April, 2006 archive

Content negotiation

Content-Negotiation is a mechanism defined in the HTTP specification that makes possible to serve different “versions” of a document (or more generally of a resource) at the same URL, so that user agents can choose which version fit their capacities the best. W3C

More on Content negotiation

User-defined accesskeys

This site enables users to define their own accesskeys. The PHP script that does the work comes courtesy of Dan Champion at Blether. Dan’s article on how to use the script is fairly straight-foward except that when combined with a Wordpress site, a couple of modifications are required.

More on User-defined accesskeys

Why doesn’t :hover work in IE?


You may have seen on other sites an effect whereby the background colour of a containing element changes colour when you hover over it. A look at their CSS might reveal something like div:hover or li:hover. This is also how a lot of CSS dropdown menus work too, by applying a :hover to a list item.

More on Why doesn’t :hover work in IE?

Tyssen Design v2 launched

Tyssen Design has been given a make-over! The site now features more of an Australian theme, some additional accessibility features and a Writing section for articles on CSS and other web-related topics.

A big thank you to Chris..S at CSS Creator for helping me sort out one of IE’s little foibles.

Trojan Horsefloats website launched


The Trojan Horsefloats website went live for the first time on March 14 and already is ranking on the first page of Google for one of the site’s main keywords.

More on Trojan Horsefloats

What is shorthand CSS?


Shorthand CSS is the method of writing related style properties all on one line instead of several. Using shorthand CSS results in files that are smaller in size and easier to read and maintain.

More on What is shorthand CSS?

How do I make my CSS file smaller?


The key feature of Cascading Style Sheets and probably the one not realised by most newcomers to CSS is that certain style properties are inherited. This means that style properties (mostly those relating to styling text including color, font-size, text-alignment etc.) set on a parent element are inherited up by every descendant element (any element contained within the parent whether directly or indirectly).

More on How do I make my CSS file smaller?

What’s the difference between classes and IDs?


Classes and IDs are how we create different styles for different elements on the page.

IDs are unique identifiers and can only be used once on any one page. Classes can be reused and applied to different elements.

More on What’s the difference between classes and IDs?

My links won’t change colour when I hover over them


Usually when people have trouble with their links not doing what they want, it’s because they’ve arranged them in the wrong order. More on My links won’t change colour when I hover over them

How do I get different styled links?


So you’ve set up the styles for the links of your page but you have one section that you want to be different from everything else. To do that, you need to assign a different class or ID.

More on How do I get different styled links?