Mark Poppen

You know, Internet Explorer 6, that old piece of shit browser that some people still use? The browser that’s always a pain in the ass when you’ve finished your design, to find out it doesn’t work in IE6? Yes, That one. We’re going to kill it. Join the IE6 DeathMarch and show you’re done with IE6.

Why should we still design around IE6 when there’s a bog load of alternatives? IE7 and IE8 are up for download, Firefox is better, and Chrome is faster and Safari is cross platform. Unless you charge your client extra for working around IE6, it’s just costing us, as designers, money.

So: Join the DeathMarch and start creating conditionals for IE6 telling people to upgrade their browser!

Today I took the time to actually make a decision on how to approach learning PHP. After looking at the introduction video’s on Lynda.com (recommended by Jacob), I decided to go for the video tutorial-way, and if I don’t get it after this, I shall get a book.

Now, I found my way through the first chapter “Getting started”, and I must say, I’m not so overwhelmed as a thought I would be. Back in the days when I was using MS DOS (I guess  I’m that old, yes), the logic of writing a .bat-file was pretty similar to PHP. Something like “If this is something, do that. If not, do this”. Also the echo-statement is of course an oldie.
Of course PHP is a lot more advanced than batch-files in DOS, but I think I might get the hang of this.

I’m getting more excited to get hands on with the programming, as I have something in mind I want to create in PHP. Of course, my skills will fail me many times, but I’m sure there are people out there that can help me with some stuff, once I get the hang of basic PHP.

I’ll keep you posted!

When a website fails, I turn to the programmers and say “Hey, I’m the designer, not the coder. I don’t know shit about this stuff”, and I want to change that attitude. I want to learn PHP. It’s kind of a scary thought, since I DO know how complicated php-code looks to me.

I’ll be doing a series of posts with my progress, and I will post links to resources that helped me creating stuff. I will also set up a url where you can follow my progress live (Since I didn’t start yet, there’s nothing to see).

Up to now I know nothing of PHP (I’m just the designer), but I hope to create a database driven php site in the future. I’ve set my standards high, because I like pushing myself.

Anyway, the first link I’ll give you will be the one to The Web Squeeze. The people there are a talented bunch and very helpful. I started there by asking the question if I should learn Django or start from scratch. Their advice was simple: start from scratch with PHP, because what if Django fails because of a php-error? You’d know how to handle it when you know PHP.

I also asked where to start, and I’m doing the same here. Please leave your comments with useful links on how to learn PHP and OOP.

[Check out my other posts on this in this category]