Paul Randall » thoughts

The Constant Redesigner

Paul — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 13:42:50 +0000

This site has, it seems always remained in a state of flux. In it’s current ‘version 3′ guise I have never been 100% happy with it.

The many redesigns are usually due to me getting bored with the site. My skills and design knowledge have improved and a personal brand redesign along the way have changed the look also.

Part of the problem comes with a lack of purpose for the site. Although a designer I don’t have much of a portfolio on the website – mainly because I am currently in full-time employment and do not show any work I do during office hours. The site also isn’t a promotional tool either so it only exists to be a place to blog and host experiments.

So I again rethink the purpose of the site, and after recent analysis reports being constructed by @RobHawkes I have been rethinking what I want to do with the site:

Publish experiments
Indepth research
Front-end focused
Collate social profile (last.fm, twitter, dribbble, delicious)
Frequent blogging

This will no doubt come with a new website design, and i’m also thinking about moving from Wordpress to a custom CMS. Along with all the hacking i’ve heard about recently to Wordpress blogs I have always had a keen interest in optimisation and speed.

Watch this space.

Language Agnostic Programming

Paul — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 11:42:42 +0000

Having coded in many languages, and recently when using MooTools instead of jQuery, i’ve come to realise that most actual programming is pretty language agnostic. What I mean is that most languages do the same thing, just very differently, but it is how you contruct your code that makes you a good programmer

Chances are, if you are good at jQuery you will be pretty good at MooTools (after learning the new declarations etc). The same goes for in a larger extent SQL/MySQL/Oracle or ASP/PHP/Ruby etc.

This stems from when I was at college and we would write psuedo-code, programming without any actually code. Something like this:

if number is greater than or equal to 10 then write "congratulations, you are a winner!"

Now this very basic bit of programming isn’t very complex, but when building up larger bits of code, the skill comes in how you construct your code, not what language you write it in.

note: I am still a huge fan of jQuery, but MooTools does look pretty awesome as well. Perhaps I’ll write my own little comparison once I’ve used it a bit more.

On ‘Magpie Designers’

Paul — Wed, 26 May 2010 21:36:21 +0000

In an ever-changing web world, new technologies are constantly evolving. With the emergence of alternative font display systems, new CSS effects and the increased uptake on modern browsers, designers are using these new techniques more and more. Add this to a sprinkling of current design ‘trends’ such as the noise filter, and pixel perfect line details and it makes for some very similar looking websites.

It is inevitable then that these new and shiny capabilities will catch a web designer’s eye (especially after years of browser constraints) but are we turning our eagerness to use the latest styling techniques into a world of monotonous and similar designs?

A Screenshot Showing Some Modern Design Trends

It’s worth saying that there are some great sites being produced at the minute. Something I hope to write about in a future post.

I’m a Magpie Designer Too!

This post isn’t without a sense of irony, i’m all too well aware of as this site features many of the effects i’m talking about. I’m clearly a magpie designer too!

In a years time things will probably calm down when “the next thing” arrives, whatever it is.

Should The Grid Be Visible?

Paul — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 22:06:47 +0000

A couple of recent designs have left me wondering whether we should be ’showing our workings’ and display the grid at all, whether subtlety like Jina Bolton’s Sushi & Robots or something more elaborate, like Analog (note: press Alt+G).

Once visible, the precision of the grid acts as evidence of design credibility, and its purity of form has a mystical draw.

A Brief History of Grids, Lucienne Roberts http://www.graphics.com/modules.php?name=Sections&op=viewarticle&artid=620

Having a visible grid is certainly not new; Here you can see the Vormgevers exhibition poster in 1968 by Wim Crouwel.

I’m certainly not going to say if the grid should be visible or not, but I’d love to hear your thoughts or opinions on the topic, or just to add a link to a site where you have seen a visible grid used well.

Why Comment?

Paul — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 19:49:10 +0000

A subject that has created a bit of discussion recently has been to do with comments. With Tim Van Damme removing them completely with the latest design of maxvoltar.com and Sam Brown blogging about the subject just last week I thought I’d reply to a question I was asked last week.

Leaving comments to me just shows my appreciation to the writer. It’s not for linking reasons, or to get my name out there, but I feel it’s a way of thanking the writer or expressing an opinion I have on the subject. Most of us write blog posts in our spare time, and I know personally that I enjoy it when someone leaves a comment. It shows that it interested them, or provoked a response; good or bad. I find that the narrative of comments almost always positively extends the actual article, and if it doesn’t then it usually leads to a healthy debate.

We all read blog posts, possibly hundreds in a week, but how many do you actually comment on? Next time take a minute to leave a comment.