For the most part you won’t give file formats or colour modes a second thought unless you’re a graphic designer, but there are a couple of things to bear in mind when saving images for the web:

File Formats

• GIF - 8-bit pallette, so limited to 256 colours including “transparent”. Lossless compression. Can be animated. Useful for small icons.
• JPG - 24-bit pallette (full colour). Lossy compression can mean poor image quality if set too high but good filesizes as a result. Useful for photographs.
• PNG - 24-bit pallette including alpha-channel transparency which enables any percentage transparency on any pixel regardless of colour supported by all modern browsers. Lossless compression. Ideal for more complex icons or images with crisp edges. The only downside is a relatively large filesize.

I recently completed what was perhaps the most difficult exam of my life. A true achievement, if I do say so myself. So what was the exam in question, I hear you ask? Some high-powered qualification? Rocket Science, perhaps?

Well.. no.

The basic enrollment test in the Microsoft Partner Programme: A simple set of questions to prove we are in fact web developers. “Great, should be easy enough” I thought, firing up Internet Explorer (yes, Microsoft do insist you use their browser to view their website). I’m not sure I could have been more wrong. Twenty or so multiple choice questions. Specialist subject: The features and benefits of Microsoft Expression.

Microsoft Expression I hear you ask? Essentially the new and “improved” Frontpage. Back to school to read up on the wrong way to build a website. The official product home page on the Microsoft website proved fairly helpful, but wasn’t much use when confronted with Microsoft’s attempt at writing legible English. Have a look at the screenshot and remind yourself how important it is to get someone to check everything you publish, no matter how trivial it seems.

I’ve noticed recently that many people who use the variable font/text size feature while surfing the web are quite unaware that modern browsers provide a much neater alternative: Zooming the entire page in and out.

I was never a fan of text zooming. If it allowed people to read the text better that was of course a benefit, but too often it just didn’t work. Layouts weren’t always built to cater for varying text sizes and could become even more confusing to understand.

So cue the idea of not zooming just the text, but magnifying the whole page and therefore keeping everything in proportion. Genius! Not a new idea granted, Opera has featured it for years, but it’s an immensely handy feature not only for people with poor eyesight. Users with large screens at very high resolutions, or for developers to take a closer graphical look at the positioning of elements on the page. Controls can usually be found in the “View” menu or by handy keyboard shortcuts:

• Zoom In: CTRL +
• Zoom Out: CTRL -
• Reset: CTRL 0

These days page zooming is becoming more widespread with good support in mainstream browsers Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer 7, as well as lesser-known Opera. Apple Safari and Google Chrome have yet to implement it, which I’m surprised and a little disappointed about.. Come on guys, catch up!

While browsing for some information on surfers still clinging to Internet Explorer 6, I came across a company providing free information about software vulnerabilities on their website. Secunia have published some excellent data and advice on security, and while a lot of it is fairly technically written they do provide some neat features for the more casual user such as their online software update checker which can scan your computer and tell you if you have any insecure software which needs to be updated. Handy!

As for those still using IE6? Take a look for yourself: Internet Explorer 6.x Security Advisories - 142 vulnerabilities and 135 advisories, 16% remain unpatched and up to “moderately critical” in importance. By comparison, Firefox 3.x has 39 vulnerabilities and 8 advisories, 0% of which are unpatched.

Whichever browser you choose, use the latest version and keep it updated. Identity theft is on the increase and it’s simple steps like updating your browser which will help protect you online.

Almost since the internet was born, people have been using it to share ideas and offer their opinion on a wide variety of subjects. Blogs - or “web logs” - are hardly a new idea, but they have become something of a phenomenon in recent years as businesses and personal writers realise the potential they offer to anyone looking to share ideas or information.

Blogs fill a niche which ordinary websites cannot cater for:

• A focused piece of software designed to efficiently organise and publish information.
• Built-in search engine submission and pages which are easily crawled by bots.
• Optional comments by readers allow you to get instant feedback.
• Categorised posts allow different subjects to be written about, and readers to choose those which interest them.

So, a blog is a sure way to get my voice heard on the internet? Well… no, not really. It is however a powerful tool if used properly. At Primate Designs we specialise in helping small or new businesses find their feet on the internet, so here is a short list of bloggy things to consider:

• Separate it from your website: Whether your blog is visually seamlessly integrated with your website or noticably separate, remember it is there to allow you to focus on specific topics. Properly written, you can drive good traffic to pages on your main website.
• Choose your content wisely: Give readers something they actually want to read. If your blog is informative or entertaining, readers will keep coming back for more.
• Get involved: There are plenty of other blogs out there on a wide variety of subjects. Be sure to read others and do not be afraid to comment on them. Remember, if you leave a useful comment and your website address, people may visit your website to find out more.
• Keep it up to date: Blogs are typically search engine friendly because they often represent fresh information and are updated regularly. Regular blog posts can really help your search engine rankings; Alex’s post on our blog the other week regarding the Internet Explorer security risk ranked on the first page of Google for several search phrases!

This post could go on for pages and pages, discussing everything that is possible with even the simplest blog, but hopefully this will give you a taster. As with many things, the best way to find out is to get stuck in and see for yourself… happy blogging!