Sunday, October 28, 2007

What is the purpose of this blog?

The main purpose is to share what I learn about varying elements of web development and possibly some programming or maybe script programming. Writing about what I learn helps me to think through the intricacies more deeply and fully grasp that which I recently read.

During the last several years, I've been studying a Computer Information Management curriculum that recently brought me to Visual Basic 6.0. The course instructor is quick to admit that Visual Basic is not a hugely powerful programming language, but is being taught first as it is easier to learn and will build a solid foundation and strong habits for learning more complex programming languages.

As I delve further into the basics of Visual Basic - no pun intended -, I am starting to see a lot of applications for it. I love how the book explains each step in extremely basic steps. The fluidity of the examples and lessons is unsurpassed, as it offers a meaningful approach. I'm at work, or I'd give kudos to the title and author of the course, which currently escapes me.

I'll certainly keep everyone up-to-date with my progress and share some examples of what I've mastered. Please feel free to share yours.

What does the blog title "mean"?

I pondered changing the title of this blog today to eliminate the word "partial", however, I find it fitting after some thought. Normally, one would see "Your perception is my reality" or some mix thereof. I disagree with this, in that, as I'm suggesting this: What you perceive is another individuals' reality or is it? What you see may only be part of the truth, all of it, or none of it. With this said, there is no logical basis to calculate the validity of one's perception over that of an individual standing, say, across the street that you have never met.

So, as we can see, there are many variables to determine the reality of another. My reality is an assessment of that which I think I know. Since there really isn't a method to give absolutes to an assessment without actually engaging the subject, then there is no surety to be had. One can only surmise by the factors surrounding the object in question as to what is really happening or what attributes appear to affect it by such reality we have learned based on our own bias.

With significant certainty, we can now implicate the term "partial" into our objective hypothesis by stating "Perception *is* partial reality" given it "fits" what we can say we know, but may not necessarily know.

Now here is a question for you: What do you think the title "Perception is partial reality" means, or more precisely, what does it mean to you?

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Nesting and Centering div elements

Designers struggle frequently with proper nesting and centering of div elements. I've found, from reading many sources, the best way to take control of your elements is to surround them completely with a div container.

Div containers can be centered and manipulated just about anyway you see fit. Once the "container" is established, one can have seemingly perfect control of design - whether location of internally nested divs, centering, colors, the list goes on.

I've written about centering before. Recently, for whatever reason, I've had much better success with using this style for centering: margin: 0 auto (this means to make the margin equal 0 on the top and bottom and for the sides (left/right) to be auto aligned. Keeping in mind the clockwise approach to remembering single-line declarations, so the above style can also be written as margin: 0 auto 0 auto, more clearly, margin: W X Y Z, where W=top, X=right-side, Y=bottom, and Z=left-side.