Awesome other, word.
Flash could be that other word and in 2001 was on most, web, peoples lips. But doing what is already being done is easy whereas doing what has yet to be done requires imagination.
The web will all be Flash in a few years. People love it - it moves!
→ Paul Putwain 2003
Moron Putwain thought Flash would rule the web in perpetuity and was backed in this dribblewhitted belief by Cambridge Scientician & Programmer Dr. Micheal Woodley who qualified this prediction with Math:
The web will be 95% Flash!
He went on, whispering at me:
Fucking wanker, fucking bastard, fucking cunt.
→ Prof Mikey Woodley - Genius
As Oxbridge inherity public schooly trust–fundduh silvered spoonyah types aren't really known for efficiency & although Woodleys name calling fits me, like a ribbed condom ready for poshfapp, I can't help but improve it to “Fucking Cuntankertard®” – now THAT is design thoughtening :P
Predicting stasis in any industry is risky – on the web and within computing, historically, pretty much opinionual harakiri.
My countering prediction or opinion mixed with belief based on observation, this was after all a Quasi (no Modo sadly) courtroom setting, was more user focussed with text and ease of use leading to content moving away from just that produced by large corps, rolled out in motion for motions sake Flash, to be digested by us great unwashed masses - after all social networks existed and mobile phone use was growing.
A meet B tills CD
We must have a minimum of 4 results per screen, people don't like scrolling! It'll look really great – yah?
→ A tall drink of Double Dutch tech
More than a decade on from Woodley and Putwain Flash (in the pan) prediction and I still hear statements from people with supposedly advanced Programming &/Or Marketing skill–sets based, as far as I can ascertain, upon the colour of their undergrids held up to a 800 Lumen LED against last nights Thai Curry stains.
“We must have a minimum of 4 results per screen!” leads to a raft of questions: What screen? What device? What OS? What resolution? What product results? What language? & (my personal favourite thrown in to see if the person in question retains any ability to listen) What about your mothers sphincter?
Maybe these type of programmers & marketing bods, once they reach a certain level of 0 & 1 bullshit wrangling, start to crap themselves that people expect them to know everything and so begins a boring, and expensive, make it up as you go along game.
Who knows, I guess we are all open to the sexy traps of wanting to appear knowledgeable to those around us and letting our wishes get in place of admitting to not knowing all answers. But by feck it's boring as hell to hear mindless phrases repeated when they blatantly have no basis in fact.
Pixel Perfection. Please!
“Pixel Perfect” I remember first hearing this pile of pants during The Browser Wars in the final decade of last Century - Pixel Perfect generally meant it had been tested in both Netscape and IE! Hardly perfect, and even worse meant building tortuous nested tables for layout, using images in place of text and so producing clumsy Graphic Design style leaflets as a webpage.
I have been designing and building (html mark–up and CSS) mobobo.co.uk on & off for over a decade now. This version has focus on mobile first Responsive Web Design and site speed within a performance budget: limiting resource calls and minimising http requests. There is still a lot that can be done: leverage browser caching (for which I I'll have to move hosting providers), splitting/cleaning CSS for the first render & compressing files & images further, possibly implementing SVG fallbacks and maybe bothering with older versions of IE to name a few… but it's a start with the landing page coming in at less than 100kb, a reduction of over 200kb on the previous landing page alongside less http requests.
Perfection, whether Pixels or otherwise, is by it's very nature unattainable & aiming to make it fast to download and make it flexible – the same as I felt about content over a decade ago is just as relevant today.
Note to self: Lay hands on a wearable and weep into my beer at the inadequacies of this site layout.