Creating an eBook with ePub This is a first round overview of the ePub format used for digital books, which I’m finding is needed more and more in my freelance work. I’ll go over both…

• Professional, Functional Timesheets in iWork Although most of us use electronic time keeping, there are still times when an easy, quality spreadsheet can fill a quick emergency or an immediate need. I’ve found most of…
• Buying a Piano: Digital vs Acoustic Buying your first piano is a monumental achievement; in many ways, a validation that you’re dedicated to the world of music for recreation or for profession. Nowadays, the choices between…
• Thank you, East Bay Mac User Group! Thank you to everyone at East Bay Mac User Group taking time out of your busy schedules to share your thoughts, and work together to learn web development! It’s always…
• Eregi deprecation for PHP 5.3 in CubeCart Older versions of Cube Cart heavily used the erge family of functions. Luckily, the fix is using the new preg family, and a bit of light code changes. Head on…
• XML error for WordPress iPhone I was attempting to add my blog, and my various corporate blogs, to the recent WordPress iPhone Application but kept getting the following error: “XML-RPC Service for you blog cannot…
• The Cove Douglas Hahn writes: “Billed as ‘an intelligent action/adventure/Ocean’s-Eleven-like horror film wrapped around a tale of redemption and ultimate revenge,’ The Cove is a documentary that follows an elite reconissance team…
• Thrillist.com jumps shark Thrillist is a modern, hip (cough, trendy) website that often features some of the most entertaining new events & eatery in your city… especially when someone pays them to tell…
• Legal Judgment on Randy Vo Most of you have followed along through this website, as well as the main site, regarding our legal, financial, and emotional troubles dealing with the Pet Broker Randy Vo. Due…
• Pursuit of Equality As Art Director for Bently Reserve, I was asked to manage, direct, and design the Advertising and Marketing for the upcoming event Pursuit of Equality. Aside from a Branding Identity,…
• Archstone, round 2 Recent issues aside, Archstone has offered us a new place to live… albeit not without some stress. As I wrote prior, our upcoming move was delayed by the existing tenant…
• And there goes our apartment Recently, we’ve been extremely excited about our upcoming move to the Archstone South Market ; a stone’s throw from the museum of modern art and Yuerba Buena Gardens. Apparently, it…
• Cloak Update: I’ve passed the torch to Jonny at his wonderful WordPress CMS site. He’s going to keep an eye on this, head over there for the new work! Building off…
• Hanzo's doing well Although we have not heard from Randy Vo since last week (when he was still trying to come up with a small payment), Hanzo has been doing fantastic. He’s running…
• Sequential Numbering in BBEdit BBEdit’s grep replacement feature is not as robust as most; most people get smart and learn perl or another language with a deeper definition of features, but I don’t have…
• Facebook Gangsta Worth linking, though I feel a little dirty posting this video in my blog. Humorous for the first 30 seconds, then I have to admit, way too long to be…
• Microsoft: You are in a helicopter Neil Bishop, IT man at BPB, emailed me this entertaining tidbit today: A helicopter was flying around above Seattle when an electrical malfunction disabled all of the aircraft’s electronic navigation…
• Talking with Randy Vo The saga continues with the broker who sold us our dog; it’s come to an interesting point where I’m unsure that we can mediate a solution, though I’ve tried over…
• Randy Vo I talked one more time yesterday morning (while in Chicago) with Randy Vo. He had told me last Wednesday that he would be getting the money to reimburse us for…
• Parkmerced I’ve been digging around the Bay Area looking for a new apartment, and we continue to see the marketing ads for Parkmerced, so it was worth doing an online search.…
• First-line and letter for all browsers Safari allows full support of the first-line and the first-letter CSS request, but Firefox 2 and under only shows partial support. Case example: the containing div of this post is…
• Disable wpautop My apologies for the feed reflux, but fed up with wordpress’ auto correct functionality, I turned it off in my posts via disable wpautop plugin. No longer paragraphs in the…
• Hanzõ Day One It was a long night with a spunky puppy; I'm slightly scared for my life with the next six months looking forward to staying at home babysitting and not being able to spend time with Sheryl... but he's cute, and he's here to stay...
• Welcome home, Hanzõ Yesterday evening Sheryl joined me for a spring trunk show of Amber Marie Bently’s new line of Jewelry at the W Hotel in San Francisco. As the evening ran down,…
• Awarding the web through negative reinforcement Would you accept a compliment about your hair, from a stylist with horrible hair? If a mechanic said your car was junk, would you take them serious if their own…
• Ads are now on YouTube Videos Well, it was bound to happen, the question was less when so much as it was how, and it’s an interesting addition I’d say uses inventive techniques. Case in point-…
• Grandview park: 360° of San Francisco On April 19th, 2008, the pacific coastal winds burrowed through the avenues of San Francisco and up the hillsides peaked with houses. Very few people seemed out on the town, and the ones who braved the gusts held close to personal items darting abruptly against...
• Microsoft Vista SP1 Video: 80's humor, today! I lost a part of myself this morning I’ll never get back, thanks to this Microsoft Vista internal pitch:
• Randomizing Post Data in WordPress 2.5 I recently updated a client’s business website to WordPress 2.5, and noticed the dated rand_posts trick failed me. Further investigation noted that WordPress had completely changed it’s table schema from…
• the RedPost: Custom Signs for the Bently Reserve Eric Kanagy of the RedPost Inc. recently posted my sign Designs at the Bently Reserve, and I wanted to explain them a bit more to the world. I’ll go more…
• It's Tops: Best Diner in San Francisco San Francisco, like most major cities, is a town built on a melting pot of cuisine. No where else can you find fresh sushi next door to a bistro serving the in season best of the Sonoma valley- but they can't make a pizza, and breakfast tastes like a salad...
• Microsoft Sends Letter to Yahoo! Board of Directors Microsoft sends an aggressive, and somehow sour, message to Yahoo! Board of Directors. I can’t help but giggle at the tone of professionally whining in this letter- like the big…
• 960 Grid System Working hard to streamline web design, Nathan Smith created the 960 Grid System: a series of electronic templates and web code to help designers create advanced sites based off the…
• Bless you, New York Hot on the tails of an upcoming moving, New York hits us with a quality poster mark. George Clooney’s a good actor, but you can’t help but giggle at the…
• How to find and replace in MySQL PHPmyAdmin Just because someone asked, here’s a quick way to find and replace content in MySQL using PHPmyAdmin. This technique works the same command line, and it’s possible it works similar…
• Why even advertise, MSN? Todd Bishop asks Why are these ads for MSN, not Windows Live – I’m wondering why they’d even advertise. Google gets to write snart billboards if they so choose seeing…
• The $1000 font Keeping things business as usual, LetterHead Fonts was nice enough to post about the subsequent bittorent of the their LHF Garner, a classic sign font akin to the Larabie Blue…
• Expelled from Expelled Ben Stein’s scientific review of creationism in film format offered a private screening to those who reserved a seat. Apparently, however, that didn’t include Dr. Myers, regardless of his reservation…
• Robot Chicken: Gummy Bear Trap, unedited Absolutely hilarious video by Robot Chicken – I laughed so hard I just had to convert it for youtube enjoyment: Update: Aww, deleted, thanks YouTube.
• Great Scenes from TV and Film, Told Using Only Typography (and Sound) Always Watching posts an article from David Chen with an excellent collage of Great Scenes from TV and Film, Told Using Only Typography (and Sound). Enjoy it!
• Methane detected on exoplanet Space Today reports that methane has been detected in the atmosphere of an extrasolar planet; the first organic molecule discovered on a planet outside of our solar system.
• Lost Boys 2 Thank god someone thought to bring a sequel to the Lost Boys. This looks like stellar work.
• Millions of Bees Released on Sacramento A truckload of bees close highway 99 ramp at Florin Road in Sac-town.
• Laser Engraved Powerbook Very cool laser engraved powerbook.
• I went skydiving I get to knock another event off my list, as Sheryl treated me to skydiving for my birthday. Brady’s Jump Sheryl’s Jump
• How to defend yourself from a Terminator Wired News keeps the world safe again with an indepth article on how to Terminate a Terminator. Very thorough and worth the entertainment in your free time.
• Boobs and Dinks Early Detection Kit Cool Hunting offers a helpful application to train yourself in cancer examinations called boobs and dinks.
• Windows 7 Microsoft announces Windows 7 as confirmed for launching via 2010. That’ll happen, just like vista was supposed to launch in 2005. I look forward to seeing it happen.
• Pi Day Happy Pi Day to the world!
• Permitting Time Travel A dated, but interesting article debunking the traditional vision of time travel. Simply put, the back to the future method of adjusting history seems improbable; traveling back in time is…
• Is it time to Globalize time? Mike Elgan makes the case for Globalizing Time, and I’m all for it. I could care what the sun looks like compared to the time of day, I’d love for…
• Do the test Keeping himself busy at freelance work, Douglas Hahn discovered this great cyclist advertisement. Can you follow along?
• Product Announcement: New Sins! Good morning! We’re proud to announce new forms of Social Sin! That’s right, not only do we include previous sins, but we now offer brand new ecological sins as forms…
• Apple Porn I’d have to say I assumed Apple would take the lock down route regarding their most recent SDK release, but I have to admit I was also shocked to hear…
• Apple's Design Process An interesting overview of Apple’s Design Process from a senior engineering manager at apple. Interesting as a designer is the Pixel Perfect Mockup, though I imagine they still go through…
• The 8 least funny comic strips I loved garfield as a kid, but hey, he nailed the other ones. Read the 8 least funny comic strips.
• White Killer Whale Scientists spotted a white killer whale off the Alaska coast.
• Hexapus I’ve never heard of a six legged octopus (it would, in fact, be a bit off in naming alone), but it was recently discovered in England’s Blackpool Sea Life Centre.…
• New beginnings Dotfive needed to end. Although I have a back log of clientele both within San Francisco and the Chicagoland Area, the challenge of design has become a mundane set of…
• Safari developer 90% of the way to Acid 3 Test validation Dave hyatt blogged recently that although safari 3 was finishing with a decent 39/100, their developer version has now surpassed the 90/100 point with some hard development time. Dave notes:…
• Microsoft releases the first IE8 Beta Microsoft is releasing it’s first public beta of IE 8 today. It should be interesting to see what bug fixes are in store for developers, and what new bugs we’ll…
• Flash is a joke Thanks Uncle Steve, for telling the rest of the world what professionals in this industry have known for a while… flash is a joke. A cute inside joke where inexperienced…
• Anorexic dork in the Rhapsody Commercial Am I the only person who hates this rhapsody commercial? The songs decent for pop tart, but this anorexic 20 something pops out of the shower, walks up to the…
• Refund for Airborne? Airborne is the product of choice for most folks leery of public transportation, flying just about anywhere, or looking for a vitamin shot to curb oncoming illness. Well, atleast it…
• Wired news: Babies see in pure color Douglas Hahn, of Sink Review, found this interesting article on the perception variations of color between Babies and Adults. While adults translate color information, for the most part, in the…
• Acid3 Today it’s announced the new Acid3 compatibility tests for modern web browsers. The goal, defined by their press release, is: The Acid3 Test is designed to test specifications for Web…
• Microsoft Online gets rolling CNET is pitching Microsoft’s online system adds some big names, but I feel underwhelmed by the idea of Microsoft doing anything big in regards to the world wide web. My…
• The new $5 A unique flash application that showcases the new $5 bill, including a history of the bill design dating back to 1861.
• Xtreme Pug Skydiving Nice video on YouTube showing off a tandem skydive with a man and his pug. Poor pug.
• Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins Looks like there WILL be another terminator; the one everyone has been clamoring to see, the battle for humanity. Although there’s no talk of Arnold featured in this version, Christian…
• Comcast admits paying attendees at FCC hearing Comcast, a company well known for it’s deep pockets and increasingly coming under fire for internet reactionary response, recently admitted to hiring attendees to an FCC hearing: Comcast Corp. admitted…
• CNET: Google expands free phone and voicemail CNET notes: Google is partnering with homeless shelters in San Francisco to distribute free phone numbers and voicemail accounts to those without homes, the company said Wednesday.
• Region-free gaming for the wii Beautiful region-free adaptation without hardware modding from Wii News.
• YouTube spoof on Fox News Fantastic little video spoof of fox news and it’s single minded agenda. Reminds me of an oldie but a goodie!
• California furniture linked to birth defects? Courtesy of Green Daily, I learn something new about Birth Defects and Cancer in California.
• Install PHP, MySQL, & Subversion on OS X Tiger Server Mac OS X strives to better itself than most in application and operating system simplicity. Updating some of the more basic management systems for OS X server can still boast…
• LogoMaid rips off their logo designs In the interest of the discussion: “Art is a lie that makes us realize truth.” -Pablo Picasso …or any other quote that justifies the theft of experienced design, LogoMaid has…
• WordPress – designing without style Joe Trotter discusses his distaste for default wordpress designs and laments on the cookie cutter appeal wordpress has on it’s average users. Most will agree that the default themes suit…
• Increase your traffic with Publications Lately, we’ve learned to love the search results for Technorati. Where Google typically indexes news and general sites, Technorati uses technology to spider blogs and independent news sites with nearly…
• Out to Lunch says accessibility is in ‘no way possible’ Recently I’ve posted comments on Out to Lunch’s remark against accessibility on the web who notes when debating how to code for the blind: I see it in no way…
• Falkner Winery rips off Cork’d Or maybe it was design inspiration. Nevertheless, Falkner winery has taken the disgusting tactic of removing said complaints from their blog, without apology or otherwise. I’m thinking of making a…
• “Get your Blog on…” I spoke recently on dotfive about our experience at the new Wordcamp – openly I am not a blogger by trade… it’s simply a tool for our design and development,…
• Semantic Code for CubeCart CubeCart is one of many standards-compliant shopping cart systems at the forefront of the new internet. Its focus is on pursuing an entry level store system for the average to…
• Upgrade to PHP 5 on a Media Temple (dv) Dedicated Virtual Server For those of you frustrated on your aged PHP for Media Temple DV, they’ve recently released a step-by-step rpm install for PHP 5 on your server. While this worked in…
• Roman Cart says that dynamic code is bad? From the Roman Cart site: We strongly recommend that you create your website using html, and not a server side language such as php or asp. The reason for this…
• Stifling Design with Creative Management There is a sincere divide between managing the talents of your artists and guiding the talents of your artists; each industry falters in it’s own special way, and each industry…
• WordCamp 2006 Matt Mullenweg, founder and leader of the renowned blogging tool WordPress, kicked off the first annual WordCamp celebration this year, featuring a day of events catered to the new WordPress…
• Web 101 Web development, as we’ve discussed many times, is a varying hodgepodge of misinformation coupled with varying experts; many of them are geniuses and fantastic leaders of this industry, although at…
• The web is not print: helping a client in the transition Every web designer finds himself grounded by the volumes of theory, recommendations, and standards when they first step into this industry. It can be a little more than intimidating when…
• Steve Bojesen, thank you When I was near 16 years of age, I had the dumbfounded luck to be hired on as a production artist in training for American Outfitters; gifting me a chance…
• Typography for the Web, a client overview Often times we’re asked about unusual bugs that transfer from content typed at the office into our the beautiful content management system we designed for our clients. Those of you…
• Print Production: Color for print, color for web – 1 of 3 Color Science, Color Theory, Color Calibration; much of it in our industry is still a psuedo-science — filled with much speculation, and, to tell you the truth, professional confusion. In…
• How not to redesign your store by Converse.com Converse has done a fantastic job at creating an online store catered to a more interactive shoe search… trouble is, it has some newbie failure that’s almost instantly apparent even…
• Print Production: A many part series Recently Mark Boulton published his Web Designers guide to Print Design, a needed and well founded discussion about the variations of print to the new media web. Playing off this…
• How you say it reflects how you work It can be both impressive and inspiring to watch the reaction/interaction with your day to day clientele. Just today, we did something that we’ve never done at dotfive – we…
• Host Rocket – Support and Customer service that doesn’t care Probably one of the more frustrating hosts I’ve had to deal with , Host Rocket lost all of our client’s data… and not just the standard issue website data, the…
• “Design Inspired”, maybe more than just inspiration? Maybe it’s just me, but when I see the term ‘inspired’ within a design companies title, I almost always become suspicious — it’s akin to a car sales man asking…
• Dreamhost : Hosting Redemption Dreamhost may have made marketing redemption with the beautiful and revealing Web Hosting’s Dirty Laundry. A brief, and quality, tirade into the realm of ‘independent hosting review sites’ that market…
• Panic’s Rip-off Express looking for new passengers Ripped off a website or website icon lately? Ripping off Panic’s will get you a first class ticket to the “Panic Rip-off express”; and it’s a hilarious display of a…
• Slashdot CSS with design guidelines from someone who’s not a designer Slashdot is launching a new css design contest that could throttle any qualified designer, here’s some sad tidbits: Topic Icons – So we have 150+ topic icons. Your design needs…
• Google Calendar, complete with censorship? Doug Bowman at Stop Design recently notes the new Google Calendar and it’s new, unique features. While I haven’t had the glory to test it out, there’s been a good…
• hacking wordpress: Unique id’s for the admin menu One of the more troubling issues I had with wordpress is unique ID’s for the admin menu bar. I’m sure you’re asking why in the world I would need this:)…
• dreamhost charges it’s customers 2000% markup? Looks like the dreamhost blog is bragging about it’s financial margins on how easy it is to host with their past experience. Does this mean that I’ll stop having downtime,…
• paypal shopping cart won’t work for pop up blockers and tabbed browsers In an attempt to make a simple, managed site for a clients Jewelry Business, we looked to paypal’s shopping cart as a solution to our financial restraints… however, there seems…
• cubecart — xhtml/css store wonder falls short div’s You can imagine my pure bliss when Andrew told me about his find… CubeCart. ZenCart and osCommerce looked to be a thing of the past; I now have an…
• folietto borrows simplebits design? Wow, less than a week and we see Folietto already has decided to borrow Simplebits design… I’m hoping this is a learning experiment for folietto and not simply a rip…
• quark’s new logo loses big Quarks new logo is reviewed, and I must say, it’s uninspired…
• the failure of colleges and universities in web design For the past three weeks I’ve interviewed for an assistant in web and print design — with little to no success. The position is perfect for a college student or…
• oriugly Microsoft finally unveils the goods on the new Origami. Another look and feel disappointment that took less cues from apple’s stunning iPod innovations, and more from 98 Sony laptops. This…
• mag.nolia’s not for me Very few can argue with the thought that Ma.gnolia is a beautiful site. The look and feel alone makes me want to API all my bookmarks and import them into…
• roundcube mysql via terminal Roundcube went beta last week: http://roundcube.net/ Many of us are testing this application very aggressively — I’ve actually been using it in production for a few clients, 200+ users, and…
• microsoft’s ipod packaging redesign The truth hurts when middle management leads your design and marketing. Enjoy: The Video Be sure to Digg this as well. Edit: So it was Microsoft who made it themselves.…
• origami — microsoft continues to ignore web design The recent buzz of a potential Microsoft tablet/media handheld device is impressed upon the public with this roughly coded and developed site: http://www.origamiproject.com One page. 14 errors. Flash scripted with…
• brady j. frey’s logo design featured in logo lounge 3 My logo design for the explore portion of the Smithsonians Luce Foundation will be featured as one of the top logo designs of 2005. The publication will be Logo Lounge…
• talking apple mail with tim gaden, hawk wings Adding valuable input to the growth and improvement of Apple Mail, Tim Gaden interviews developers, designers, and all around mac lovers as to the current state of OS X 10.4…
• high5advertising & ylunch borrow stopdesign’s… design? High5advertising was nice enough to ‘borrow’ the design look and feel of the well known Stopdesign his response to our inquiries of their inspiration? And I quote, unedited and [sic]…
• design without all that… design. It’s good to see that Microsoft makes an acknowledgment that there are designers in this world, notably so, in regards to the web. While most of us can cite page…