I found myself in a debate with a colleague the other day regarding file sizes for advertisement banners on a website. We are in the process of setting image size specifications for static advertisement banners to give to ad vendors who will be creating the final ads. Based on the width and height of the ads in question I proposed a conservative yet realistic file size of 20kb, just to keep sizes down where possible. I was met with some resistance, and an argument that went something like “with all the broadband connections out there, why would we not allow for 50kb so that we can get the best image quality?”. My view on this is actually the other way around. Why would you not optimize your website wherever possible? Why not force the smaller file sizes (which were well within reason to begin with) so that page load, file storage, bandwidth, etc. can all benefit, even if just a tiny bit, from the savings. It all adds up.

Let me use an example outside of the web to draw a comparison. When Mazda was redesigning their latest model of the Miata MX5 a few years ago, they were faced with a car that was going to be larger, with more safety features, and would represent a vast improvement from the previous model. However, with a small, great handling car like the MX5, weight is the enemy – and this car could have easily gained hundreds of pounds through the model change. Mazda tasked all of their engineers and designers to shave weight wherever they could. They saved a few grams off of redesigning the rear view mirror, for example. They did this with hundreds of components within the car. In the end the new model only ended up weighing 27 pounds more than the previous model. An amazing accomplishment considering what was involved to get it there.

So back to my point. 20 or 30kb here or there may not seem like much. But when you account for thousands of page loads and potentially hundreds of banners, it eventually all ads up (pun intended). We should always adhere to best practices, even if technology seems to grant us more leeway than we are used to having.

While each implementation has unique goals and intricacies, here are some common themes we see on a regular basis.

Expectation #1: A CMS should solve the most urgent business problem at hand without regard to specific department, person or function.

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More sites are lining up in their support of Google’s first move to drop Internet Explorer 6 from the internet. This past week saw notices from Salesforce.com, Atlassian, and even Facebook. Whether we credit Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 Campaign, or more savvy users, IE8 is currently the market share leader within the IE family. That being said, IE6 still equates to about 15% of global browser use (average of sources @ Wikipedia).

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I’m no stranger to eCommerce, I’m proud to say I am a regular contributor to this $129.8 billion industry. But it has always been on the consumer side.  Now I’m getting a whole new view into the online commerce world from the application side. There are so many eCommerce platforms to choose from and each one has something different, their own secret ingredient that sets it apart from the rest.

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Continued lack of Flash support on the iPhone OS means it's time for web creators to adjust.

The recent unveiling of the iPad brought one glaring truth to the attention to the web community: Apple does not like Adobe. That might be a bit simplistic, but the fact of the matter is that the iPhone OS has never supported Flash and in the public unveiling of their new “magical” uber internet device, still no Flash support. Of course, Apple is the leader in controlled computing experiences, so it makes sense they would avoid Adobe’s technology, especially since it compromises the security and stability of their devices.

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In the world of SEO, meta tags likely get more time on the debate stand than any other. You’ll hear from one SEO expert that Meta Data is critical to help the search engines in understanding what your page is about. You’ll hear from another that none of the engines pay attention to this anymore – it’s an archaic tag and shouldn’t be an area of focus.

This debate will undoubtedly continue, but in this post we’re hoping to clarify how best to use Meta Data on your site. Read the rest of this entry »