Little Asterisk

Hi mrdee, You're welcome. As for the new HTML 5 tags, like <header>, <nav> and <article>, you're right that they don't do much as in text formatting. They, however, add up to the semantic (i.e. valuable, I don't know how to explain differently) meaning of your website. For instance, <div class="header"> doesn't tell you much about it when you see it's counterpart (i.e. </div>), while <header> and </header> do explain that a little better. You can then simply style your CSS using selectors like this: header { display: block; color: #333333; -moz-box-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #e3e3e3; /* et cetera */ } If you'd like for these elements to be rendered correctly in older browsers (for instance, IE 7), you could use this script (link on Remy Sharp's blog, https://remysharp.com/2009/01/07/html5-enabling-script) which does the trick for you. Again, hope that clears things up a bit.

Can I see anywhere how much my posts are worth? (That is, not counting this one ).

Yeah, I suppose so... Didn't think about that from this perspective. However, I stand by my opinion that then we should find a use for these rep points. For instance, on the top of a topic there could be a notification that says something like "this and this posts got the most rep points", so we can know where to look for our answer in the entire topic. Otherwise, no one will use rep points.

Hi Mrdee, it's expected for the <video> tag not to work in Internet Explorer 8. Not that I know the exact specs, but Internet Explorer doesn't support most of the *new* HTML 5 and/or CSS 3 tags. I've checked your site in both Safari, Opera and Chrome, where everything seems to work just fine. That should mean, your script isn't wrong or anything right now. I wouldn't worry too much about the markup, since I don't expect for IE (before its 9th version, that is) to fully support all the new features. If, however, you'd like for all browsers to see your video, I suggest not using the HTML 5 tag, but rather JavaScript or YouTube embedding. (For a more understandable look, http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ has a nice video player embedded using JavaScript - look at the source code, and search for <script type="text/javascript">var s1 = new SWFobject ) The particular site is using JWPlayer, and you can find out more about it on https://www.jwplayer.com/about-jwplayer/. P.S. The skins for the video player you're using (HTML 5) look different in different (Opera, Safari, Chrome) browsers, if that's a problem. If you need anything else, ask! You already know I like to intrude and interrupt and a bunch of other things starting on "I".

I know, in the end it always depends on your own preference how you're going to call it. I, too, sometimes refer to a person as a "web designer", and sometimes as a web-developer.

Hi OpaQue, I have only one (or two ) questions for you now;1. Do the "reputation points" count when counting myCents? I suppose so, since they won't have a real value otherwise.2. Sorry, but I can't remember right now. I'll be sure to edit if I remember it.Thanks!

Okay, so now that the question of myCents is out of the way, I have a question for everyone who might know the answer (since this is an active topic, I suppose the quickest way to get my answer is by posting here, hope you don't mind):Why, oh why, can't I pick up the money I got from referrals on my Xisto account? It says there that eleven people clicked on the link, but still I can't see the button that would say "Take your money, you've earned it". Anyone have a clue why?Thanks for the answer in advance.

Oooooooh! (I'm saying that in Homer Simpson's voice )Not that I'm sad about the myCent system being back on (because, as you can see, I'm thrilled about it), but I was kinda hoping to be in the first five to make money from posting. :DWhy, guess it's back to work for me now, isn't that right? But again, great having the system back on so I can track the earnings. Congrats to web_designer.

OpaQue, since you've put the myCent system back on I'm going to offer you a plethora of PHP scripts that make a rotating banner: https://www.google.hr/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=random+banner+rotator Or someone has an iPhone or iPad, which doesn't support Flash (I hate Apple for that. I'd still like to use some of their products, though. Just not the iPhone).

As Bandias said, a web designer can also be a web developer. However, the fact still remains that a web developer is often considered the guy who does the back-end work. But; a web designer can also be only the guy who actually only *designed* the website.That is, Mister X designs the website in Photoshop (just an example), and then Mister Y and Mister Z do the front-end work. They then become not Front-end designers (or web designers), but front-end developers. :)And if then Mister XYZ and Mister ABC do the back-end work, then they become back-end developers.Finally, if one person does the entire thing than he becomes a web-designer/developer?! No, I don't think so.As you can see, there are many ways we could abstract the word web-designer or web-developer, but fact remains a DESIGNER should be called the person designing, and the DEVELOPER should be called the person developing (i.e., coding).For convenience sake, and for *normal* (that is, non-programmer) people to understand it easier, we often refer to people making websites as "web-designers". It's like calling "video-games" only "games". Because, games can be board games, card games, tequilla ga... (Oops, I probably shouldn't have said that )... The fact remains, we can often differentiate these types of games from the sole context (i.e., if I say "I just bought a great game for my computer", it's implied that it's a video/computer/PC game).Whoa! This text-essay just made me look a bit smart. I guess I'm just happy the myCent system is back on.

Wait, I got a message that says my account has been credited with no money, but the amount in the mail still says the right value. I suppose it's been updated then, but the only mistake was that the mail sent a wrong info?

Hi, Hate to interrupt (joking, of course I love to interrupt ), but Chrome and Firefox should render the Video element correctly. If they're not, that means something is wrong with your code. Now, I'm not too familiar with this element, but after a short search on Google I came to this assumption; your code is wrong. Again, I don't know that much about <video>, but here's what I can tell from your code: 1. Why is there a controls attribute empty? 2. Can you actually put an anchor tag in between a video element? (I mean, is it allowed?) 3. Try one of these solutions (okay, not actually a question, but rather an answer ): <video style="width:480px;height:270px" poster="media/bbb480.jpg" durationHint="4:44"><source src="media/bbb.flv"> <source src="media/bbb.ogv"/></video><!-- According to the site I'm about to mention, that way you can make a fallback for browsers that don't support Flash videos --> And the second one: <video height="270" width="480" src="media/bbb.ogv" poster="media/bbb.jpg" durationHint="0:4:44"></video><!-- This one is a skinnable video, but you get the deal. Just replace the source and other attributes as desired. --> These examples can be found at http://html5video.org/wiki/HTML5_Demos (the actual site being http://html5video.org/). (Offtopic: I suggest you take a look at the video they're using as a demonstration, it's killer and made totally in Blender! Reminds much of professional Pixar and similar work) If that doesn't work, you should check your CSS for some collisions between different selectors and elements. Perhaps the problem lies there. My final idea: do a blank page, with only the basic declarations and insert the video tag there (something like this): <!DOCTYPE html><html><head><title>Test</title><!-- You can set the meta tags for noindex here, if you'd like to --></head><body><!-- Replace these tags with one of the two solutions I've alreadymentioned. You can also try your old solution --><video style="width:480px;height:270px" poster="media/bbb480.jpg" durationHint="4:44"><source src="media/bbb.flv"> <source src="media/bbb.ogv"/></video></body></html> Hope some of my advice helps!

Hey OpaQue, I've just gotten a nice note from the site about the MyCent system being back on track. That's great, and even better if I'm not dreaming. You should post the news immediately, so everyone knows... Oops, I guess I've done that. Anyway, great to see that it's all been handled now (unless I'm dreaming ).

Yeah, that's what Oprah says, too. (Note: That's what my confidential source says. The "confidential source" is my girlfriend, but it sounds more official that way. ) Anyhow, we all know this problem exists for some time now, and I see no purpose in repeating the discussion again. What we have, is here - and we can only hope Opaque fixes it as fast as he can.

@OpaQue Thanks for the updates, I sure hope that we can have more members coming here in the future. It's great to see you're doing changes towards a better future on this forum. Here's just a couple of things I want to mention: The emphasis here was on the "why not hire someone to work this out". I know you have a lot of work now (as I've read through topics), and I understand that you don't want to let others to ruin the source code - but if you have at least someone who knows programming, and who you trust, why not give him part of the source code to mess with on another server - it'll reduce the complaints, take the pressure off of you and make the updates faster. I'd call it a win-win situation If you want to put less red, but still emphasize the "Getting started" links, I think it'd be a great idea to put a little box on top of the forums - like you see when you're posting (the nice little icon and "You can make xx more posts today"). You could switch the background color to a more "exclamation" one (not red-red, but some light shade of it. If not, the "normal" color would work, too). Make that "free website, forum". (Or, look at my proposal a few posts upwards) As I already said, it's great to see improvement, but it's not nice to see people leave from the forum because it's not complete - it takes the experience away both from us (the ones who stay - we can't talk, or write, to them) and them (the ones who leave - they don't get a website).

I see your logic, but I still don't like the fact there are so many subforums. Because that means that, when new people come to the site, they won't know where to start. If you look at the link from rob86 (https://forums.techguy.org/), you'll see what I mean by readability. And you can't say there aren't many people out there, when the oldest recent post I found was from 2nd July. Here, on the other hand, there are subforums (not subsubforums) that haven't been replied from 15th June. I hope you see my concern here.

Yeah, Nettuts is an excellent site and offers some great tutorials (unfortunately, I'm not getting any money for saying this ). Other sites that you might find interesting are all of them from the "Smashing network" (https://www.smashingmagazine.com/write-for-us/), I particulary like CSS-tricks (http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/). Man, would I be a rich guy if they gave me some money for posting this here... :DAnyhow, we're deeply offtopic now, so I won't ramble that much anymore.

@rpgsercherzYes, so basically if you add an element to the page you could use it. Don't take my word for it, though, since I'm not 100% on this one. You might have to add the element using some JavaScript (I think it could be done using createElement or createElementById - again, not 100%).For further reference, you could look at an great article over on NetTuts (https://code.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-make-all-browsers-render-html5-mark-up-correctly-even-ie6--net-8669). Recommended reading!

I must admit I'm not quite sure what you mean by "new additions", but here are my two best guesses #1 You mean new elements, such as <article>, <header> and <section> It's perfectly fine to use these selectors like you would normally do with HTML 4. For instance: article, aside { display: block; color: #e3e3e3; }section { display: block; color: #999; } Would display perfectly fine (i.e., <article> and <aside> elements would display block and have a color of #e3e3e3, while the <section> element would display block and have a color of #999). #2 You mean CSS 3 You can also use CSS 3 styling with no trouble whatsoever. For instance: article { text-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #999; background: -moz-linear-gradient(top, #eee, #999); } You could do the same with anything other CSS 3. (Sorry if the syntax for the linear gradient is wrong, although I believe it isn't). Hope that helps

@anwii Yes, the thing with myCents and forum/site relations was confusing at first for me, too. I sent a PM to OpaQue about putting that in the Start here subforum that has just opened. I also realise the forum has been upgraded to a newer version, but I believe that the old forum didn't appear before, either. (I was searching for "Free domain and hosting" and similar things even before, and I found out about this forum from another website, and then a quick search for Trap 17 directed me to another forum where I found out it's Xisto now )@mahesh2kI realise it's good for SEO, but still... I think we should not sacrifice readability and traffic on certain subforums just for the sake of SEO.

@rpgsearcherz By buying a "normal" HTML 4 book you can build websites without worrying about them not being compatible with browsers nowadays, since HTML 5 only enhances these *old* elements (from HTML 4) and adds some new stuff. I believe Xisto was built using HTML 4, and it turned out looking just fine - right? If you'd, however, want to use these HTML5-specific elements (like <canvas>, for instance), you should think about learning from a book or even on line (Nettuts - https://code.tutsplus.com/, for instance does have some tutorials about HTML5 from time to time). @bandias https://remysharp.com/2009/01/07/html5-enabling-script This is the answer to your prayers. You only need to use JavaScript's "createElementById" to make <article>, <header>, <aside> and similar elements working in old browsers, and set a CSS rule (I believe it was something like this: article, header, section, etc. { display: block; } And that does the trick for older browsers. However, using the link I presented above is much quicker and easier - it's a JavaScript file which enables these HTML 5 elements in old browsers.

Hi anwii, It's OK that we use the descriptions for SEO, but I still think they look somewhat ankward when compared to one another. Three to four lines of text should be just enough for these purposes, and the rest should concentrate about promoting the site for "Free hosting" searches. In my Google search (https://www.google.com/search?q=free+hosting&hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_HRHR294&prmd=l&ei=wp4tTJDlCcL5OZzCjdAB&start=10&sa=N) for free hosting, Xisto doesn't appear in the first two pages. And, in my opinion, that's one of the Forum's strongest points compared to other forums! Maybe I could call that one to the Flash site, too, but people seem to like it so I won't comment on that matter. While speaking of Google searches, a query for "Free website forum" (https://www.google.com/search?q=free+website+forum&hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_HRHR294&ei=UZ8tTP_AC5SVOIjdlIEC&start=10&sa=N), again, doesn't return Xisto in the first two pages. And, if you look at the source code of this site, the keywords (although Google claims not to care too much about that, I still find it a good practice) are this: [font=monospace][size=2]<meta name="keywords" content="knowledge, knowledge forums, open discussion, discussion forums, free website, free web hosting." /> [/size][/font] Which means we would concentrate first on "knowledge" and "open discussion", and only later on "Free website". Since this is a Forum, I don't think "discussion forums" is necessary. Here's an example of what I would do: [font=monospace][size=2]<meta name="keywords" content="free domain, free hosting, free website, Xisto, Xisto, forum, discussion" /> [/size][/font] And, if you look at the description, it looks like this: [font=monospace][size=2]<meta name="description" content="Xisto is your online destination to discuss & share knowledge to earn myCENTS and setup your own online website for FREE. KS is Open Discussion Forum showing no Ads to members and offers free website hosting to its members." /> [/size][/font] Wouldn't it be better if we, again concentrated on the fact this Forum offers free hosting? It says "earn myCents", but will new visitors really know what myCents are? The fact they say "Setup your website for FREE" makes me feel like the website will be something like ks.com/mySite, which shouldn't be good. I'm not sure what should the description be, so I won't write it yet. If I remember, I'll post it soon. And also - I'm not sure if that is already working - but we should put a big "New here? Read our getting started guide" for first-time visitors. That would be great. And we shouldn't write "Forum rules" or something like that because I personally think very few people read that. Let's face it - every forum asks for the same rules... Okay, maybe I've already discussed some of these remarks in my previous post, but it's good to repeat every now and then. Right? P.S. Did you notice I turned this post, from a couple of words about SEO, to an entire book?

Since this is my second post in these areas of Xisto, I would like to tell all my complaints here. There are only three currently, so you're lucky for being so good :DThe first two are almost irrelevant, so I'll just quickly post them:1. MyCents are inactive and no one knows when they'll come back. Sorry to say so, but that's unprofessional. I know Opaque is doing all the work alone, but why not hire someone to work this out, at least on a separate server if not here? My opinion is that, no matter how necessary were the changes, you shouldn't have switched until everything has been tested. Please, don't take the opinion as being too harsh, since I think most people here feel that way.2. Too few people are here... Or at least it seems that way. This complaint is indirectly related to my third complaint. Have you ever thought about advertising a bit more? You should clearly indicate you offer free domain name and hosting, and that the domain can be .com, .org, .net etc. My feeling is that this is not clearly emphasized, at least not from your Flash site (which I had complaints about in my previous topic) and this forum. Sure, there is a "Start here" link, but I just noticed it now - when I was searching for something like that. Also, the "Start here" link first says "Forum rules and guidelines". And then, after a few lines of some text, I noticed it says something in lines of "In return for posting, you get a free .com domain and hosting...". That sentence should be first after the title ("Getting started" might be suited), and clearly emphasized in size and color. I would also suggest making the "Start here" emphasized with smart use of color.The third complaint is, as my topic title says, too many subforums and forums over here. Do we really need that many things under "Life talk" and "Health and fitness? Do we really need that long descriptions? I also think that's what makes the forum look empty - too many topics with useful information, that no one looks at!Did you know there are two "Tutorials" sections (one for graphic, one for technology). Is that really necessary?!There is a "Gamers area" and a "Games" subforum. And that subforum contains 15 other subsubforums, which also have categories like "Counter strike", "Unreal tournament" and "Halo". I mean, what's the deal with THAT? I feel like there shouldn't be that many categories. Where to put Overlord? Is it an RTS or RPG (banal example, but you get my point).Also, are that many subforums and subsubforums about spirituality really needed over here? Why not have ONE?! Is having 8 subforums for education serving some higher purpose?! Because, quite frankly, I don't see it. Why use an "Arts" subforum under Life talk, when there is also a "Graphic" forum?I hope you understand my concerns and will try to fix them. It's sad to see a good forum ruined because of these little mistakes!

Hi again, deadmad. I really think it depends on the type of editing you do (it can't be exactly the same picture), but as long as you keep at least one element (so, I think there can be more elements from the original image) everything counts. Here are some sites you might find interesting, that talk about Photoshop/Layer tennis. I particularly like the second link, and if you scroll a bit you can see all the images that Jason Santa Maria and Darel Powazek made while playing. http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ http://v4.jasonsantamaria.com/articles/reflections-on-layer-tennis/ Once again, hope that helps and clears things up a little more

Well, deadmad, as I understood Photoshop tennis (from one of Jason Santa Maria's posts - jasonsantamaria.com/articles), you must edit the last "Photoshoped" file. In this case, that would be the rvalkass' picture. As for the rules, you should pick one interesting element from the picture and then edit it accordingly. For instance, it could be the background, or the summer beach ball, etc.Hope that clears things up