Robert Accettura's
Fun With Wordage

• Popup Blocker UI is a yellow bar on top notifying the user. They can simply click on it to get a contextual menu with options. That’s good. XPI blocker is the same yellow bar, but you have to click on a button to get option. Should be 1 interface.
• When you save an image to a disk, there’s no need for the download manager. It’s bothersome more than helpful. People use the download manager to track download times. An exception should be large (>500k) images perhaps. But not all images
• Extensions, and Themes shouldn’t be listed separately in the tools menu. Should be 1 option. The dialog that opens should have 2 tabs. One for extensions, one for themes.
• While were at it, we should have one for plugins to, since people are confused about the difference between plugins and extensions. That’s a 3rd tab. Same format. about:plugins content, but formatted for consistency. No it’s not unnecessary duplication. look at about: and the about dialog.
• Smooth Scrolling should be enabled by default. This just ticks end-users off. They don’t see it.
• Download Manager gets slow as heck when it’s full of downloads (100+). This delay is annoying, especially with small files that should be done in the bat of an eye. Should notify user first time they exceed the threshold, and allow them to ignore (forever), or purge.
• Preferences (especially in privacy) should contain a little ‘?’ icon that opens up the help and takes them to relevant document ion, so they can make an informed choice should they want more info. Ideally, it should popup a specialized shortened detailed explanation of the option, and it’s consequences
• Viewsource should show line numbers. Goes good with “Go to Line” menu option.
• Auto-Update should have option to automatically install (at a minimum) security patches. As MIcrosoft learned, people aren’t inclined to do it themselves. Stuff like this can easily be automatic. We are asking for trouble if we don’t. People will still credit Mozilla as insecure, even if it is their fault for ignoring requests to upgrade. This should be a default, and warn if you disable it.
• When not using auto-update you should get a dialog clearly stating if it’s a security fix. Perhaps a different color.
• Wikipedia should be an included search option. Were looking to get end users. End users like searching stuff like that. We want them to have stuff they like. We aren’t Microsoft after all.
• A script as follows is in the page
  HTML [Show Styled Code]:

  <script language="Javascript" type="text/javascript">
  var $x = '@';
  var $a = 'accettura.com';
  var $r = 'robert';
  document.write('<a href="mailto:' + $r + $x + $a +'" title="Email Robert Accettura">'+ $r + $x + $a + '< \/a>');
  </a></script>
  

  HTML [Show Plain Code]:

  1. <script language="Javascript" type="text/javascript">
  2. var $x = ‘@’;
  3. var $a = ‘accettura.com’;
  4. var $r = ‘robert’;
  5. document.write(’<a href="mailto:’ + $r + $x + $a +’" title="Email Robert Accettura">‘+ $r + $x + $a + ‘< \/a>‘);
  6. </a></script>

  When you view source of the page, you see:

  HTML [Show Styled Code]:

  <script language="Javascript" type="text/javascript">
  var $x = '@';
  var $a = 'accettura.com';
  var $r = 'robert';
  document.write('<a href="mailto:' + $r + $x + $a +'" title="Email Robert Accettura">'+ $r + $x + $a + '< \/a>');
  </a></script><strong><a href="mailto:robert@accettura.com" title="Email Robert Accettura">robert@accettura.com</a></strong>
  

  HTML [Show Plain Code]:

  1. <script language="Javascript" type="text/javascript">
  2. var $x = ‘@’;
  3. var $a = ‘accettura.com’;
  4. var $r = ‘robert’;
  5. document.write(’<a href="mailto:’ + $r + $x + $a +’" title="Email Robert Accettura">‘+ $r + $x + $a + ‘< \/a>‘);
  6. </a></script><strong><a href="mailto:robert@accettura.com" title="Email Robert Accettura">robert@accettura.com</a></strong>

  That’s not right. The output isn’t in my source. The script is. Only the script. Grr.

There bugs for some, no bugs for others. Feel free to link to relevant bugs, feel free to create bugs (cc me if you do), feel free to link to this post to advocate some things mentioned. Bla bla bla. Gripe, disagree, debate, as long as it’s peaceful, and done with an open mind…. you know the deal.

Repeat after me:

Posting this because I though it was interesting. I know it’s somewhat off the general techy feel of the site. A ‘Volcanic Advisory‘ has been issued. They don’t think it will be as big as the 1980 eruption, calling the projected eruption “small to moderate eruption”.

So keep an eye on the VolcanoCam.

Touchdown of Spaceshipone!

Tis another historic day for mankind.

If you haven’t already. Signup to Spread Firefox and start putting sexy Firefox Web Badges on your website!

Spread the word. Lets get these on every blog on the web.

Well, I decided to do some freeipods research:

eCost: Couldn’t give me a number. But when I asked about the 20GB Apple iPod was told there was ‘a lot’. No backorder. As of 12:30 PM EST.

PCMall: 223 in stock (enough for at least week). As of 12:39 PM EST.

eCost has been a known supplier for freeipods.com. PCMall has been said to be a new supplier. Though no confirmation on that.

The company apparantly has more than a week of shipments. Nobody sounded like there was any sort of problem shipping ipods out the door. No limits seem to be in place. In fact, the PCMall rep even joked with me “buy them all, and we’ll make you a deal”.

The folks at both companies are as always rather helpful. I’ve had a good experience with MacMall in the past. Though this makes me wonder why Gratis is lagging.

This is part of a multi-part story: First Post | Next

Adobe today released the specs for a new image format: DNG.

I’m interested. The ideas behind it seem to make sense. JPEG sucks. That’s about all there is to it. It’s what we have, it’s what we use. But it stinks.

I’m curious if Adobe’s going to be able to get DNG actually out there. It’s going to be an uphill battle for sure. JPEG is such a defacto standard, it’s going to be tough. But I’m welcoming the change.