Wednesday, 2nd April 2008
What’s New in Edge Rails: Easier Timezones (via) Time zones can be a nightmare to get right—if this works well it’s going to make a lot of people’s lives a whole bunch easier.
Python-by-example. “This guide aims to show examples of use of all Python Library Reference functions, methods and classes”, thus addressing my number one complaint about Python’s standard library documentation.
OpenID and Spam. Matt Mullenweg: “OpenID has a ton of promise for the web—let’s not hurt it by setting people up for disappointment by telling them it’s a spam blocker when it’s not.” True for the case of general registration, but I still believe whitelisting known OpenIDs could be a powerful tool for fighting spam on personal sites.
CSS Compatibility and Internet Explorer (via) Official Microsoft guide to which CSS properties are supported by which versions of IE. This is the kind of documentation browser vendors should be providing as a matter of course.
Firefox 3’s password remembering. I’m loving Firefox 3, and the way it does password remembering (with a non-modal toolbar so you can tell if your password worked before deciding to save it) is just one of the major improvements. Opera gets this right as well.
The ISO are now calling a "standard" the Microsoft Office format [...] What is interesting is that TeX, LaTeX, OGG/Vorbis, OGG/Theora, Perl, Python, PHP, Ruby, OCaml, are not standardized by any organization. [...] This shows that standardization organizations are no longer relevant in the software field. What really matters is free full documentation, free full implementation source code, and of course the absence of any patent risk. [...] In other words, what matters is evidence that any independent third-party can create and distribute a fully-conforming implementation.
London Connections. Marvellously obsessive blog about the vagaries of London transport, including some really nice custom created maps. I love detailed maps of tube stations; anyone know a good place to find them?