Archives for December 2004
Zapfino Extra Pro
Linotype has released Zapfino Extra Pro:
> “when used in an OpenType-supporting application with all contextual features activated, draws on the rich library of glyphs included in the font to automatically generate numerous, changing alternatives that work together, creating a lively typographic impression. This impression can offer the same harmonious feeling as real calligraphy.”
This is an amazing font. Take a look at the different instances of the same letter within the example image. The variation provided by the different flourishes and letter types fools the eye into believing that this is actual calligraphy. This doesn’t look like a font.
Link via Authentic Boredom
The alt and title attributes
Roger Johansson has provides a great post discussing the purpose of the alt and title attributes as defined by the HTML spec, and the way browser makers have muddied the usage of each.
> Alt text is not meant to be used as a tool tip, or more specifically, to provide additional information about an image. The title attribute, on the other hand, is meant to provide additional information about an element.
Link via Jeff Croft
Shh!
From Coudal Partners and Draplindustries comes the Society for HandHeld Hushing, a polite way to fight back against “obnoxious cell phone users that we all have to deal with in stores, restaurants, trains and pretty much everywhere else.” Simply print out the PDF template and carry the cards with you when you go out.
Lift Your Mood
Men’s Health provides yet another great article, Lift Your Mood explains how your state of mind affects your workout, and how to best take advantage of your mood.
What you’re feeling can make you put less into your workout–or cause you to skip it altogether. But those same moods can be used to help your lifting session. How? Most strong emotions–anger, anxiety, frustration–cause your adrenal glands to release adrenaline and more than 30 other hormones into your system. “This hormonal surge causes your heart to beat faster, relaxes your bronchial tubes to improve breathing, converts fat and protein into extra blood sugar, and even slows down your digestion to improve muscular energy,” says Richard Marsella, Ph.D., author of Welcome to Stress Management. “Whether you feel like exercising or not, your body is already getting a temporary boost that could enhance your workouts.”
Favatars
Paul James presents an intriguing, and quite usable idea to provide ubiquitous, decentralized avatars (graphic representations of a person, usually seen in Web forums, chat rooms and instant messaging programs) throughout the Web. Favatars, as he has dubbed them, are the favicons that so many people already use on their site (look in the address bar of your browser, and you should see an orange block, with a white ‘A’, that’s my favicon). The idea has a lot of potential, and as it is so easy to implement, I expect to see it added to various blogging packages and content management systems in the future. He has already provided the PHP he uses to create Favatars in the comments on his site.
I have implemented Favatars in the comments here on this site. So, if you have a favicon on your Web site, and want to test, just leave a comment to this post.
To implement this, cut and paste the code he provided within the first set of php tags at the top of your index.php, I would recommend you place it right after the require (blog header) line. Then, to place the icon next to a comment, place the following code in your wp_comments.php page, wherever you want it to appear (remove the line breaks, they are there for readability only):
$CommentIcon = getFavicon($comment->comment_author_url);
echo '<img src="' . $CommentIcon . '"
alt="' . $comment->comment_author_url . '"
class="CommentIcon" height="16" width="16" />';