While recently using Scribd’s services, I came across a very nasty bug, and a nice clean fix. Scribd allows developers to tap into a great, but somewhat basic API. One of these settings allows a developer to set a default ‘mode’ before the API then builds the flash calls necessary to display the document. The issue comes up when you choose the ’slide’ mode as the loading view. No matter what ‘height’ you set, with ‘auto_size’ set to false, the height will adjust to the wrong height.
Read More
Usability and a Simple JavaScript hovering menu
Many web developers ask ‘what is usability?’. This is one of those topics that I can explain, but it may be easier to demonstrate. My this experiences have led to some principles; one of them is that if I’m going to build it, it must be usable. Unfortunately, many sites that I like, that tout usability, screw up one important concept that annoys me greatly.
I ask myself, “when using a menu, why do I have to drag my mouse from one button to the next, and fear losing the menu if I cross it’s border anywhere?” Some menus are just annoying because they disappear mid mouse move, some are extremely hard to use because of several layers of menus, some I have resorted to using `tabs` to get to the correct menu item. It’s unfortunate that people can’t get this right.
Read More »