Bored with the plain old HTML divider? Try this quick tutorial and learn how to make more interesting horizontal rules.

I wrote a blog post about this a while back but now I’m adding a full tutorial so you can actually see an example as it’s created. Learn how to turn any CSS background image into a clickable image map.

Try my tute and let me know what you think:

Clickable image maps example

I’ll be adding more CSS tutorials in the coming weeks, so check back every so often.

I’m working with a prospective client who needs specialized e-commerce assistance - more than I’m capable of doing in a timely manner. So I found an experienced PHP programmer who can provide this expertise.

We met with the client today and all went well. The programmer has a good grasp of the rather non-traditional desires of the client as far as the workings of the checkout process, and that’s great. I’m not going to make as much money from the job as I originally thought, because I’m now not going to be the one doing the cart, but the client will get exactly what he wants and hopefully I’ll get a good long-term business relationship out of it.

What irked me today was the way the programmer continually referred to me as ‘the one who’ll make it all pretty.’

‘Pretty’ isn’t the tip of the iceberg. What I bring to the table goes way beyond aesthetics.

It’s 9 years of personal e-commerce experience and 12 years of building websites; a strong graphic design background; an understanding of search engine optimization practices; a deep understanding of cross-browser compatibility and web standards; familiarity with Section 508 accessibility guidelines; the ability to partner with my clients and provide as much education on the care of feeding of their web presence as they can take; an understanding of information architecture and navigation; and an understanding of how to create a website that engages the customer from page one.

Programmers think that my job is all about aesthetics, and hard-core designers think that I shouldn’t use the word ‘creative’ in my business name because I’m not really a creative if I work with code. I’ve actually been told that to my face…

What exactly am I? I refer to myself as a designer/developer on my business cards and I thought that covered the bases pretty well, but perhaps not. Should I consider reworking my title yet again? Web strategist? Web jack-of-all-trades? Web designoper? Web develsigner?

I’m running a campaign to purchase a $499 annual BrowserCam account at Fundable. You web designers should be familiar with BrowserCam for viewing your work on many other browser/OS platforms.

The cost is $25 each and 20 people can join. For your money, you get unlimited captures and unlimited 60-minute remote access sessions (on Windows and Linux, or 30-minute sessions on Macs).  Please sign up if you’d like to take part by clicking the link here.

Well I finally sat down this afternoon and learned how to integrate Wordpress into an existing website.

I followed Jonathan Wold’s tutorial - it’s pretty good, and got me far enough into the process that I understood how to finish it myself.  You can see the results here; I’m not quite done as of this afternoon, but it should be finished up in the next few hours (or days depending on my workload)…

I found a nice online color tool today - a full Pantone chart with RGB and HTML conversions.

I’d been hanging around on Meetup.com for my town for about a year, on the ‘waiting for a web design meetup’ and other lists, and a few weeks ago finally decided to bite the bullet and start a group myself (with one other coder as co-organizer).

So… this morning we had our first meeting over breakfast, and it went really well! Only five of the 9 that had RSVP’d yes or maybe showed up, but it was a good group and we had a great time. I just set up the second meeting and hopefully we’ll get a bigger turnout, but I was really pleased with the first one.

As far as Meetup.com, it has its pros and cons. One is that it’s really user-friendly and very simple to manage your group, communicate with everyone, set up meetings and RSVP’s/reminders. It has a few nice features like the message board and polling or profile questions.

The cons are that there aren’t forums - my group is interested in having that so we can post projects for review, post code snippets, book reviews, that kind of thing, and the message board is limited to only the one general topic. Also, that you can’t do anything with the site template, which is what I’d like to get my hands on…

One of our members has started a site on CollectiveX, which is a group/social networking platform, and we’ll be using that for our forums and other things that Meetup.com doesn’t offer. But I think for the time being we’ll keep the Meetup site too, as it really excels within its limited scope: getting people to join and get involved on a basic level. If you’re in the Northern Colorado area, consider joining us.

I met with a potential client last week who’s been trying (without a lot of success yet) to put together a real estate site using one of the ubiquitous do-it-yourself sitebuilder packages on a prominent host.

He asked me point blank: “What can you do for me that’s better than what I can get on (name of ubiquitous host)?”

A very good question. We talked for about an hour, and I answered his questions and just submitted a bid for his project last night. But I thought I would summarize here… (Not in any particular order).

1. Custom websites. I don’t use templates - if you go with a sitebuilder, you’ll be using a template that maybe dozens or hundreds of other sites are also using. If you go with a pro, you should get a totally unique site that’s customized to fit the goals and personality of your own business, not a carbon-copy of someone else’s.
2. Clean code. Sitebuilder applications tend to put out really messy, bloated code. A pro who knows what he/she is doing will write clean, valid code and externalize all those scripts. He/she should also be checking across multiple browsers, testing for accessibility and validating code (IMO) and this isn’t something that probably occurs to most users of sitebuilder apps.
3. (Probably) better rankings. I know that many of those ubiquitous hosts offer SEO tools, and that’s great. But the messy code and sometimes just confusion about using the SEO tools means that websites don’t get optimized the way they should be.
4. No monthly fees. I know that (ubiquitous host) doesn’t charge much, but you generally pay by the month unless you pay up front. When you hire a pro, you pay and you’re done. And yes, pros charge more, but when you pay very little, you tend to get very little.
5. More efficient use of your time. If you own a business, you’re probably a very busy person. Why spend hours or days or weeks working on a website that looks like many others? Hire a professional and get what you really want - something that makes your business look good and helps you establish and improve your relationships with your clients.

All my opinions, but I think they’re valid ones. DIY sites may be okay for personal sites or if you’re just starting out, but eventually moving up to a custom, professionally-built website is a better move for many small businesses.