Web Info & Tutorials

Chris Double of Mozilla has posted about a proof of concept showing Zimbra working offline with Firefox.

The Firefox features used to enable offline operation were:

• DOM Storage for storing emails and folder information. DOM Storage is an implementation of a WHATWG specification.
• Offline Cache. A patch is available for Firefox that adds an offline cache specifically for web applications to store data (like images, pages, etc) that must be available while offline. Items are loaded in the cache using a rel=”offline-resource” element on a <link> element.
• JAR file Protocol. Firefox accepts JAR protocol URLs. These reference individual items in a JAR file and allow convenient bundling and caching of resources. For example, to reference the file /core/AjxCore.js in the ajax.jar file, the URL would be: jar:/zimbra/js/ajax.jar!/core/AjxCore.js
• Offline Events. The browser has “offline” and “online” events that are triggered when the user chooses to go offline via the menu, or when network connectivity is lost. I modified Zimbra to listen for these events and display a status indicator showing whether it is in offline or online mode.

He also put together a screencast showing him working offline.

Nice work!

SilverStripe is an opensource CMS from Wellington, NZ.

The admin piece is built using Prototype, Scriptaculous and the TinyMCE rich text editor. It uses Object Oriented PHP5 and talks to MySQL backend.

There is a nice feel to using the explorer interface to manage files (e.g. hit rearrange and you can drag and drop), and then seeing your site in preview mode. A really nice touch is being able to see your site in draft, and compare it to the published version.

Christos Constandinou wanted to take YUI Grids and make something that was easy to use and would work with anal designers who want to achieve pixel perfect layouts.

He came up with ___layouts:

The foundational ___layouts file offers five preset page widths, the option to have a fixed width or a text “zoom” style scaling effect and two core templates which give you the ability to nest subdivided regions of one to four columns.

• Supports fluid-width (100%) layouts.
• Supports preset fixed-width layouts at:
  • 640px
  • 760px
  • 900px
  • 1000px
• Supports easy customization of the width for fixed-width layouts.
• Option to make layout flexible in response to user initiated font-size adjustments
• Self-clearing sections. No matter which column is longer, each div.section will clear correctly.
• Option to center within the viewport pages less than 100%.
• Supports easy to over-write CSS classes for people who require “pixel perfect” layouts
• font.css based on YUI fonts.css though changed slightly to rid you of having to look up calculations for different font-sizes (so now: 1em = 10px, 1.3em = 13px, etc…).

A builder application (FF only) gives a designer view on the layout.

Bungee Labs is a rattling well-funded aborning contestant in the Ajax-based covering clog space. The consort is ease in concealing fashion and activity modest with specifics, but their profession promises to attain it cushy to create full-featured, service-consuming Ajax applications — every without ever leaving your application or instalment anything. They’ve declared digit upcoming “pre-public beta events” for folks to endeavor with their stuff:

Tuesday Feb 20th, 8:15-4:30pm

Tuesday March 6th, 8:15-4:30pm

These trainings allow tutorials using scheme services from Amazon, Ebay, Yahoo, Google and PayPal. Attendees module be a conception of a assemble of inferior than 100 developers with an astir Bungee developer account. Bungee engineers module be at both events so attendees crapper garner their brains and intend counselling on individualist projects. A transcontinental breakfast and meal module also be provided.

We looked at Bungee’s clog a patch backwards and patch the bits won’t “ship” for a whatever months yet, they’re definitely up to whatever modify stuff.

Have you ever wished that you could getPercentRemaining() to find out the battery charge left in a users device, or getProtocolRateTx() to find out about the connectivity of a device?

These are some of the methods available in the Intel Web 2.0 Technology Development Kit (TDK).

Imagine if your Web 2.0 application could be aware of the platform it is running on and its environment. It could, for example, leverage multi-core power to provide more immersive user interfaces, postpone certain tasks during low power situations, avoid network traffic over low bandwidth/high latency connections, etc.

The Intel® Web 2.0 Technology Development Kit (TDK) allows developers to learn about the platform's configuration, e.g. display, storage, processor, and the platform's context, e.g. bandwidth, connectivity, power and location, etc. within a browser using JavaScript.

The Intel® Web 2.0 TDK contains documentation and full source code (C++ and JavaScript) for IE 6/7 and Firefox. The code can be incorporated directly in your extensions or JavaScript libraries, and be redistributed royalty free.

I have to admit... I wouldn't have guessed that this would be the next API out of Intel!