A List Apart

Topic: State of the Web

  • The Survey, 2008

    by ALA Staff · Issue 264 ·

    Calling all designers, developers, information architects, project managers, writers, editors, marketers, and everyone else who makes websites. It is time once again to pool our information so as to begin sketching a true picture of the way our profession is practiced worldwide.

  • Findings From the Web Design Survey

    by ALA Staff · Issue 247 ·

    In April 2007, A List Apart and An Event Apart conducted a survey of people who make websites. Close to 33,000 web professionals answered the survey’s 37 questions, providing the first data ever collected on the business of web design and development as practiced in the U.S. and worldwide. Working with statisticians, we spent the next months crunching raw data into meaningful findings. Here we present what we have learned about our powerful yet little-studied profession.

  • The Web Design Survey, 2007

    by ALA Staff ·

    People who make websites have been at it for more than a dozen years, yet almost nothing is known, statistically, about our profession. Let's do something to change that. Presenting A List Apart's first annual Web Design Survey.

  • To Hell With Bad Browsers

    by Jeffrey Zeldman · Issue 99 ·

    In a year or two, all sites will be designed with standards that separate structure from presentation (or they will be built with Flash 7). We can watch our skills grow obsolete, or start learning standards-based techniques. In fact, since the latest versions of IE, Navigator, and Opera already support many web standards, if we are willing to let go of the notion that backward compatibility is a virtue, we can stop making excuses and start using these standards now. At ALA, beginning with Issue No. 99, we've done just that. Join us.

  • The Long Hallway

    by Jonathan Follett · Issue 236 ·

    In the virtual conference room, no one can hear you scream. Social networking enables knowledge workers like us to build virtual companies with no office space and little overhead. But can we make them succeed? Follett dissects the skills required to create, manage, and grow the virtual firm.

  • Version Targeting: Threat or Menace?

    by Jeffrey Zeldman · Issue 253 ·

    Version targeting shakes our browser-agnostic faith. Its default behavior runs counter to our expectations, and seems wrong. Yet to offer true DOM support without bringing JScript-authored sites to their knees, version targeting must work the way Microsoft proposes, argues Jeffrey Zeldman.

  • The Rules of Digital Engagement

    by Jonathan Follett · Issue 252 ·

    Jonathan Follett takes another trip down the long hallway, looking at ways to collaborate, communicate, and manage conflict in virtual space.

  • From Switches to Targets: A Standardista’s Journey

    by Eric Meyer · Issue 251 ·

    Grab your galoshes and walking stick and follow along with A List Apart's Eric Meyer as he considers the vices and virtues of version targeting as a standards toggle.

  • Evangelizing Outside the Box: Web Standards and Large Companies

    by Peter-Paul Koch · Issue 238 ·

    Contrary to popular belief, designers and developers at many big companies use web standards in their work every day. They just don't talk about it. For standards awareness to reach the next level, they'll have to start talking, says PPK.

  • Valentine’s Day Massacre

    by Our Gentle Readers · Issue 212 ·

    From buzzword-happy marketers to snobby standards gurus, from AJAX to Zope, ALA's gentle readers tell us what they bloody well hate about the web.

  • Valentines to the Web

    by Our Gentle Readers · Issue 212 ·

    You love it! You really love it. ALA's readers tell us who gets their candy hearts this year.

  • Thinking Outside the Grid

    by Molly E. Holzschlag · Issue 209 ·

    CSS has broken the manacles that kept us chained to grid-based design...so why do so few sites deviate from the grid? Molly E. Holzschlag can tell us that the answer has something to do with airplanes, urban planning, and British cab drivers.

  • The Web is Like Canada

    by Joe Clark · Issue 84 ·

    Those who "get" the web create it. Those who do not get the web are put in charge. Joe Clark presents a vision for defending our web against their worst ideas.

  • Why Don’t You Code for Netscape?

    by Jeffrey Zeldman · Issue 129 ·

    Long considered the Holy Grail of web design, “backward compatibility” has its place; but at this point in web development history, shouldn’t we be more concerned about forward compatibility? ALA makes the case for authoring to web standards instead of browser quirks.

  • Information vs. Experience

    by Emmanuel King Turner · Issue 125 ·

    The conflict between presentation and structure reveals two views of the web. Which one’s winning?

  • The Devil His Due: What Online Porn Portends

    by Bob Jacobson · Issue 112 ·

    It’s a dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it: Jacobson studies “adult” sites to see what they can tell us about the future of web content. His predictions are not pretty.

  • Beyond Usability and Design: The Narrative Web

    by Mark Bernstein · Issue 106 ·

    Crafting a narrative web: To succeed profoundly, Bernstein says, websites must go beyond usability and design, deeply engaging readers by turning their journeys through the site into rich, memorable, narrative experiences.

  • The Declination of Independence

    by Ryan Holsten, Michael Krisher, Brandon Oelling · Issue 102 ·

    Three web designers discuss trendiness and innovation in design, and list 15 sites that made a difference in the year 2000.

  • Time to Close the Web?

    by Alan Herrell · Issue 61 ·

    Focusing on presentation at the expense of content, and invasive money-making schemes at the expense of everything else, designers must take some of the blame for the trashing of the web. Herrell wonders if it’s time to call it a day and close up shop.

  • Dr. Strangeglobe: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love The W3C.

    by Erika Meyer · Issue 76 ·

    Can the mysterious Dr Strangeglobe save the WWWorld from a conspiracy to contaminate our precious liquid layouts? Erika Meyer takes a non-standard look at the W3C in this charming yet educational spoof of the Kubrick classic.

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