Category Archives: Design
On “Free” vs. “Constrained” Site Designs (and Being a Privateer)
To continue on my retro kick, today I’ll be look at Origin Systems’ “Wing Commander: Privateer” and how it relates to web design. Origin was a prolific publisher of DOS games, creating the entire Ultima series in addition to a line of Wing Commander games. Privateer was released in 1993, and unlike other games in [...]
Posted in Design Tagged constrained design, free-form design, privateer, wing commander Leave a comment
The Power of Simplicity (and Heavy Plasmas)
One of the best PC games of my youth was X-COM: UFO Defense (known in the UK as “UFO: Enemy Unknown”). Released in 1993, it instantly became a favorite among players and critics alike. The game tasked players with commanding a secret, multinational organization that researches and intercepts hostile aliens looking to take over the [...]
Old Fascinations and New Sensations
Like many Americans, I spent last week visiting my family for Thanksgiving. Since moving to Miami put me within driving distance of my parents for the first time since their move many years ago, I brought back with me a few boxes of books and knick-knacks I had accumulated during high school. The boxes work [...]
Also posted in Misc Leave a comment
Controlling Your Design on the Web, Part 2: Progressive Enhancement and Graceful Degradation
To continue yesterday’s talk about graded browser support, let’s take a look at the techniques that make the “A-grade” / “C-grade” distinction possible: progressive enhancement (PE) and graceful degradation (GD). These two work at the same problem – the fact that different browsers and devices have different levels of support for web technologies – from [...]
Also posted in Techniques Tagged browser grading, graceful degradation, progressive enhancement Leave a comment
Controlling Your Design on the Web, Part 1: Browser Grading
Designers generally like to have control over all aspects of a design – colors, layout, imagery, fonts, the list goes on and on. Part of what makes designing for the Web so frustrating, then, is that there is so little that the designer can directly control. There are an endless combination of browsers, browser versions, [...]
E-Books as a Blank Canvas