For those requiring a text version of the image, the breakdown reads thus:

2% – Time spent actually designing anything
35% – Time spent trying to get the layout to work using only CSS before giving up and using tables
8% – Swearing
2% – Time Spent making the site W3C compliant
43% – Time spent trying to get the bastard to work in Internet (expletive deleted) Explorer
5% – Time spent wishing a slow and painful death on Bill Gates plus more swearing
5% – Time spent looking for that one extra space in the Javascript that Firefox is throwing a wobbler over
JBVoices

My own breakdown would differ somewhat I have to say, partly on the grounds that I hate JavaScript with a vengeance, and I’m crap at writing it (as I’m sure my OU tutors would agree), and do not have the time or resources to check it’s accessible in all situations/combinations of browsers/assistive technologies, so it’s easier to avoid it and achieve the same effect using other methods (e.g. CSS). For me therefore I’d replace the JavaScript with PHP.

As Gill also said in her entry, being the stubborn cow that I am, I refuse to resort to tables, and will chip away with CSS until it damned-well works, and I have to say I must be doing something right, as under the skilled tutorage of Gill, Carol and Helena when I jumped in feet-first and launched myself from M$ Frontpage into “doing things properly”, I developed a fairly good grasp of CSS, and recently something’s obviously “clicked”, because I’ve been finding CSS layouts a lot less time consuming to initially put together (though that’s not to say that I don’t spend ages tweaking things here and there to accommodate horrible browsers and generally knock things into shape.

There are also a couple of differences in my method of working, and the stuff I end up lumbered doing, so without further ado (I obviously had far too much time on my hands that day!), here’s my very own version of “Time management and modern web design”…

And, again, the text version…

• 2% – Time spent actually designing anything
• 18% – time spent trying to get the layout to work
• 8% – swearing
• 12% – time spent making the site W3C/WAI compliant and checking accessibility
• 14% – time spent trying to get the bastard to work in Internet (expletive deleted) Explorer
• 6% – time spent wishing a slow and painful death on Bill Gates plus more swearing
• 5% – time spent looking for the semi-colon in the PHP the server’s throwing a wobbler over
• 6% – time spent staring blankly at the screen, waiting for inspiration to strike/wandering the web in search of inspiration
• 5% – deciding which colour scheming tool to use/deciding a colour scheme
• 1% – changing all the CSS for the new colour scheme I’ve just changed my mind over
• 5% – Searching for accessible/compliant [insert name of widget/feature here] script/searching for prior bookmarked script
• 4% – Trying to make sense of the client’s latest vague design request
• 5% – Searching for stock images to replace rubbish ones provided by client/to meet request, “Oh just put whatever you think there!”
• 4% – Time spent correcting appalling images supplied by client
• 2% – Time spent on phone beating client into submission over appalling design request
• 1% – Time spent deciding on suitable music for coding to (essential to the design process)
• 1% – Time spent wishing real life was more like “Hackers” and I zoomed around on roller skates
• 1% – Wishing I’d chosen something easier for a career…like brain surgery

Of course, hurling obscenities at the screen comes as an optional extra with all the categories, possibly with the exception of the talking to the client on the phone, as they tend to get a bit miffed if you start swearing at them…

…and of course like 67% of all statistics, these figures are dreamt up on the spot.

One of my favourites of these is a rather nifty PHP include menu which means you can use an include for your navigation list, but still have the current page highlighted in the site’s navigation, without needing extra markup like adding an ID to the ‘body’ element. I can’t accept the credit for this one because it’s not something I coded, but I’ve been using it for so long now that I can’t remember where I first found it.

All you need is two bits for the navigation; your unordered list for your navigation, which of course you can style in any way you so desire using CSS, and a tiny little PHP snippet. First you’ve got your unordered list (I save mine as ‘menu.html’):

</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="mylink1.php">Link 1</a></li>
<li><a href="mylink2.php">Link 2</a></li>
<li><a href="mylink3.php">Link 3</a></li>
<li><a href="mylink4.php">Link 4</a></li>
<li><a href="mylink5.php">Link 5</a></li>
</ul>
<p> 

<br />
 < ?php<br />
 $menu = file_get_contents("menu.html");<br />
 $menu = preg_replace("|
<li><a href=\"" . basename($_SERVER['PHP_SELF']) . "\">(.*)]+>|U", "
<li class=\"current\">$1</li>
<p>", $menu);<br />
 echo $menu;<br />
 ?><br />
 

Just place the PHP snippet within your page wherever you want to display your menu.

What does it do? It simply uses ‘preg_replace’ to take your menu, find the link to the current page (basename($_SERVER['PHP_SELF'])), and then remove the ‘a’ tags to remove the clickability for the current page (visitors don’t need to click it because they’re already there), and give the ‘li’ tag a class (’current’) and print out the menu on the page. Of course then you can style the ‘current’ class in whatever way you choose with CSS. Though the same thing can be done using the cascade and CSS, that involves using extra markup (adding an ‘id’ to the body and list (’li’) elements), and of course you have to remember to change the body ‘id’ for each page, and adding extra markup to the HTML and CSS seems a lot more cumbersome than this nifty little PHP snippet that does the job without any extra effort on your part. That’s the sort of code I like!

When my pressure’s high I have these weird kind of absences where I’m aware of what’s going on around me, but it doesn’t make much sense to me, and I have trouble responding to things. The first time it happened not long after I was diagnosed with IIH my mum thought I’d had a stroke or something. It’s so frustrating because it’s as though something else takes over my body, something I don’t have any control over.

The OU course I’m doing at the moment, it’s a level 1 course for christ’s sake! I should be able to do it standing on my head, and the first couple of assignments I got marks in the 90’s. Come the third assignment though, the programming one, and everything I ever knew goes out of my head. My brain’s like this tiny little walnut rattling around in my head. Okay, I hate javascript with a vengeance, and I very rarely use it, mainly due to the accessibility problems with it, but having done javascript before I should know this stuff – it’s basic ‘while’ and ‘for’ loops. Throw in a few conditionals and the job’s a good one, but my brain just isn’t making the connections. Too many bad pings.

I’ve never really fully got to grips with javascript, I’m much more at home with PHP, and with javascript even after the previous javascript courses I’ve done, though I knew enough to know what it was doing when I saw it, I’ve always struggled actually writing it myself. This isn’t even complicated stuff though, and it’s so damned frustrating because at times I feel I’m nearly there and it almost comes, but I just can’t get the final pieces of the puzzle together and actually get the program working. I don’t think I’m a natural programmer. I haven’t got the patience for bug hunting, and my code tends to be more of a ramshackle Heath Robinson kind of affair rather than the “elegant code” that real programmers talk about.

I’m giving this assignment one more try tonight though in the hope that something will connect, for tomorrow it’s back to designing, and the day begins with a load of Photoshopping to try and rescue some half decent photos from a load of complete rubbish I’ve been sent for a site.

Like they say; tomorrow’s another day.