Choices
14 Feb, 2008
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“The problem, is choice.”
Neo, The Matrix Reloaded
To Experiment, or Not To Experiment
I thought I would take the time to discuss some of the choices and details that went into this version of frdk.com ... who knows, it might be of interest. The first decision I faced was if I should continue using this site for experimentation, or not. Experimenting, “living on the edge” as some call it, is half the fun of web development. On the other hand, if you experiment too much, chances are that your audience will find it off-putting. Especially if they can’t really partake in the experiments. In the end I decided to keep it up. Because it’s fun. ;)
The main experiments on the site at this moment are a) use of “web fonts” and b) use of CSS3 elements like border-radius and box-shadow. While these effects may not seem all that experimental (they’ve been in use for years via images after all), they actually are. Web fonts, or the @font-face rule, is currently only supported by Webkit nightly builds; border-radius and box-shadow are only supported well by Safari/Webkit and Firefox 3. Firefox 2 handles border-radius, but not all that well. So, this iteration of the site design uses all CSS rounded corners and drop shadows (on some objects), without a single image being used. That’s an improvement.
As for web-fonts – while Webkit supports the use of @font-face (see other post on this subject), the support is somewhat shaky, and inconsistent between processor generations. Intel Macs fare worse than PowerPC Macs. I have no idea how Webkit Wintel behaves. So it’s an experiment. The good thing about the experiment is that it degrades gracefully: if your browser doesn’t support an experimental feature, the fallback look isn’t that far removed from the desired look. (Screengrabs to come.)
To be continued...
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