Comments on: 10 things I wish I had known about web designing 10 years ago

By: Share Your Best Post Ever! (and Use These Proven Formulas to Create Epic Content)

Sat, 21 May 2011 01:27:58 +0000

[...] 10 things I wish I had known about web designing 10 years ago (Rob Cubbon) From Rob: “This post took off on StumbleUpon like no other I’ve ever seen. At least 4,000 visitors from SU in 2 or 3 days. SU becomes a virtuous circle, the more people see it the more people are likely to give it a thumbs up, the higher it goes up the page on SU, the more people see it, and so it goes on. But it was popular on Twitter and keeps on drawing in traffic and comments.” [...]

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 15:20:12 +0000

Thanks Simon, I’ll check them out.

By: Simon

Simon — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 06:34:18 +0000

Good article. I’d switch out point 4 for reset.CSS. Irons out a whole load of cross browser problems in one easy piece of code.

I’d also include blueprint.CSS. It just makes designing and building a website on a grid system so easy. Essential for quick turnaround. Get some background on grids by looking for Khoi Vinh’s work.

By: 10 things I wish I had known about web designing 10 years ago « Todd's Tech Talk

Wed, 29 Dec 2010 16:16:20 +0000

[...] June 22, 2010 by Todd Lohenry Leave a Comment via robcubbon.com [...]

By: Le basi ragazzi, le basi.. « Uncategorized « Relazioni Pubbliche 2.0

Le basi ragazzi, le basi.. « Uncategorized « Relazioni Pubbliche 2.0 — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 09:40:56 +0000

[...] online della aziende di ogni ordine, grado, mercato e budget, a rileggere con attenzione questo post , intitolato "10 things I wish I had known about web designing 10 years [...]

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 09:16:44 +0000

Cheers, Afam, you should try to reduce validation errors as much as possible as it will help you’re website in a number of ways!

By: Afam

Afam — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 08:24:13 +0000

This list is the best. I sually don’t validate my website, i don’t know why.

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 10:42:17 +0000

Hello, Caitlin, there are many reasons why I like WordPress but no one has the ability or time to test the plethora of free CMSs out there and I have to say that 90% of my CMS experience has been with WordPress. The difference of a self-hosted WordPress.org site over Weebly or DevHub is that WordPress is housed on your own server giving you total control over the site. I have never used Weebly or DevHub but I think they host your site and, as a result, you won’t be in complete control. They also seem to hit web marketing pretty hard – I just stumbled over a blogger eulogizing over how amazing DevHub was … written on his WordPress blog!

The other CMSs I have slight experience of are SilverStripe, Drupal, Joomla and Expression Engine, the last one being proprietary. These also require you to set up a server to run them.

Which is best for an absolute beginner? Well I would say WordPress. But by all means try out the free products first – WordPress.com being one of them. HTH.

By: Caitlin Foster

Caitlin Foster — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 10:53:42 +0000

Hi Rob and other contributors, I have just joined the Linked In group for website developers because I don’t know anything about website development, yet am very keen to learn and apply my newfound knowledge to build a website for myself. Rob, you and other contributors speak of WordPress positively. What do you think of Weebly? Also, what do you think of DevHub? What other free WCMS are there out in CyberLand? Which is best for an absolute beginner, in your opinion? Thank you for any information you can share with me. I greatly appreciate it.

By: How to publicize your blog posts | Blog | Graphic and Web Designer London UK

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 09:07:52 +0000

[...] People click on posts with numbers in the titles. My most popular post through social media was 10 things I wish I had known about web designing 10 years ago. This got 7,000 visitors through StumbleUpon in only a few days and the visitors continued for [...]

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 21:16:36 +0000

Thanks Sparrow, I can recommend some good hosts in the States, UK and Europe but I don’t know any Australian ones.

By: Sparrow

Sparrow — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 05:11:20 +0000

Some very good lessons here. After I discovered WordPress my online presence exploded.
I have since discovered Googlw Webmaster tools, site maps, compression, and SEO.
However still having problems with hosting. My only tip here is to have your hosting physically located in your country of residence.

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:45:17 +0000

Haha, Juan, surely not!

Noz, you are absolutely right. I realize that WordPress is right for me but that doesn’t mean it’s right for everyone. I make a lot of niche websites for which WordPress is ideally suited. Drupal, Joomla, Dotnetnuke and EE are better for other types of sites.

By: Noz

Noz — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:36:42 +0000

I like wordpress and I also use and love working on Drupal, Joomla and Dotnetnuke cms’s. The one thing I would say about WordPress and the like is that they are NOT silver bullets…. In other words, you need to spend time and get familiar with wordpress (or any other cms) before simply assuming it is the answer to all your prayers.

By: Juan

Juan — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 07:13:48 +0000

Yes, number 7 it’s a hate thing

By: _yak technoblog » Web Development Tricks

_yak technoblog » Web Development Tricks — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 14:18:09 +0000

[...] http://robcubbon.com/10-things-i-wish-i-had-known-about-web-designing-10-years-ago [...]

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 08:56:20 +0000

Yes, Michael, I mean with JavaScript disabled the HTML elements on the page that were affected by the jQuery can still function. Without Flash installed however, Flash features won’t work at all. Sorry for the confusion.

By: Michael Hodgins

Michael Hodgins — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 06:43:39 +0000

I’m not sure I understand your comment that jQuery works when JavaScript is disabled, as it doesn’t. Do you mean that the page still works?

By: Neil

Neil — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:37:04 +0000

@Rob, Thanks for the tip – more things to play with

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 10:06:43 +0000

Neil, Firebug is awesome. Another thing you can do is uncheck certain styles to disable them. It’s a great way of finding out other people’s CSS tricks!

Esger, thank you, I’ll certainly be using that.

By: Esger

Esger — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 08:20:50 +0000

When I discovered jQuery as an amazing tool for front-end development, I felt the urge learn some javascript first. To debug my javascript (with jQuery code) I always use this: http://www.jslint.com/ That’s a great help!

By: Neil

Neil — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 00:41:55 +0000

Firebug sounds awesome. I have downloaded it now and am hoping that it will lead to a greater understanding of CSS!

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 23:28:32 +0000

I agree. More disasters, please!

By: Elizabeth K. Barone

Elizabeth K. Barone — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 18:28:23 +0000

Yes! Without those CSS disasters, I wouldn’t know what I know now. I’m sure they’ll be more, too. For me, solving the problem is what’s addictive.

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 16:48:42 +0000

It’s funny, Elizabeth, looking back, there were so many CSS nightmares I had that could have been avoided but then it wouldn’t have been so much fun. Remember ill-fated attempts to get a div to center with text-align before discovering the delights of margin: 0 auto;! Our introduction to website creation and CSS has been very similar. And I agree with you that it is fun and rewarding. In fact I would say that I get a bit obsessive about websites, actually. I think the instant feedback from visitor numbers etc. is almost addictive!

By: Elizabeth K. Barone

Elizabeth K. Barone — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 16:23:21 +0000

When I first got into web design, I was a twelve-year-old obsessed with fan fiction and anime. I wanted to make my own fan fiction site, so I started off by using other people’s free templates and tweaking them for my own needs. I didn’t know a thing about code and would play around with it in Microsoft Notepad, using Google — or probably AOL Search back then, actually — to find what I needed to know.

I basically taught myself everything, going to college just so I could have that official looking piece of paper. When I got my first real job as a web designer, I didn’t know CSS. Within six months, though, I had learned a lot and was designing and developing websites with relative ease. However, I wish I’d known about

display: block;
width: 800px;
margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;

a few years ago. Up until about a year ago, I would center websites with careful math and lots of headaches when Firefox’s MeasureIt told me the right side was a little wider. I also wish I’d known many years ago that this would be such a rewarding and fun career. Some days it’s tough, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything!

By: Rob Cubbon

Rob Cubbon — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 09:43:50 +0000

Hi Grantly, yes, by incoming links I meant the same thing as back links or inbound links. Cheers.

By: Grantly Lynch

Grantly Lynch — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 05:33:31 +0000

Hi Rob

Are incoming links the same as back links?
Might sound a stupid question but I cant see the difference

All the best Grant