[thelist] owed tips (hey, 3 free tips!)

[aardvark]

i owe these for posting those list admin thingies to thelist yesterday, and then
apologizing with no <tip>, which makes me down three <tip>s...  so the
countdown to freedom begins...


<tip type="testing">
Testing across multiple browsers is almost always a good idea.  BUt how
often do you test across multiple configurations?  It may seem silly, but there
are people out there who surf without images, without plug-ins, without
JavaScript enabled, in oddly sized windows, with their own custom CSS files,
or even with a dozen toolbars and their chrome size set to huge.

It is important to at least test your first and second target browsers in all sorts
of configurations.  It's entirely possible you'll run across more users of IE5.5
with JS disabled than you will run across all NN4.x users combined,
depending on the site.
</tip>


<tip type="Photoshop">
Trying to make images tile well, but getting really frustrated?  There are a
number of options at your disposal.

First, simply trying mirroring the image.  This is especially good with images
that will only tile in one direction.

If that doesn't work, use the Offset filter in Photoshop, and a few minutes with
the clone, smudge, and paintbrush tools to blend the edges together.

And if that's taking too long, consider not tiling at all, but perhaps fading out to
a solid color with a graident fill, allowing you to use a background color (of a
cell or <div>) to continue in place of a tile.
</tip>


<tip type="shameless plug">
Always wondered about the current evolt.org use of HTML and CSS, even
though it's been well over a year?  Well, read up on it:

Inside the evolt.org Rebuild: The HTML and CSS
http://evolt.org/article/tip/20/5816/

But wait -- you want to know more?  Cool, we got that covered, too.  Like
maybe how we addressed the usability and interface issues from the first
design, and how we've constantly refined the site:

Usability: The Site Speaks for Itself
http://amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1904151035/evoltorg02-20
ISBN: 1904151035

And yes, that referrer ID at the end kicks back to evolt.org, which is
something you should all do very often.  Want to know how?

Help Support evolt.org
http://evolt.org/help_support_evolt/
</tip>