Xooxia Development

OK, I’ve finally forced myself to take the time and develop a custom theme for the blog. I’m hoping to create more of a branding with this new theme as this site will serve not only as my professional blog, but also my portfolio. With this redesign, I’ve incorporated a new logo, I’ve incorporated my gravatar image, and moved to a more neutral color base, accented with orange links and headings. I welcome any comments on the theme that you may have.

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Wow, I’ve been way too busy recently with a number of projects.  Currently in the works are a couple of site redesigns and a full site development that have kept me from updating the blog.  However, I’m getting through the mess a little better and am working on a couple of posts.  Anyway, let me introduce you to the new projects I’m talking about.

1. CheerMix Download  (http://cheermixdownload.com)
   This is a site that I’ve really been excited about and will run and maintain myself.  In the competitive cheerleading industry, music mixes are a necessary addition to a squad’s/team’s routines.  This site allows coaches, choreographers, sponsors, etc. to arrange professionally mixed music sections into a full mix for use at performances and competitions.  The interface is a Drag and Drop sortable list of music sections developed with the use of Prototype and Scriptaculous.  Previewing of music is done via JavaScript and the SoundManager2 script.  Once a user gets the sections arranged in an order that works for their routine, they can create a high-quality downloadable MP3 file of the mix.  There currently is no support for limited browsers and no plans to include that support.
2. Pet Connect Online (http://petconnectonline.com)
   This site was developed by a friend and colleague of mine.  His father runs the business and he maintains the online presence.  Recently, traffic and conversions have been dropping and the administrators feel a rebranding of site and image are due.  I’ll be handling most of the graphic redesign and CSS required for the new look.

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OK, so I’m looking at my shelf and I notice that almost 1/5 of the books I have deal in CSS hacks.  I’ve spent many a night reading through these books trying to find the right hack to make a 1-pixel difference in a design for a browser that is being used by only 5% of my clients’ visitors.  Now, many of you will say that I shouldn’t go through so much trouble to accommodate just a few visitors and I would agree with you.   However, if I tell my clients that their site will look great in specific browsers, then I’m going to make sure that it does. Read the rest of this entry »

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