Box Model Blues

Jonathan Putnam — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 15:04:17 -0700

I have spent many hours adjusting the code on this site so it would display properly on Firefox and Internet Explorer. Everything that had worked so perfectly in Firefox was horribly munged by Microsoft's market-leading browser. I tried to correct the situation with little CSS tweaks but ended up scratching everything and starting over. As a result, I had to make a few compromises on the design which I will try to remedy in the next few weeks. For now, things display OK and that's fine with me.

If you are still using Internet Explorer to browse the web, do yourself and everyone else on the Internet a favor and use Firefox instead. For those who aren't aware, Internet Explorer horribly misinterprets the basic standards established to maintain consistent display across all browsers. This makes the process of web design much more annoying than it should be. Not only that, Internet Explorer is notorious for its lax security. This means that by using it, you open yourself up to all kinds of attacks, with the potential to completely wreck your computer.

Firefox is a free alternative to Internet Explorer that adheres to web standards and is much more secure. As if that wasn't enough, Firefox's functionality can be extended through the use of extensions. There are over a thousand extensions and I have used dozens of them. Over the next few days, I will highlight the ones I have found most useful. To say they are useful is an understatement. I have grown to rely on some of these extensions so much that it's disappointing when I have to use a browser without them.

To start with, since some of you may have followed my bulletin on Myspace, is the Myspace toolbar. The toolbar makes it easy to check whether you have messages without logging in to the site. You can also set it up to automatically log in when you visit Myspace. Best of all, there's a simple little button on the bottom of the status bar that toggles the toolbar visibility. That way, you don't have to have the toolbar always taking up space on your screen. Nifty, huh? If you're already using Firefox, you can simply click on the following link and drag it to the location bar of the browser (where you type web sites in): Install myspace toolbar.

wavetheory.org - myspace

Box Model Blues