It’s outrageous that the CSS standard created in 1996 is not properly supported in Outlook 2010. Let’s do something about it.

Hundreds of millions use Microsoft Internet Explorer to access the web, and Microsoft Outlook to send and receive email. As everyone reading this knows, the good news is that in IE8, Microsoft has released a browser that supports web standards at a high level. The shockingly bad news is that Microsoft is still using the Word rendering engine to display HTML email in Outlook 2010.

What does this mean for web designers, developers, and users? In the words of the “Let’s Fix It” project created by the Email Standards Project, Campaign Monitor, and Newism, it means exactly this:

[F]or the next 5 years your email designs will need tables for layout, have no support for CSS like float and position, no background images and lots more. Want proof? Here’s the same email in Outlook 2000 & 2010.

It’s difficult to believe that in 2009, after diligently improving standards support in IE7 and now IE8, Microsoft would force email designers to use nonsemantic table layout techniques that fractured the web, squandered bandwidth, and made a joke of accessibility back in the 1990s.

Accounting for stupidity

For a company that claims to believe in innovation and standards, and has spent five years redeeming itself in the web standards community, the decision to use the non-standards-compliant, decades-old Word rendering engine in the mail program that accompanies its shiny standards-compliant browser makes no sense from any angle. It’s not good for users, not good for business, not good for designers. It’s not logical, not on-brand, and the very opposite of a PR win.

Rumor has it that Microsoft chose the Word rendering engine because its Outlook division “couldn’t afford” to pay its browser division for IE8. And by “couldn’t afford” I don’t mean Microsoft has no money; I mean someone at this fabulously wealthy corporation must have neglected to budget for an internal cost. Big companies love these fictions where one part of the company “pays” another, and accountants love this stuff as well, for reasons that make Jesus cry out anew.

But if the rumor’s right, and if the Outlook division couldn’t afford to license the IE8 rendering engine, there are two very simple solutions: use Webkit or Gecko. They’re both free, and they both kick ass.

Why it matters

You may hope that this bone-headed decision will push millions of people into the warm embrace of Opera, Safari, Chrome, and Firefox, but it probably won’t. Most people, especially most working people, don’t have a choice about their operating system or browser. Ditto their corporate email platform.

Likewise, most web designers, whether in-house, agency, or freelance, are perpetually called upon to create HTML emails for opt-in customers. As Outlook’s Word rendering engine doesn’t support the most basic CSS layout tools such as float, designers cannot use our hard-won standards-based layout tools in the creation of these mails—unless they and their employers are willing to send broken messages to tens millions of Outlook users. No employer, of course, would sanction such a strategy. And this is precisely how self-serving decisions by Microsoft profoundly retard the adoption of standards on the web. Even when one Microsoft division has embraced standards, actions by another division ensure that millions of customers will have substandard experiences and hundreds of thousands of developers still won’t get the message that our medium has standards which can be used today.

So it’s up to us, the community, to let Microsoft know how we feel.

Participate in the Outlook’s Broken project. All it takes is a tweet.

Tags: browsers, bugs, IE8, outlook, microsoft, iranelection

Filed under: Browsers, CSS, Compatibility, Design, Marketing, Markup, Microsoft, Standards, State of the Web, The Profession, Tools, W3C, Web Standards, Working, XHTML, software, spec, style

WaSP InterAct is a “living, open web standards curriculum.” Put together by an amazing group of dedicated educators and industry experts, the curriculum is designed to teach students the skills of the web professional—and ease the burden of colleges and universities, struggling to develop timely and appropriate curricula for our fast-moving profession.

Schools that teach web design struggle to keep pace with our industry, and those just starting their curricula often set off in the wrong direction because the breadth and depth of our medium can be daunting. The WaSP InterAct curriculum project seeks to ease the challenges schools around the world face as they prepare their students for careers on the Web. … Its courses are divided into six learning tracks that provide students with a well rounded foundation in the many facets of the web design craft.

The group offers its resources to all who need them (to reuse adapt), and it seeks your content and ideas.

Tags: design, data, webdesign, webstandards, education, curriculum, WaSP, webstandards.org

Filed under: Design, Web Design, Web Standards, Working

• Blog post template final (with rotation in footer)
• About page template final (with rotation in footer)
• Contact page template final (with yadda, yadda)
• 404 page – my favorite!
• New! 21 May Subscribe page
• New! 21 May Style switcher in footer
• New! 22 May WordPress tout page
• New! 22 May (mt) Media Temple tout page

Note: Top left and top right footer elements rotate. ALA element (top middle) changes every two weeks, upon publication. Bottom three elements are static, at least for now.

Thanks to Mark Huot for the rotation script (same one we use on Happy Cog) and Noel Jackson, Daniel Mall, and Media Temple for the love and support.

A couple more templates to go, and then we can build this thing. Can’t wait.

Tags: zeldman, zeldman.com, design, redesign, designingfromthecontentout

Filed under: Design, Redesigns, Web Design, Working, Zeldman, development, work, zeldman.com

Working on the footer of zeldman.com redesign. Once footer is done, going to adjust header and Twitter sidebar blip.

Tags: zeldman, zeldman.com, design, redesign, css

Filed under: CSS, Design, HTML, Happy Cog™, Web Design, Web Standards, Working, XHTML, Zeldman, development, wordpress, work, zeldman.com

Armed with nothing more than a keen eye, a good seat, a fine camera, and the ability to use it, An Event Apart Seattle attendee Warren Parsons captured the entire two-day show in crisp and loving detail. Presenting, for your viewing pleasure, An Event Apart Seattle 2009 – a set on Flickr.

When you’ve paged your way through those, have a gander at Think Brownstone’s extraordinary sketches of AEA Seattle.

Still can’t get enough of that AEA stuff? Check out the official AEA Seattle photo pool on Flickr.

Wonder what people said about the event? Check these Twitter streams: AEA and AEA09.

And here are Luke W’s notes on the show.

Our thanks to the photographers, sketchers, speakers, and all who attended.

Tags: aneventapart, aeaseattle09, AEA, AEA09, Seattle, webdesign, conference, Flickr, sets, Twitter, photos, illustrations, sketches, aneventapart.com

Filed under: An Event Apart, Appearances, Browsers, CSS, Career, Code, Community, Design, HTML, HTML5, Happy Cog™, Ideas, Images, Information architecture, Redesigns, Seattle, Standards, State of the Web, Surviving, The Profession, Working, Zeldman, client services, content, creativity, eric meyer, events, industry, jobs, speaking, tweets, twitter

Here’s a little something for a Wednesday evening. (Or wherever day and time it is in your part of the world.)

The body and bottom of the next zeldman.com design are now finished. Tomorrow I start working on the top.

Have a look.

Looks extra sweet in iPhone.

I’m designing from the content out. Meaning that I designed the middle of the page (the part you read) first. Because that’s what this site is about.

When I was satisfied that it was not only readable but actually encouraged reading, I brought in colors and started working on the footer. (The colors, I need not point out to longtime visitors, hearken back to the zeldman.com brand as it was in the 1990s.)

The footer, I reckoned, was the right place for my literary and software products.

I designed the grid in my head, verified it on sketch paper, and laid out the footer bits in Photoshop just to make sure they fit and looked right. Essentially, though, this is a design process that takes place outside Photoshop. That is, it starts in my head, gets interpreted via CSS, viewed in a browser, and tweaked.

Do not interpret this as me dumping on Photoshop. I love Photoshop and could not live or work without it. But especially for a simple site focused on reading, I find it quicker and easier to tweak font settings in code than to laboriously render pages in Photoshop.

If you view source, I haven’t optimized the CSS. (There’s no sense in doing so yet, as I still have to design the top of the page.)

I thought about waiting till I was finished before showing anything. That, after all, is what any sensible designer would do. But this site has a long history of redesigning in public, and the current design has been with us at least four years too long. Since I can’t snap my fingers and change it, sharing is the next best thing.

A work in progress. Like ourselves.

Tags: zeldman, zeldman.com, redesign, webdesign, css, code

Filed under: Appearances, Browsers, CSS, Design, Fonts, HTML, Layout, Web Design, Web Standards, Websites, Working, XHTML, Zeldman, content, creativity, wordpress, work, zeldman.com

In Issue No. 282 of A List Apart, For People Who Make Websites:

• Can we finally get real type on the web?
• Does beauty in design have a benefit besides aesthetic pleasure?

Real Fonts on the Web: An Interview with The Font Bureau’s David Berlow

by DAVID BERLOW, JEFFREY ZELDMAN

Is there life after Georgia? We ask David Berlow, co-founder of The Font Bureau, Inc, and the first TrueType type designer, how type designers and web designers can work together to resolve licensing and technology issues that stand between us and real fonts on the web.

In Defense of Eye Candy

by STEPHEN P. ANDERSON

Research proves attractive things work better. How we think cannot be separated from how we feel. The next time a boss, client, or co-worker scoffs at the notion that beauty is an important aspect of interface design, point their peepers here.

A List Apart explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on web standards and best practices.

Tags: alistapart, type, typography, realtype, truetype, CSS, beauty, design, aesthetics

Filed under: A List Apart, Advocacy, CSS, Design, Fonts, HTML, Happy Cog™, Ideas, Interviews, Layout, Publications, Publishing, Standards, State of the Web, Typography, UX, Usability, User Experience, Web Design, Web Standards, Working, XHTML, art direction, business, development, industry

Rated Five Stars at Amazon.com since the day it was published, “Taking Your Talent to the Web” is now a free downloadable book from zeldman.com:

• Download the front cover! (TIFF image, 1.8 MB)
• Download the book! (PDF, book galley, 9.5 MB)

I wrote this book in 2001 for print designers whose clients want websites, print art directors who’d like to move into full–time web and interaction design, homepage creators who are ready to turn pro, and professionals who seek to deepen their web skills and understanding.

Here we are in 2009, and print designers and art directors are scrambling to move into web and interaction design.

The dot-com crash killed this book. Now it lives again. While browser references and modem speeds may reek of 2001, much of the advice about transitioning to the web still holds true.

It’s yours. Enjoy.

Update – now with bookmarks

Attention, K-Mart shoppers. The PDF now includes proper Acrobat bookmarks, courtesy of Robert Black. Thanks, Robert!

Tags: design, webdesign, TYTTTW, takingyourtalenttotheweb, zeldman, jeffreyzeldman, book, instruction, artdirection, printtoweb

Filed under: CSS, Community, Design, Free, HTML, Happy Cog™, Ideas, Information architecture, Layout, Publications, Publishing, State of the Web, The Profession, Tools, Typography, UX, Usability, User Experience, W3C, Web Design, Web Standards, Websites, Working, Zeldman, art direction, books, content, creativity, downloads, industry, jobs, reprints, writing

The annual A List Apart survey for people who make websites is the only public source of data on the shifting salaries, titles, job skills, and work satisfactions of full- and part-time, staff and freelance web professionals.

This year’s survey findings, culled from answers provided by over 30,000 ALA readers, are now up for your pleasure on a specially designed website. We’ve sliced and diced the data, making sense of complex interrelationships, and displaying the results in miniature CSS masterworks by Mr Eric Meyer. (More about the CSS.)

This year’s findings paint a clearer picture of the distinctions between full-time and freelance web professionals: how you work, what you earn, and what you love about the job. Interestingly, too, despite the brutality of a global recession that was already in full swing when we offered the survey, most respondents revealed a surprisingly high level of job security, satisfaction, and confidence in the future.

See for yourself. Read the findings.

Comments off. Please comment on ALA.

Tags: alistapart, aneventapart, webdesignsurvey, survey, forpeoplewhomakewebsites, surveyfindings, findings, meyerweb, css, jobskills, titles, webdesign, webdesigners, webdevelopment, webdevelopers, IA, UX, editors, writers, webmasters

Comments off.

Filed under: A List Apart, Advocacy, An Event Apart, Design, Survey, Working, business, jobs, work

Now with significantly enhanced audio quality, courtesy of Zoomy.net’s Peter Richardson…

Here, for your consideration and pleasure, is the new! improved! audio recording of “From Freelance to Agency: Start Small, Stay Small.” Listen and enjoy.

Tags: design, webdesign, podcast, recording, SXSW, SXSWi, SXSWi09, panels, panel, freelance, agency, smallagency, transition, survival, economy

Tags: design, webdesign, podcast, recording, SXSW, SXSWi, SXSWi09, panels, panel, freelance, agency, smallagency, transition, survival, economy

Filed under: Community, Design, Working, business, development, work