Faux Absolute Positioning

by Eric Sol ∙ 125 Comments

CSS layout is awesome, except when your layout calls for a header, a footer, and columns in between. Use float, and content changes can cause columns to wrap. Use absolute positioning, and your footer can crash into your columns. Add the complexity of drag-and-drop layouts, and a new technique is needed. Enter "faux absolute positioning." Align every item to a predefined position on the grid (as with absolute positioning), but objects will still affect the normal flow (as with float).

Sketching in Code: the Magic of Prototyping

by David Verba ∙ 33 Comments

The rise of Ajax and rich internet applications has thrown the limitations of traditional wireframing into painful relief. When you leave the world of page-based interactions, how do you document all but the simplest interactions? Flowcharts and diagrams don’t work. Prototyping saves the day by focusing on the application and conveying its "magic." Prototypes can help you sell a decision that is fundamentally or radically different from the client’s current solution or application. Sit a stakeholder down in front of a working prototype and show him or her why your approach is compelling.

Columnists

Rachel Andrew on the Business of Web Dev

You Can’t Do Everything

In any given day I can find myself reading up on a new W3C proposal, fixing an issue with our tax return, coding an add-on for our product, writing a conference presentation, building a server, creating a video tutorial, and doing front end development for one of our sites. Without clients dictating my workload I’m in the enviable position of being able to choose where to focus my efforts. However, I can’t physically do everything.

From the Blog

MapBox Develops an Open Source Vector Format for Maps

MapBox's new vector-based map tiles are more stable, more scalable, and customizable to an amazing degree.

Paul Irish on Chrome Moving to Blink

The dust has begun to settle after Google’s announcement that Chrome would soon be using their own divergent fork of WebKit as a rendering engine. Now that things have calmed down a bit, I’ve asked Paul Irish to share some of the Chrome team’s plans for the near future.