CSS was proposed? Time flies when you're coding with tables!) Lie currently serves as CTO of Opera Software.

In the interview, Lie suggests that before releasing IE 7, Microsoft should ensure that the browser passes the Acid2 test and supports TrueType downloadable fonts. He also discusses XML, microformats, Ajax, and (of course) the future of CSS. Read the interview and watch him effortlessly knock down all suggestions that CSS is somehow lacking in capabilities.

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Internet Explorer 7 Beta 3 has been announced and is now available for download. Features include tabbed browsing, RSS integration, multiple search engines via the built-in search box, and more. Sure, these are all features that Firefox, Safari, etc. have had for a quite some time, but as the old saying goes, better late than pregnant. There are no new CSS features, however; Microsoft has stayed true to their promise that, for better or for worse, as of this March IE 7 was "layout complete."

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In his article "HTML's a Tag Too," Bryan Veloso discusses the benefits of applying styles to the element. He argues that by making more effective use of , developers could eliminate the need for a wrapper div. Everything would effectively be "moved up" a level - apply global styles to instead of , and then can serve the same purpose as the wrapper div would have. Bryan points out that this can be particularly handy in XHTML 1.1, in which the no longer stretches the entire length of the page.

It's a neat idea, but for many developers - particularly those of us who work on large, enterprise-level sites - it is simply impractical. On large sites, rarely would you want to declare a global background image, for example. Or, you may not be able to access certain elements of a page at all, due to CMS limitations or other restrictions. However, for a small-scale site, styling could be a good way to reduce divitis, as long as you're mindful of scalability issues.

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WebdesignFromScratch.com recently gave sunhome.biz a slick re-design and they documented there thoughts and motivations so everyone can learn. The original design was drab with a large white space in the middle of the page. Also, the original design doesn't consider the needs of its target audience, senior citizens. The new design is much easier to follow and more pleasing to the eye. Give the article a read to learn the specifics of what they changed and why they did what they did, which is the best way to learn good design.

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Analytic services provide valuable stats to web site owners and can be the only way of determining if a design is really working or not with real users. ClickTale hopes to up the ante by recording user actions so you can see every mouse movement, every click, and every scroll. Then the service lets you, the owner, see exactly what the user did. Perfect for testing usability. Currently ClickTale is a closed beta but you can sign up for updates by email. A web 2.0 site that is plum purple? I like it.

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It's true that IE is the most notorious browser for inconsistencies, incompatibilities, and bugs. But the fact remains that no two browsers are created equal, and while IE is the most likely to cause headaches in the course of development, other browsers can be culprits, as well.

If you run into a major roadblock, Rafael Lima's CSS Browser Selector could be your saving grace. A tiny bit of Javascript (less than 1kb!) determines the user's browser and creates an accordingly-named class. From there, it's simply a matter of applying the styles that were written for that particular browser. For example:

.ie .example {
background-color: yellow
}
.gecko .example {
background-color: gray
}
.opera .example {
background-color: green
}
.konqueror .example {
background-color: blue
}
.webkit .example {
background-color: black
}
.example {
width: 100px;
height: 100px;
background-color: brown;
}

The colored box on the CSS Browser Selector page gets the point across better than anything else, though. Open the page in a few different browsers to see for yourself.

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Looking for examples of CSS in action? Well you have come to the right place. The examples are very crude but function perfectly. Take a peek at the source code to figure out how it was done. There is a lot to look through.

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Looks like Microsoft is the latest to be guilty of a failed redesign. Their current homepage iteration sports a table-based layout circa 1998.

They've also released a beta preview of their new new homepage - which you can view only with Internet Explorer. (When I attempted to view the preview site in Firefox, I was simply redirected to the existing homepage.) The preview site appears to use semantic markup, although the source has been compacted down to only a few lines, so it's nearly impossible to read. And with no Web Developer extension in IE, outlining all block-level elements (or all table cells) isn't an option.

Funny that with the IE 7 team touting how standards-compliant the new browser will be, the Microsoft homepage flies in the face of standards. (Is that for-real ironic or only Alanis ironic?) Having worked for a few large corporations, I understand that one department's products can appear to be the antithesis of another department's, with the worker bees in both departments being none the wiser. Still, this is pretty egregious, given the emphasis Microsoft claims to be placing on web standards.

Although... we've been there before with Microsoft, haven't we? Perhaps these things are cyclical.

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HowToCreate.co.uk has an interesting guide to creating a purely CSS-based nested-list menu. This technique uses absolutely no Javascript except for IE 5 for windows. Here is the list of supported browsers:

• Mozilla 1+
• Netscape 7+
• Opera 7+
• Safari build 60+
• OmniWeb 4.5+
• Konqueror 3.2+
• IE 5.5+ on Windows (using DHTML behaviors)

Some browsers that don't support this technique display styled nested-lists instead. Go check it out.

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According to a post on IEBlog, IE 7 will be distributed via WIndows Automatic Updates.

I'm confused now, because in the interview with Chris Wilson that I linked to yesterday, Chris seemed to definitely say that Microsoft won't go that route in distributing updates. Or maybe when he said "pushing it out" he was referring to something other than Automatic Updates...?

Hmmm...

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