The Times New Roman, they are a-changin'
Never let it be said that when B2 hears a plea for assistance, he blows it off. Oh, no. Being the sensitive, caring jamoke that I am, it pleases me beyond description to toil, sweat, bleed, and scrape for the merest inkling, the most trifling sign that I have in some infinitesimally small way improved the wretched, bottom-dwelling lot of my synapse-inhibited readers.
Yes, it's true ... B2 is warmth, compassion, and harmless fluff personified.
That being said, apparently there are four or five people on the planet who still suffer with dial-up Internet service, and at least two of them live in the Finger Lakes region. Phone modems? I thought they went the way of Lincoln Logs, Spoolies, spats, and the Edsel (please don't email - just Google Spoolies). I know that particular ISP mode is antiquated because whenever I say something that dates me, one of the New Wave chicks at work will condescendingly spout, "Like, oh muh Gawd ... that's sooo dial-up!"
Good header is hard to find
Anyway, I received an email this week simultaneously lauding the new Web site design whilst chiding me for the slow loading speed. Mind you, the site wasn't graphics-heavy to begin with, but I got to thinking about Mr. Dial-up and his pathetic whining. Obviously, he wasn't referring to the slideshow and imagery sections because: A) They are sub-pages and don't load until visited; B) The sub-pages themselves and the links to access them have enough heavy-graphic warnings posted to serve double duty at Chernobyl; and C) any moron with a phone modem who ignores the warnings and plunges into the PowerPoint shows and photo viewers is beneath contempt and deserves a deliciously slow, agonizing dial-up death.
Er, but back to the love. After throwing up in my mouth, I figured one way to reduce the load time of the main page and sub-pages, as well as preemptively stifling future complaints, was to replace the image-laden header and title sections with pure CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) banners. I re-designed them, streamlined the CSS, trashed the background and border images, and made it happen. I must admit that while I really liked the look of the old design, the new, clean, simplistic header is growing on me. Bonus? The page does load a tad quicker ... but was there anything else I could do to ensure I would never again hear any more insufferable mewling?
Circling the square
Since all that remained on the page in the form of graphics were a few measly, light-weight thumbnail images and some heavier-weight menu box images for style, I dutifully looked toward improving the boxes. I conjured up some pure CSS boxes but even with tastefully-crafted titles, colors, and borders, they just didn't look right - too square and clunky - kind of like those shoes your mom used to buy you because "they're stout and will last a long time." Yech. But similar to when those first few rays of sunlight break through the dark, ominous thunderclouds, enter that Sorcerer of Style Sheets, that Conjurer of Content, Stu Nicholls.
Stu happens to be a Brit and also happens to maintain the CSS Play Web site where he shamelessly flaunts his innovative genius. Stu has developed quite a well-deserved reputation in Web development circles, and his forte is design applications of pure CSS - eliminating the need for JavaScript, code hack workarounds, and table-dependent schemes (most of it thanks to Microsoft and IE, but that's another story). The nice bit about Stu is that for the painless price of a hyperlink to his site or a paltry PayPal donation, you are welcome to use any of his myriad ideas.
And so we come to the round-cornered menu boxes you see on the right of the home page (for those of you in Yates and Okeechobee Counties, that would be your other right: -->). Originally designed by Alessandro Fulciniti and called Nifty Corners, the arcs were accomplished with CSS and images. Others ran with Alessandro's idea and some eliminated the need for images but replaced them with a JavaScript crutch - bad for those unable to view JavaScript-assisted content.
Stu, however, improved Nifty Corners and added Snazzy Borders - all without images or JavaScript. The beauty of his method is that they can be placed anywhere on the page and can be either fixed or fluid as required. They also happen to look pretty good too, eh?
Oozing with compassion
One other thing ... I also added a simple, stylish, top navigation bar - pure CSS of course. I did so before one of you befuddled B2 readers, rivers of drool dribbling down your chins and angst-induced forehead veins throbbing in syncopation with the drum part in Steppenwolf's Born To Be Wild, spumes "But B2, B2, the menu boxes are too tricky and I need additional help getting around because I'm too stupid to figure out how my browser's Back button works!"
So there you have it - graphics-free excepting four insignificant 75x50 thumbnail images and my rather spiffy logo image alongside the first paragraph. They aren't going anywhere, so don't even think about complaining. In fact, the site would be totally devoid of everything except pure CSS and XHTML if it wasn't for the JavaScript code that despicable spammers forced me to install on my email link. Nevertheless, this entire, arduous sacrifice on your behalf just proves what you've always known:
B2 is all about the love.