HTML5 Cram Session

Tonight I’ll be running a HTML5 cram session at the monthly Launch Haven event. Here are the tools and resources that I’ll be mentioning in the talk. If you’re in New Haven, I’d love to see you there!

Presentation Resources

Browser Support

Tools

Templates/Frameworks

Resources

Demos

I’m Writing A Book

In gradeschool I was the kid in the back of the class, sketching comic book characters and plotting out the sequel to Super Mario Brothers in my notebook. By age 16, I had discovered Kerouac and Ginsberg and started drafting the terrible free-style poetry that only makes sense deep within the throngs of teen angst. In my early 20’s I moved on to plotless Carver-esque short stories while I sat in sidewalk coffee shops, doing way more smoking than actual writing.

Through all of this, my poorly nurtured love of writing felt at distinct odds with my techie side. I was always outwardly the “computer guy,” though I may have often wished I was something else. Today, I’m excited to announce that I am working on a book for Packt Publishing and those two conflicting sides can finally shake hands and be friends.

More details are coming soon. In the meantime, back to writing.

Web Nerd Acronyms TextExpander Group

Recently, Chris Coyier of CSS Tricks posted a list of common “Web Nerd Acronyms” to be used with HTML’s <abbr> tag. Like Chris, I’m lazy about my use of <abbr>, so I created this set of TextExpander snippets to aid in motivating me beyond my default indefference.

For example, with TextExpander, if I type:

,,CSS

TextExpander will change my output to:

<abbr title="Cascading Style Sheets">CSS</abbr>

In hopes that we can all make the web a bit more semantic, I’m sharing this snippet group. I hope you find it useful!

Download the Abbr’s for Web Nerds TextExpander snippet group.

Kindle Format 8

Designing and developing for Kindle’s .mobi format has been like revisiting 1999. Embedded tables? (check!) Limited CSS support? (check!) Screwy box model? (check!) With the release of Kindle Fire, I was initially disappointed that Amazon did not take this opportunity to support the EPUB standard. Luckily, Amazon has announced its own file format entitled “Kindle Format 8” that offers support for many HTMl5 & CSS3 tags.

Straight from the horse’s mouth:

We’re pleased to announce a wide range of new features and enhancements – including HTML5 support – coming in Kindle Format 8 (KF8). KF8 is the next generation file format for Kindle books – replacing Mobi 7. As showcased on Kindle Fire, KF8 enables publishers to create great-looking books in categories that require rich formatting and design such as children’s picture books, comics & graphic novels, technical & engineering books and cookbooks. Kindle Format 8 replaces the Mobi format and adds over 150 new formatting capabilities, including fixed layouts, nested tables, callouts, sidebars and Scalable Vector Graphics, opening up more opportunities to create Kindle books that readers will love.

Interestingly, it appears that this new format will only work with the latest generation of Kindle devices. This leaves me to wonder, will Amazon allow publishers to submit stripped down .mobi versions of titles or will customers with year old Kindles be left out in the cold?

Can Service Learning Shape Your Community?

Our communities shape our lives. Why not help shape our communities? The idea of community has taken an amazing turn with the advent of interactive media. Communities under utilize the learning centers that lie within them. Universities and secondary schools supply a plethora of untapped resources. This conversation will uncover topics of community outreach in interactive media education. Project based, real world education is the most rewarding and enriching experience students can be afforded. The connection between learning and community needs to be explored more than ever. Can interactive education bridge this gap? Are communities, next door and internationally, aware and ready to engage? How do we start the conversation? These are topics we will discuss in our engaging conversation.

If you’re interested in joining Brad Berkner & I in discussing service learning and interactive media education at this year’s South by Southwest, please give us a thumb’s up at the SXSW Panel Picker. I hope to see you there.