Notes from a Desi Geek

And if you still want to use them, please, please DO NOT use ‘D’ as your accesskey!

Let me explain why.
I am a touch typist and keyboard is what I use, most of the time, to communicate with my computer. So when I hear about accesskey attribute, I am definitely happy. Now I can press ALT + [[WEBMASTER DEFINED ACCESSKEY]] to access particular link on a site. A webmaster can define ‘H’ as accesskey to home link, and I can presss ALT + H to go to home link! Now that’s neat!

But there is a little problem here. If you use ‘D’ as accesskey, you break my browser shortcut! IE/Firefox uses ALT + D as a shortcut to address bar and I am so used to it, I think my children will have that shortcut engraved in their DNA!

So, I hate it when Mapquest decides to use ‘D’ as accesskey for their link to ‘Directions’!

I hate it when WordPress admin console uses ‘D’ as accesskey to their strike out tag!

I hate it, I hate it, I hate it!

Story doesn’t end here. Derek, a web develoepr and accessibility specialist, has published an article about why they don’t use accesskeys. That article uncovers more problems with accesskey and it was written in 2003! Guys, it’s 2005 now and we gotta learn our lesson in two years! So let’s put a hold on (or moderate) accesskey usage till we sort out this issues!

JD

Today I went to Staples Store to buy some stationary. [I needed stationary because I decided to fully implement techniques outlined in Getting Things Done book.]

I bought quite a few things totaling worth 130$. Staples stores was very nicely organized and Staples staff was very courteous and helpful. I spent 2 hours looking at different things! So far so good. They gave me all the things I bought in plastic bags. I carried them in cart and dumped it in my car’s trunk. I came home and tried to unload all stuff from Car. And voilla, those wafer thin plastic bags got torn apart when I tried to lift them!
Out of the 5 bags, only 2 were in working condition because they were carrying Post It notes and other light items! I had to go to my home and use my Gym bag to carry items in 2 rounds in cold weather outside!
Those plastic bags entirely ruined my shopping experience! It reminded me of this thread on ‘Ask Joel’ forum where Joel explained reasoning behind these fucked up bags.

Anyway, I am going to write to Staples and see what their response is.

JD

When I was browsing some site today, I came across this:

Do you see how they have highlighted ‘MACROMEDIA FLASH’ and if you read further it says ‘… Macromedia Flash compatible toolbar.’ If you are in hurry and just glance at this pop-up, you might well click ‘Yes’ thinking that it is something from Macromedia.

Can’t we take some legal action against companies who employ such practices?

JD

Can you guess what following words mean??

‘Addnl comm on visa extn..’

I received one mail today which had above words in subject line and though I figured out what it means [Additional Comment on Visa extension], I really wonder why someone should write in such a manner. I really hate it when people use ‘u’ instead of ‘you’, ‘r’ instead of ‘are’! It’s so much like a teen who is new to Internet, trying to impress his ‘female’ friend on NET! You see it’s just few extra letters you have to type and you get tons of readability!

Anyways, enough whining. Back to work…

JD

Jivha just blogged about how irritating Times of India site is with all those Animated ads.

But there is a simple tool which can help you! These are called bookmarklets! Check my earlier entry about Bookmarklets here.

Times of India page - Before using ‘Zap Plugins’ Bookmarklet

Now you know how to tackle those annoying web pages!
JD

I had heard about the issue of IE not being able to display URLs correctly. I didn’t realise the seriousness until I came across this.

If you click on this link, it will direct you to Internet Explorer page. Rather it will make you beileve so. Actually it goes to the Exclipy.com page only. I, seasoned user, was mistaken thinking that site is legal. I wonder how this can create horrors for not so literated in computers. MS should patch this immediately!

JD

Being a power user of Computer, I regularly update my Windows XP using Windows Update site.

Just a while back, I happen to check Windows Update and installed update for my video drivers. I restarted computer and I find that new Games group has been added to my Programs menu! It’s so annoying!

Why on the earth, Windows Update needs to create Games group when all I was trying to do was to update my Video drivers ???

JD

I just happen visit Nero Burning Rom Software’s homepage.

To my surprise, I found content in language (de - Denmark?) which I don’t understand.

Then I saw ‘International’ link on Top, I clicked on the same, was greeted with another page where I had to select between 1. Great Britain English 2. USA/Canada Version 3. ?? German Version ?? and finally I reached the English version of Nero homepage! Phew!

I was wondering what made Ahead Software (Creators of Nero) to make De as their default language rather than English. To my knowledge Nero is EXTREMELY popular software and I am 100% sure that number of Nero users speaking English will be far greater than any other language. I find it extremely stupid to see some other language as default language for Nero homepage!

JD

[b]Update[/b]

Someone pointed out in JoS that the homepage comes in English for him, bydefault! It means, homepage is trying to figure out which part of the world I am from and serve me content appropriately. But certainly their implementation is broken because I am from India and they should rather show me english version. I would like to add that other sites like google.com and php.net correctly determines that I am from India and redirects me to Indian mirrors of their site.

Before reading this entry, Check Absolutely fucking nuts. [Hint:No porn material there! ;)]

I used to think that Patent is a good thing to protect your IP. But some patents like this just drives me nuts!

Anyways,
Being only HTML/DHTML user, I will not be affected by this but I am scared how many sites will become less usable if the developers doesn’t start acting fast.

Surprisingly Appl has put up several articles which can help you get round the problem.
Here are the links: [Thanks to What do I know ]

Creating the Best User Experience for Active Web Content

Authoring Websites for Compatibility with Internet Explorer for Windows FAQ

Preparing Websites with Active Content for Upcoming Changes to Internet Explorer for Windows

I recently recieved Macromedia’s newsletter ‘Edge’. There they had link to one of the article.
Can you see something missing??? Here is my experience:

I was reading the text by Mr. Alan and then suddenly it stopped at ‘….pushed into the’, I was wondering what to do, how do I scroll and suddenly I saw those numbered buttons at bottom and upon clicking them I realised that they are used to move from page to page! Talk about fucked up usability! I mean why on the earth you need to use FLASH in such a wierd way? I mean I have seen too many examples like this where FLASH usage is simply killing usability. I am going to ask everyone to stay away from FLASH!