Finally! - Email Standards Project

Email Standards Project: "The Email Standards Project works with email client developers and the design community to improve web standards support and accessibility in email."

I'm very happy to see an organized attempt to address the issue of poor and inconsistent industry-wide support for rich email (html email). The Email Standards Project looks like the bandwagon to jump on. The site has a great chart right on the homepage showing popular email clients (desktop and web-based) and their rating in terms of standards support. The project has come up with an "acid test", much like the Web Standards Project, that is used to fairly and consistently test the ability of a given email client.

Check out the site, join the email list or spread the word.

Vitamin: "Creating Sexy Stylesheets"

Vitamin Features - Creating Sexy Stylesheets : "Being a CSS expert is more than just memorizing selectors. It’s also working to improve the maintainability and efficiency of your stylesheets, planning for the future and mastering your workflow. In this article Jina Bolton gives 10 CSS tips culled from surveys with 12 top designers."

This article summarizes common best practices and also introduces some handy tips and tricks for things you can do to optimize the CSS workflow for multiple contributors. Bottom line is keep it clean and think ahead to what it will be like to have to open up your CSS file 6 months later - 'what was that selector named again?...'

Four Paths to Mobile Web Design and Deployment

Here's a handy article...

creativepro.com : "In this excerpt, well-known -- and better yet, well-respected -- Web designer Cameron Moll explains four ways to design and deliver standards-compliant content for mobile devices:Do nothing with your current Web siteReduce its images and stylingUse handheld style sheetsCreate mobile-optimized contentCameron lays out the pros and cons of each method and includes real-life examples of how content from sites following each of these methods displays."

Project Seven Announces CSS Layout Magic

PVII CSS Layout Magic: "Whether you are a CSS novice or a seasoned pro, CSS Layout Magic is an indispensible addition to your developer toolkit — instantly providing you with a rock-solid and standards-based foundation for your CSS-based projects and allowing you to focus more energy on your site's content and style than on its underlying structure."

Interested in how this compares to the template selection built into Dreamweaver...

70 Expert Ideas For Better CSS Coding

via digg: "Smashing Magazine does it again with a superb list of little CSS tips & tricks to increase your productivity."

This is an excellent compilation of many of the tips and tricks posted to digg, but all rolled up in a nicely organized package with plenty of source-links to expand on the techniques outlined. There's definitely a buzz around what's to be considered "Best Practices" when it comes to CSS design and development. I see a strong opportunity out there for the development of a tool or app that puts a ui on top of these practices, making it easier to replicate across multiple projects.

read more | digg story

Panic Releases Coda "One-Window Web Development for Mac OS X"

Panic.com: "So, we code web sites by hand. And one day, it hit us: our web workflow was wonky. We’d have our text editor open, with Transmit open to save files to the server. We’d be previewing in Safari, running queries in Terminal, using a CSS editor, and reading references on the web. “This could be easier,” we realized. “And much cooler.”

When Panic releases an app, it's usually just perfect for the subset of users that they choose to target. So Coda has definitely caught my attention. I've only played with the trial a few moments and can say that it looks pretty interesting, especially if you don't already have Panic Transmit and/or CSSEdit. With CSS editing properties still squished in a small floater within Dreamweaver, this could be an actual threat for those more into hand-coding. As always it's beautifully Mac-like and the visual bookmarks are a sweet touch.

Here's a more in-depth review by MacApper.

Adobe CS3 Official Launch

Here's a round-up of some other interesting coverage and details:

• AppleBlog coverage
• digg.com coverage
• Apple.com special feature
• creativepro.com: What's New in Adobe Creative Suite 3
• CNET coverage

Adobe Releases Beta Version of Photoshop CS3 & CSS Advisor

"Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) will introduce a beta version of Adobe® Photoshop® CS3 software, the next release of the world standard in digital imaging, on Friday, December 15th. Adobe is delivering a widely available Photoshop CS3 beta to enable customers to more easily transition to the latest hardware platforms, particularly Apple's new Intel-based systems. The beta is available as a Universal Binary for the Macintosh platform, as well as for Microsoft® Windows® XP and Windows Vista computers. The final shipping release of Adobe Photoshop CS3 is planned for Spring 2007. The software can be downloaded at: http://labs.adobe.com , in the early hours Pacific Standard Time on December 15."

Check out this article, it suggests that you'll need a CS2/CS serial number to use the beta. Also, there's a note about a CSS forum for designers to reference, see www.adobe.com/go/cssadvisor.

UPDATE: Here's a cool sneak peak video:

The Best (FireFox) Browser Extensions for Web Development

This article summarizes things well IMHO. Glad, and not surprised, to see the Web Developer extension as number one on the list. Thanks to mondaybynoon.com for compiling this list! (via Vitamin)