Blog
Here you will find a number of articles I have written the last few years. The subjects vary but are usually around web development, especially HTML5, but other topics are explored too.
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HTML5 video for retina displays
Recently I came across a question on Stack Overflow where a user wanted to serve a high resolution video to devices that supported retina displays. I had half a solution.
I guessed that the user …
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On hybrid apps
After recently spending some time (lots of time…) building a hybrid application for the first time, I thought I would share a few thoughts on the subject, based on experience and what …
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Building an iOS signing key for PhoneGap in Windows
One of the tasks I had to overcome when building a hybrid application that I’ve been working on was how to generate an iOS signing key that’s required by PhoneGap Build in order to …
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beyond tellerand 2012
For the last few years I have been bemoaning the fact that I’ve been unable to attend a web conference due to time and especially money. These events have always been out of my reach, but this …
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Responsive images using the video element
Whilst at the beyond tellerand conference the , I was listening to Mat Marquis talking about responsive images and the current progress on getting a method to implement them into the HTML5 …
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The menu element
One of the less talked about elements that is included in the HTML5 specification is the
menu
element. This is probably due to the fact that most browsers either don’t support it at all, or … -
On HTML5 and the proposed main element
As many of you probably already know, the HTML5 specification has a number of new structural elements whose intention is to add more semantic meaning to the content of a HTML document. One of the …
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PhoneGap Build is Awesome
Recently I’ve taken my first steps into the world of hybrid applications and found Adobe PhoneGap Build to be absolutely brilliant and essential. You may not believe this if you have seen some …
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HTML5 media and data URIs
In a recent email conversation with Slava Paperno of Cornell University who builds applications for language teachers, he brought something to my attention that I was unaware of. Namely that HTML5 …
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On the media attribute
When I was putting together my post on responsive HTML5 video last week, it led me to investigate the
media
attribute of thesource
element a bit further.First of all I’ll talk about what it …
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Responsive HTML5 video
Recently I was building a one page site, the centre piece of which was a video. Naturally I went with HTML5 video with a Flash fallback, but I also wanted to make the site, and the video, …
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Thoughts on real web development
Given that there is (quite rightly) an awful lot of talk, articles and discussion on new and upcoming web technology and methods in our industry, I feel that it can be quite disappointing for someone …
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Using HTML’s kbd, samp and pre elements
I was recently taking a look at the W3C‘s HTML5 specification when I noticed some elements I hadn’t come across before that are used to markup keyboard input and program output:
kbd
, … -
Filtering a webcam using getUserMedia and HTML5 canvas
With the recent release of Opera 12 which has webcam support with the
getUserMedia
API, I decided to have a look at this API myself and see how easy it is to use. As it turns out, it’s … -
Google Chrome supports WebVTT Subtitles
In researching an article recently I was pleased to discover that Google Chrome actually supports WebVTT and the
track
element, albeit it in limited form.I’ve written about WebVTT before and …
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The Truth About HTML5 – Book Review
HTML5 has interested me since , and ever since then I have learnt a lot about it. Naturally I don’t know everything but there are some areas I was quite confident of my knowledge …
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The Cost of Attending Web Conferences
For a few years now I’ve wanted to attend one of the many web conferences that take place throughout the year but I have yet to do so. The one thing that has always prevented me from attending …
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A different kind of HTML5 shim
As I’m sure many of you are aware, in order to get older versions of Internet Explorer to recognise and apply styles to the new elements defined in HTML5, a JavaScript file known as a …
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Ligatures are go!
Elliot Jay Stocks is publishing a series of articles at the moment on web typography. Recently he published: Tomorrow’s web type today: The fine flourish of the ligature which, as the name suggests …
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A comment on sexism and the web industry
As the title says, this is a short comment on sexism in the web industry, but it also contains a response to a specific point made in the recent .net article: call for greater diversity in web …