http://www.hitechy.com/ The latest news from the official HiTechy website. Copyright © HiTechy 2010. All rights reserved. Alexander Dawson (HiTechy Admin) 2010-07-28T00:00:00Z Alexander Dawson 2010-07-28T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#34 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web-technology/the-webs-undead/ We all know that dead browsers, technologies, languages and practices exist on the web, so what is causing these zombies to arise from the grave and haunt our code until what seems like the end of time? This fun and comical article highlights what to look out for and how education is potentially the only cure from a future where standards are eclipsed by an ever increasing range of zombies and dead technologies which manage to consume our everyday lives. Alexander Dawson 2010-07-22T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#33 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web_design/a-guide-on-layout-types-in-web-design/ My latest article is up on Six Revisions and ready for your enjoyment! This time I have examined the various different layout techniques that exist in web design. As professionals we are used to the likes of fixed, liquid and elastic structures but is that all which exists? Within the article you shall learn that there's many more than you may have expected, actually there's 10 in all! It's a great overview if you're about to decide on a layout for your web designs. Alexander Dawson 2010-07-15T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#32 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web-standards/5-web-files-that-will-improve-your-website/ Here is yet another article for Six Revisions (and perhaps one of the most useful for the average web designer). The essence of this article is to highlight the unsung heroes of the web design toolkit. I examine and showcase a crash course on how to build robots.txt, favicon.ico, sitemap.xml, dublin.rdf and OpenSearch.xml which are five very easy files to produce but seriously underestimated small pieces of code that can enhance your website externally. Alexander Dawson 2010-07-09T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#31 Published Writing http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/07/09/web-designer-as-the-artist-scientist-and-philosopher/ This is a truly exciting moment for me, it's my very first article to appear in the illustrious publication - Smashing Magazine. The Artist, Scientist and Philosopher is a simple but hopefully inspirational tale of web professionals and the way in which our mindsets function. Are you the artist who has a love for all things pixel, are you a scientist who cultures all things code, or are you (like me) a philosopher who loves the theory of user-experience? Alexander Dawson 2010-07-07T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#30 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web_design/250-quick-web-design-tips-part-2/ Because of the sheer size of my quick tips article and the number of entries we had, the second part of this article (from where the first left off) has now been published independently. Covering the remaining 100 tips and tricks which had not been previously mentioned I provide you with hopefully some useful pieces of information that will allow you to better undertake your roles as producers for the web. It's the concluding part of this epic article! Alexander Dawson 2010-06-29T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#29 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web_design/250-quick-web-design-tips-part-1/ This is probably one of the most straight forward articles you could ask for, and with so many useful tips it's appearing in two parts. This article highlights 250 quick web design tips which I feel are important to anyone actively building, designing or running websites. Sometimes reading small pieces of information can help make the digestion of best practices easier, which is why I produced this fun and informative guide. Alexander Dawson 2010-06-22T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#28 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web-technology/web-languages-decoded/ There are a wide range of languages for the web. Unfortunately knowing what acronym accounts for what and the available choices you have requires a lot of thought and consideration. My latest article aims to account for some of the most popular web languages in existence, categorise them based on the position they serve and then showcase some benefits and pitfalls which may give you some enthusiasm toward learning a new skill. Alexander Dawson 2010-06-16T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#27 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/css/css-only-tooltips/ CSS3 has brought a wide range of gorgeous eye candy to the web designers toolbox, this article aims to uncover how using a bit of clever HTML and CSS can produce some fantastic sexy CSS powered ToolTips. If you're the kind of person who doesn't like being tied down to jQuery or scripted enhancements, this may well be worth checking out as it only uses CSS and is entirely cross browser compatible. It's a great starting point for enhancement. Alexander Dawson 2010-06-07T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#26 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web-standards/problems-with-using-website-validation-services/ My latest article is now live on Six Revisions, this time we examine the controversial issue of website validation tools and services. More of a debate style article I highlight the problems with being overly dependant on these useful tools, which tools are affected (code, accessibility and even translation) and I look to how professionals should better consider when they bring in the tools VS when they simply hit the validate button. Alexander Dawson 2010-05-28T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#25 Published Writing http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2010/05/browser-testing-a-family-tree/ Another article has been published, this time it's with Web Designer Deport and it's all about browser testing, the highlights of this article include justification for cross browser testing and some cool images which showcase all of the major rendering engines and browsers for various operating systems which actually use one of the four major renderer's (Trident, Gecko, Webkit and Presto). Well worth giving it a look! Alexander Dawson 2010-05-26T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#24 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/css/semantic-css3-lightboxes/ My next article is up on the Six Revisions website. This time around I'm showcasing a brand new method to provide web browsers with a CSS3 powered lightbox, this requires no JavaScript or jQuery (beyond a quick progressive patch for Internet Explorer) and the great thing is, you can customise it quickly and easily to have whatever content you want within it. In the example provided I show an image, scrollable content and a YouTube Video! Alexander Dawson 2010-05-13T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#23 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ Finally I have gotten round to adding more updates to my website. On top of getting my content up-to-date with all the latest things I've been up too, I have made some minor tweaks to the website to further enhance the accessibility of the website and to make things even more semantic than before! The site now takes advantage of purpose built microformats and I've licensed the design under Creative Commons (if you wish to examine and try the code in your own designs). Alexander Dawson 2010-05-12T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#22 Website News http://www.iwanet.org/ Any organisation or group which promotes web standards and accessibility gets recognition in my book. Those of you who follow me will know I'm a member of GAWDS (The guild of accessible web designers). Now I've gone and joined the International Webmasters Association (connected with the HTML Writers Guild) to show my support for their best practices for Web Designers (and to perhaps take a few courses to boost my knowledge further). Alexander Dawson 2010-05-05T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#21 Published Writing http://sixrevisions.com/web-technology/anatomy-of-a-website/ My first article with Six Revisions has been published on the Anatomy of a Website. This article aims to show how a websites internal structure closely matches that of the human anatomy. Examining such aspects as DNA, skeletal structure, muscles, nerves, the heart, blood vessels, skin and the brain (with memory, behaviour and identity in focus), you'll soon find yourself understanding how the various elements of a website interlock together. Alexander Dawson 2010-04-14T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#20 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ If you've seen the website today, you'll notice that resources relating to my portfolio have finally been added. I've provided links to all the appropriate websites, screenshots for portfolio and application items, theres a great list of all the books I've read in the published writing section and the download link, manual and method for payment for SnipClip. There's still some details to add such as Readme files and the other downloads but it's a good start. Alexander Dawson 2010-04-09T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#19 Website News http://www.gawds.org/showmember.php?memberid=2691 Anyone who knows me will be very much aware as to my standing on accessibility on the web. I am a huge promoter of accessible web design on SitePoint, Twitter, HiTechy and pretty much whenever I speak or write anything web related. I have been accepted into the Guild of Accessible Web Designers to aid the promotion of what's in our users best interests... accessibility is paramount, and I'll be enforcing this idea whenever I can. Alexander Dawson 2010-03-30T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#18 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ I've been busy working on getting my entire back catalog of portfolio added to my new look web design and you'll notice on the site that all the content that describes each item has been added giving each product it's own page! Soon you will be able to see and download the associated resources or visit the website that's linked to the item in question. Apart from that, I've been doing some general fixes to the website to make it run better. Alexander Dawson 2010-03-17T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#17 Published Writing http://articles.sitepoint.com/article/applying-lessons-from-css-frameworks My very first web design article has been published on SitePoint! "The Right Frame of Mind: Applying the Lessons of CSS Frameworks" explains why these controversial tools can be beneficial to the way you apply style to designs. Whilst looking under the hood of these misunderstood creatures, I take the opportunity to show you that by learning a few well intentioned lessons from the way code is used in these libraries, you can improve your own workflow and maximize your productivity. Alexander Dawson 2010-03-05T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#16 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ With the previous website design came pro's and con's. The pro's were an unusual design which had some very unique stuff held inside (like pure CSS Lightboxes), CSS3 integration, etc. However this came at a price, there were some major issues with usability (which is bad). As such (and after more experimentation) I present version 3.0 which uses many of the previous designs unique elements but is much more gracefully degrading, doesn't have the usability issues (as before) and is cleaner, leaner and prettier than before... and so I say to you dear visitor, enjoy! Alexander Dawson 2010-01-05T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#15 SitePoint http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=654249 I can't believe it! I've won yet another award on SitePoint. You will remember that I previously won the Member of the Month award and was given a promotion to the position of Mentor on the forums. Well now it has been announced that I won the Web Design Guru of the year award. This is one of their most prestigious awards and is only given out yearly. I am both flattered and happily surprised at winning such an accolade. Alexander Dawson 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#14 Website News http://www.twitter.com/AlexDawsonUK Happy new year to all the people who visit this website. Sorry about the lack of updates but when Christmas comes around, things tend to get a little busy! You will notice over the next couple of weeks a lot more additions are coming to the website such as lightbox panels containing all the services and products I offer plus some social networking icons linking to the places I will be contributing to. The first social network you can find me at is Twitter where I shall be micro-blogging about my own thoughts about web development. Hope to see you there! Alexander Dawson 2009-12-22T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#13 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ To coincide with the release of my book and move toward web design I have redesigned the entire HiTechy website. Now a single page website it makes use of the latest techniques to give the design a fresher appearance. Much simpler to navigate you can just scroll the design in chronological order (left to right) to see what I have been up to. Of course there is also the usual information pages, now in the upper and lower header to give you extended details. Hope you like the new design and I hope next year is as successful as this one. Alexander Dawson 2009-12-16T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#12 Published Writing http://www.friendsofed.com/book.html?isbn=9781430225171 Here it is people, the reason why I have not posted much on the website (or for that matter doing any updates elsewhere). I have spent much of the year... writing a book! My very first published piece of professional writing with the well known web design publisher FriendsOfED (APress) is a beginners guide to building websites from scratch. Basically it's aimed at the self-taught enthusiasts who want to make a website, beyond the example based "color-by-number" books. I've gone for a more progressive pathway style of writing to give you all the basics you will need to experiment and end up with a site that can compete with the best of them. If you want to support me and make your own website, why not purchase a copy for yourself and see how knowledgeable I really am! Alexander Dawson 2009-12-02T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#11 Website News http://www.the1secondfilm.com/crew/28127 Finally a new piece of news worth reporting on, I have a secret project which will soon become very apparent (I wanted to keep it a surprise until it's released so keep checking back for details). But the news I can tell you is that I have become an executive producer on a social collaboration film project called the One Second Film. Basically it's funded by micro-payments and anyone who donates gets a credit (pretty cool!). They have some high profile celebrities on board and I have been in contact with the project owner and have agreed to give some of my time to beta testing the user experience. Alexander Dawson 2009-06-02T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#10 SitePoint http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=625058 Just a month after receiving my award as the SitePoint community Member of the Month I have been made a Mentor on their forums, essentially that gives me a more long term status as a recognised professional. I am even more shocked to be added to the team in such a short period because even though I have given a lot of time to the website the position of Mentor and other staff levels are reserved for the real gurus and experts. I joined the forums with the intention of making a difference to the next generation of professionals, I guess I am doing just that. Alexander Dawson 2009-05-01T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#9 SitePoint http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=619691 I have been given the Member of the Month award on SitePoint! It is a real surprise as I have only been there for a few months, usually people who get the award have been around for years and have some seriously elite skills to offer the web design community. Obviously I am really proud to accept it so I have the badge attached to my username for the entire month to show my award. Alexander Dawson 2009-02-05T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#8 SitePoint http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/member.php?u=316859 I have decided to join the SitePoint forums so that I may be able to give some of my time to helping other people. It's not entirely selfless though because it gives me a decent place to establish myself as a web designer. As SitePoint is one of the most populated networks I have decided to go with them, it will give me some decent brain exercises to work out my web design knowledge and keep me running at the forefront of my passion. Hope to see anyone visiting this website over there as I may be able to help you with some of your questions. Alexander Dawson 2009-02-01T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#7 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ After a year of writing software (more specifically HiTechy SnipClip) I have decided that I am going to direct my business toward web design in preference to carrying on as things are. Part of the reason has been due to the software market being overcrowded and other factors include the repetitive nature of coding which has left me feeling slightly burned out. Don't worry if you have purchased a copy of the product as I will be continuing the SnipClip project and evolving it further however I will have it as a sideline project and therefore, less update cycles will occur (the product may even turn free eventually)! Alexander Dawson 2008-10-30T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#6 HiTechy SnipClip http://www.hitechy.com/ A brand new update has been released for HiTechy SnipClip. Version 1.35 is a free update for all existing 1.0 users. The new version contains no new features however contains many updates and fixes which caused issues in previous builds of the product. The updates include that demo users of the product can now email and print snippets within the software, and the program has been compressed further to reduce memory usage. Alexander Dawson 2008-10-10T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#5 HiTechy SnipClip http://www.hitechy.com/ A brand new update has been released for HiTechy SnipClip. Version 1.3 is a free update for all existing 1.0 users. The new version contains no new features however contains many updates and fixes which caused issues in previous builds of the product. Over 12 bugs have been fixed and 8 elements of the program have received updates which will improve the general usability of the program. Download the new version today. Alexander Dawson 2008-09-28T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#4 HiTechy SnipClip http://www.hitechy.com/ A brand new update has been released for HiTechy SnipClip. Version 1.2 is a free update for all existing 1.0 users. The new version contains extended functionality to users of print (includes print preview) or email (now fully integrated) snippets. Not only this but minor improvements have been made throughout the program, including extended error support and many additional bug fixes. Download the new version today. Alexander Dawson 2008-09-23T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#3 HiTechy SnipClip http://www.hitechy.com/ A brand new update has been released for HiTechy SnipClip. Version 1.1 is a free update for all existing 1.0 users. The new version contains the ability to move snippets using drag and drop, includes increased functionality, uses less system resources and contains a demo mode for people who want to try the product before they purchase it. Not only that the program contains lots of updates and bug fixes, download it today. Alexander Dawson 2008-09-17T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#2 HiTechy SnipClip http://www.hitechy.com/ The first version of our product HiTechy SnipClip 1.0 has been officially released. SnipClip is a code snippet manager which has been produced to work across all drag and drop enabled software, rather then for one specific application. For further details about this product and to purchase a copy for yourself, please click the more details link. This will direct you to a complete overview of the newly launched application. Alexander Dawson 2008-09-01T00:00:00Z http://www.hitechy.com/#1 Website News http://www.hitechy.com/ Welcome and thanks for visiting the newly launched website for HiTechy. Please feel free to browse my website and bookmark it for later on. I will be updating content on a regular occasion and adding new products and services, so remember to check for new features. Also the website will gradually improve over time to meet the needs of my users. So if you find any bugs or issues please contact me and I will try fix the problem as quickly as possible. Thanks again for visiting the HiTechy website.