The Cynic Gazette

This comes up a lot in the web development world, especially with higher level coders who are in the Java or .NET world. After just having this coversation with a coworker, I came up with a metaphor to explain the relationship between block and inline elements. A few basics first.

A div is a generic block element with no inherent attributes. By default, it’s as wide as its parent element, and breaks the line. A few common block elements are DIV, P (P is special, we’ll get to that), and BLOCKQUOTE.

A span is a generic inline element with no inherent attributes. By default, it’s as wide as its content, and doesn’t break the line. Some inline elements you’d be used to seeing are the STRONG, EM, SPAN, and STRIKE tags.

To write valid XHTML, you need an understanding of what elements can be properly nested… which is pretty simple. Block elements can be nested in block elements, inline elements can be nested in block or inline elements. Easy peazy. Well, almost.

The exception to this is the P tag, which is a block element, but breaks the rules by only being allowed to contain inline elements. The nesting order DIV DIV P EM STRONG is fine, but DIV P DIV EM STRONG can’t validate because you’re nesting a block element inside the P tag.

Here’s an easy way to remember it. Imagine block elements as pieces of blank paper, and imagine inline elements as ink. You can stack as many pieces of paper as you want on top of each other, and you can contain anything written in pen on the paper. You can use the pen on a few pieces of paper and lay them out on a larger piece of paper, you can underline pen with pen, you can bold text by writing with more pen over the pen. You can’t put paper into the ink… that relationship only goes one way. 

Imagine the P tag is a lined piece of paper. All of the same ink rules apply, but if you try to put more paper into it, you won’t be able to see the lines usefully, so that’s a no-no.

So there you have it. To put it simpler, If you need a container, use a div. If you need to effect these three words, use a span.

Joisey Mike Design, The Internets div, nesting tags, span, XHTML

I’m in the middle of a programmer’s paradigm shift that, frankly, most of the Windows development world took 7 years ago. I’m switching from Classic ASP to ASP.NET.

This of course has me searching for books on learning ASP.NET, a programming language is like a foreign film to me. I can figure out what’s going on, and know who the main character is, and more or less what they’re trying to accomplish. But I can’t tell if he’s whispering sweet nothings to his lover, or asking his sister to bring over some 10W-30 for a quick oil change. In a nutshell, I get it, but not really.

Luckily, I found an eBook on Amazon for sale which describes in just under 40 pages what the big deal is about ASP.NET, how it’s different, and why I should care.

However, herein lies the dilemma: I don’t like slowly working my way through a PDF on my laptop in bed, and I sure am not bringing it into the bathroom with me. So, I turn to my favorite eBook reader as the best solution at hand … my iPhone.

I’ve read books on my iPhone before, but a PDF… this is new territory. So I googled my way to a few solutions to see how the people who write about things get on reading other things when they’re PDFs, on an iPhone.

Jailbreak/SSH/install PDFViewer app
Too much work. I’m looking for an easy solution and the inherent problem with jailbreaking your phone is that every time you upgrade the firmware, you have to reinstall ALL of your apps. Lame. And I don’t want to have to use SSH to zip files to my phone. I want to just have the damn thing be available, and not lose EVERYTHING just because a firmware update came out. Which leads us to our next solution…

E-mail myself the PDF in an attachment
This seems like it would be easy-cheesy-1-2-threesy, but now my PDF’s only available in portrait mode. Great if you want to swipe left-to-right, up-and-down, and work your index finger harder then that day in 6th grade when you thought nobody was looking and you just wanted to breather a little easier. NEXT.

Google Documents
I can’t believe I didn’t come up with this one right out of the gate. Upload your file to Google documents, and view it in glorious landscape mode in Safari. Done and done. It’s free, and you can even e-mail Google Docs the PDF/DOC/RTF/XLS/whatever if someone sends it to you. Oh, exuberance. Oh, exquisite WIN.

I’m off to read my ASP to ASP.NET pdf now, instead of just writing about how I’m going to read it. Hopefully, this will keep my nerdy appetite sated until my Beginning ASP.NET 3.5 with C# book arrives on Friday.

Joisey Mike Technology, The Internets asp.net, ebooks, iphone, pdf, programming

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Joisey Mike The Internets

Seriously, the geekier you are, the funnier you’ll find this.

Joisey Mike The Internets funny, video

I found what I believe to be an image of the face of Jesus on the lid of my cream cheese container, and of course, put it on eBay. I don’t need it, having seen it before. And, well, I’m Jewish, so it’s just sort of … “nifty.”

Here’s an image, and the link to the auction:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320249867306

Joisey Mike The Internets auction, cream cheese, eBay, jesus, yummy

Logo design is an art form, having to come up with a brand-leading image, while managing not to kill anyone demanding you make the company name “just a bit bigger.” Note: if you can read it, it’s big enough.

Sometimes this art form is embraced and great things happen, like Apple, Nike, IBM, and countless others who have created memorable, eye catching, brand perpetuating logos. You could see a rat trying to gnaw through drywall, and if there was a swoosh, you’d know it was Nike.

But I digress. I’m writing to call attention to some of the worst logos ever created. Here’s a hint: have a teenaged-minded 30-year-old who drinks too much scotch look at your ideas before you put them on a banner.

The first entry is the logo for the Arlington Pediatric Center, which has since changed, but eluded to the possibility of employing Priests as doctors:

Next is the logo that spawned this post when a friend sent it: the logo for the UK’s Office of Government Commerce (OGC). They’ve actually come up with a good looking logo–until you look at it rotated 90 degrees clockwise:

Good stuff. Lets keep rolling on to the logo for the Instituto de Estudos Orientais (Institute for Oriental Studies). This little guy, well, took me a second to see it as anything other than a backdoor entry (it’s a Japanese-looking building with a sun behind it (they claim)):

And finally, my favorite cultural faux pas, assuming that everyone speaks your language in signage:

Note to self: don’t swap a heart for the letter “O” without running it past some international pals first.

Joisey Mike Design, Technology, The Internets bad logo, Design, funny, omg

I’m tired of seeing my myspace friend count dance around, so I “backed up” my friend list. I dare you fuckers to jump ship now and think I won’t notice.

How to:

1. Open a new MS Word (or Works, or Openoffice Write) document

2. Open myspace, and bring up your “all” friends list

3. Take a screen shot (hit the Prt Scr button on your keyboard) of page 1 of your friends list. If you can’t get the whole thing in there, take two.

4. Go to your new word document you opened in step 1 and paste (Control-V, or Open Apple-V if you bought a Mac and secretly wish you were Justin Long’s athletic supporter on a hot day) the screen shot in.

5. Go back to myspace, and open your friends list page 2, and start at step 3. Repeat until you’re done.

This blog is a special dedication the two of you who gave me the boot instead of saying “hey, I’ve known you for 7 or 8 years, but I don’t care enough to bitch you out for never calling. You’re so off my myspace friend list.”

Joisey Mike Geek, The Internets myspace

I’m not a man who’s easily impressed. Well, I am a man who is easily impressed, but not “Wow! A blue car!” easily impressed. But today, the secondteenth day of the fourth month of the 1,208th year since the Europeans decided to start a calendar 800 years in the past (makes sense; think about it), the British have impressed me.

Flip on any video on YouTube. Turn up the volume. Note that YouTube’s volume slider isn’t numeric.

The BBC’s is. And their amps go to eleven. Check out Robin Williams taking over a BBC America chat show when they were having technical difficulties, and turn the volume up. To eleven. Sweet sweet eleven.

Joisey Mike Technology, The Internets bbc, funny, spinal tap, youtube

I revel in my geeky addictions (for which Meg has infinite patience) like my iPhone, Flickr, Podcasts, PS3 (especially Pain), teh internets, Google reader, Photoshop and … well the list goes on. Today, I’m looking for other people who are addicted to Google reader, which I check, oh, say, 150 times a day. 

I’m subscribed to a bunch of Flickr photo pools, about 30 tech and web news feeds, design feeds,iCanHasCheezBurger.com, and another 30 others I’m just not motivated enough to mention. I click that share button from time to time, but who do I share with?

Now I share with thee. I mean you. Thee means you, right? Whatever. Now I share with you. 

To grab the feed of articles, images, videos, lolcats and whatever I find interesting enough to microblog about but don’t microblog about, add this to Google reader, or your favorite news aggregator:

My Google Reader RSS Feed (click to add)

It’ll come up as “KincaidKMF’s shared items” since I didn’t always use the moniker “Joisey Mike” (note to self — do a super-nerdy screen name/online identity blog) and it’ll contain anything I come across that catches my interest so I won’t have to IM it.

Also if you use the mighty Google reader, or any other thing that can make you a feed of YOUR shared items, please comment it here or email me, I’d love to see what you think’s interesting/funny/gross/whathaveyou.

Btw, work’s having a free breakfast of muffins, danish, scones and more. On behalf of Dr. Atkins, I raise my middle finger in rebellion and just drink more coffee.

Joisey Mike Geek, The Internets google reader, rss

I love the Craigslist. For serious.

It started back when I developed a sick fascination with the Missed Connections section, and to this day I’m still sitting with my foam 1 fan finger waiting for that Missed Connection that says my favorite thing an anonymous classified could say: “I saw you at Safeway and thought you were cute. Write me back if you get this.” Awesome. They’re really THAT vague.

And of course, I loved finding a girl who was looking for one friend of mine on there, and finding a guy who was ranting about someone a friend of mine took home from a bar. I still giggle when I think about that 

The lovelorn stopped being enough for my Craigslist high – so I decided my life needed a daily injection of bike pics, so I started hitting the motorcycles for sale, and since it was right next to them, eventually music instruments and photo/video equipment. Of course, electronics and computer stuff had to make the list too, because, well, I wear my geek pride like a Miss Teen USA sash — which I could totally buy on Craigslist, since anyone winning Miss Teen USA will need money for rehab once they realize they can’t really do anything about world peace. See how I brought that full circle?

I’ve been the king of commerce, selling 2 TVs, 2 digital SLR cameras, a motorcycle, Social Distortion tickets and a PS3 in the past year, and with more stuff up for sale now, I get a TON of replies. However, a lot of people, and when I say “a lot” I actually just mean a few here and there, are Craigslist evildoers. They’re different from the Craigslist ne’er-do-wells and the Craigslist nogoodnicks. They want your money, or your stuff, but here’s the rub, they don’t want to trade you their stuff or money for it.

I know, right?

A few want me to ship their item to a cousin in Nigeria, and they’ll pay me an extra $100 in a UScertified bond checks. Or, they want me to use their escrow service, Royal Mail, which involves me calling a premium toll number in Belize (like $50/minute) since I don’t have to pay for the item until I’ve inspected it, but I still have to send them money to “release” the item for inspection.

Snopes.com has been my buddy, as well as the helpful Craigslist scam pages, because while I don’t be a part of anything that doesn’t involve a cash deal in-person, I like to know how all of this stuff works so I can explain it to the great unwashed who don’t like to do research as much as I do. Now thanks to me, these bad people won’t be making the baby Jesus cry. We’ll let “2 Girls 1 Cup” do that.

I’d like to think people will heed this warning and learn from my experience, but let’s face it – most people roaming the web spend too much time wiping the drool off their keyboards to check into a dubious offer. If you don’t like to look up the weird emails you get from buyers, hey, no problem. I’ll just send you a cashier’s check for your DVD player for $8000 signed over to you, if you could just cash it and send me the balance minus $200 for your troubles, well that’d be just swell.

No?

Oh come on… even though our eyes met at Safeway last week?

Joisey Mike The Internets craigslist, sarcasm