or quite some time I have been wanting to create a CSS Zen Garden style. This morning I spent about 2 hours designing a dark layout as I could no longer resist my desires. Shown above is a screenshot (Firefox 1.0.4 under Linux) which you can click to enter the actual page. As for the translucent PNG element at the top, I suspect that Internet Explorer would not render it properly. Support for transparency with a decent colour depth has always been poor in Internet Explorer (see related item).

I named the style Palm Bliss, which like any other hastily-chosen title, is a stupid name. All graphics were worked on under The GIMP version 1.2.3. The style is still considered “work in progress”, but I could not help exposing it already (despite its premature state). Knowing my past experiences, it will remain in its current form forever, never to be worked on again or even submitted. Nevertheless, I truly feel as if it was something that I had to do in order to challenge myself.

You may also wish to see an older item about Zen Garden galleries.

The latest generation of Web development involves tools such as the one used for managing this Web log. Although many pages continue to be composed in the level of raw HTML code or using What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) tools, their days appear numbered. Quite simply, both are antiquated methods of composing for the Web since development is usually done at the remote end — the user’s end. Both content and tools (software) reside on the user’s side. Content then needs to be transferred to the Web server and software is not guaranteed to work on any platform.

In the past few years, many free content management systems (CMS’s) have emerged. They typically re-use GPL‘d components for a more rapid development process, which is the power of Open Source. The result is the existence of many packages and some prominent ones are listed below:

• WordPress is a blogging tool which has recently stretched towards becoming a fully-blown CMS. It powers this section of the site as well as Harvey Tobkes
• Plone, which is highly popular
• PHP-Nuke (and PostNuke) that run The Computer Vision Digest and MARS.
• Drupal, a highly-motivated team that grows rapidly
• Mambo which is very popular among Linux users

There is no “best tool” as it all depends on the task in question and the nature of the Web site to be built. However, Plone is very mature, WordPress is highly user-friendly and PHP-Nuke is versatile. The best thing to do is visit the sites and view demonstrative flagship sites that run on each CMS package. A quick glance will give all the impression that is needed.

mericans can take advantage of a database/map of nearby Wi-Fi HotSpots. This Web site, WiFiMaps.com, is of course far from ethically acceptable. Perhaps it will force system administrator to finally change the default, out-of-the-box settings on their routers. It is amazing how penetrable Wi-Fi connections have become.

Related links: (external)

• WEPCrack
• How To Crack WEP
• Cracking WPA

The links above are posted as a word of caution. You must ensure that you are not exposed to such hacks, which probably affect old devices the most.

Paul Thurrott, a Windows guru is and well-known Windows advocate, wrote this strong critique of Internet Explorer 7, which he claims punishes both Web developers and users.

Paul closes his write-up with the following words:

My advice is simple: Boycott IE. It’s a cancer on the Web that must be stopped. IE isn’t secure and isn’t standards-compliant, which makes it unworkable both for end users and Web content creators. Because of their user bases, however, Web developers are hamstrung into developing for IE at the expense of established standards that work well in all other browsers. You can turn the tide by demanding more from Microsoft and by using a better alternative Web browser. I recommend and use Mozilla Firefox, but Apple Safari (Macintosh only) and Opera 8 are both worth considering as well.

Related item: Internet Explorer Breaks the Web

The BBC have published interesting statistics according to which a new blog is created every second.

The blogosphere is continuing to grow, with a weblog created every second, according to blog trackers Technorati.

…

It suggests, on average, the number of blogs is doubling every five months.

Older related items:

• Blogs Recession (snippet below)

As the number of Web logs continues to rise (nearing exponential growth), an anti-climax is rapidly reached. Attention is spread among more blogs and hence feeds/spiders account for more of the traffic for most blogs…

• Internet and Nature (snippet below)

…in the near future, everyone alive will (on average) write a song, author a book, make a video, craft a weblog, and code a program…

ollowing a recent item on imitation at Microsoft and in relation to what has become a trend, surfers spotted a stunning resemblance between an MSN search test-bed (start.com) and Google’s popular personalised pages. The test-bed is supposedly maintained by interns, but it projects badly on claims for innovative thinking over in Washington. To persuade yourself that the pages are inseparable, have a look at the screenshots below and click to enlarge.

Google’s personalised portal on the left and Microsoft’s clone on the right; click images to view them in full size

ave you ever pondered or worried about what search engines know about you? If not, you should. It is no secret that even the most prominent and powerful companies see value in tracking their users. Companies do not have any desire to infringe the user’s right for privacy, but information about their users allows them to improve their services, e.g. by behaviour learning which leads to optimisation and targetted content.

A few clarifications are worth making: If you use Windows and, more particularly, if you use Internet Explorer, your privacy is jeopardised the most. I am not pointing my finger at Microsoft, but spyware is targetted at the most prolific platform and application. It is the most cost-effective spyware development process. Have you heard about Alexa rating? Ranks are most likely based on spyware at some level or another. The watchers know what sites you visit. The watchers might also know what pages you bookmark, how long you ‘sit’ on a SERP, which pages you follow and the list goes on and on.

Google should be able to infer, based on a small statistical sample that is exposed to spying, which page got bookmarked the most after it was reached from one given SERP (e.g. leaving SERP, then hitting “back” and requesting the SERP again). This way, spamfull sites can be distinguished from sites the user actually had interest in and ended up bookmarking. It is a machine learning approach. Results adapt to users’ behaviour. With a cunning Google cookie that precisely identifies users, you can only imagine the tonage of data that is accumulated about individuals. Shall it be needed, let it be taken ‘off the shelf’…

The Google Cookie

On to Microsoft, they already exploit cookies by swapping them across sites, which of course is questionable if not an illegal practice. They have recently bought a spyware company (Claria who make Bonzi and other related ‘goodies’). Consequently, they downgraded Claria’s threat level, which was a cause for controversy, much like a controversy with Firefox. Users reported that Firfox was labelled harmful by Microsoft’s spyware detection application; Firefox removal was recommended too. All in all, it appears as though MSN have similar plans in mind and aggressive behaviour remains one of their innate features.

Disclaimer: I am not entirely sure about each one of the facts above, but spying is nothing unprecedented. What I argued is based on text (and I do not mean science-fiction or conspiracy theory resources), though many speculations were involved and such communication must be taken with a grain of salt.