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Even Microsoft is urging users to dump the aged Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) with a campaign that claims the browser is past its expiration date. The latest push to convince users to quit IE6 equated…
Even Microsoft is urging users to dump the aged Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) with a campaign that claims the browser is past its expiration date.
The latest push to convince users to quit IE6 equated the browser to a nine-year-old carton of milk. IE6 debuted in August 2001.
15 secrets of next-gen browsers
“You wouldn’t drink 9-year-old milk,” reads a milk carton pictured on a page hosted by Microsoft’s Australian division . “So why use a 9-year-old browser?
The campaign, which was first reported by Australian blogger Long Zheng , touts IE8 as the replacement for IE6, and cites company-funded research that claimed IE8’s malware-blocking tools caught 85% of the malicious sites the browser faces. Microsoft has sponsored several such studies , all conducted by NSS Labs.
IE6 has had its share of security problems. Late last year, for example, hackers used a vulnerability in the browser to steal confidential information from Google and scores of other major technology companies.
It’s also gotten the cold shoulder from several prominent Web sites and services. Google’s Gmail and YouTube, Facebook and Digg have all announced that they will no longer support IE6. Last March, a Denver design firm hosted a mock funeral for the browser; Microsoft sent a floral arrangement with a card reading, “Thanks for the good times.”
Microsoft has been begging users to leave IE6 for almost a year. Last August, the company’s general manager for Internet Explorer noted that, “Friends don’t let friends use IE6” as she made her plea to users.
Whether users listened or because millions have moved to Windows 7 , which includes IE8, the percentage of people running IE6 has plummeted since August 2009. According to data from Web metrics company NetApplications, IE6 has fallen from a usage share of 25.3% to 17.6% in the last nine months, a drop of nearly eight percentage points, representing a decline of 30%.
However, Microsoft’s newest pitch is misleading, since IE6 true expiration date is April 8, 2014, when it finally retires the almost-as-old Windows XP . After that date, Microsoft will not release security updates for IE6 or Windows XP.
People still using IE6 must upgrade to Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) to continue to receive patches after July 13, 2010.
IE8 will be Microsoft’s final browser for Windows XP customers, as the company will not support XP with IE9, the next-generation browser that is in the early stages of development.
Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld . Follow Gregg on Twitter at @gkeizer or subscribe to Gregg’s RSS feed . His e-mail address is gkeizer@ix.netcom.com .
Read more about browsers in Computerworld’s Browsers Knowledge Center.
Just a few pointers for those who seek to employ freelancers at any point.
1. Remember their names.
Calling them “freelancer” is both rude and disrespectful. Yes, they may only be in the office for a day or two. Yes, it’s true, you may never see them again after their booking is up. Whatever, they still have names. Remember, they are helping you meet your deadlines. They are helping you to make money. They are solving your problems. They will think you are an asshole if you can’t even be bothered to remember what they are called.
2. Be prepared.
No. Most freelancers have no clue how your company operates. Some will hit the ground running. Most won’t. Expecting them to know the minute details of your day-to-day operations right off the bat is a very naïve assumption. Show them how the coffee machine works. Show them where the toilets are. Give them access to the assets they need to do their job as well as possible.
3. Freelancers are human beings.
Treat them thus. They are not machines you hire to disrespect and treat like shit. Remember, freelancers know each other, they communicate on various forums and blogs. If your company get’s a reputation for treating them like shit, you will find it harder and harder to find ones that want to work for you.
4. If you have a problem with their work, consult the freelancer first.
Don’t be a tell-tale to their agency without airing your grievances or trying to solve the issue with them first. This could jeopardise their future job prospects and is incredibly selfish. It also makes you look like a bit of a cry-baby who has to tell tales in order to get what you want.
5. Be aware of (and make use of) their considerable experience.
Utilise, don’t patronise. Most freelancers have been around the block a few times. They have worked for both great and bad agencies in the past. They have pretty much seen it all and will have had to deal with problems that your company may never have encountered. This makes a freelancer your friend. They can solve problems far faster than your in-house staff as they have seen more problems, from a wider range of projects, in the past. Patronising them just makes you look naïve and inexperienced. Be open to new methodologies and respect their skills.
Just a few pointers for those who seek to employ freelancers at any point.
1. Remember their names.
Calling them “freelancer” is both rude and disrespectful. Yes, they may only be in the office for a day or two. Yes, it’s true, you may never see them again after their booking is up. Whatever, they still have names. Remember, they are helping you meet your deadlines. They are helping you to make money. They are solving your problems. They will think you are an asshole if you can’t even be bothered to remember what they are called.
2. Be prepared.
No. Most freelancers have no clue how your company operates. Some will hit the ground running. Most won’t. Expecting them to know the minute details of your day-to-day operations right off the bat is a very naive assumption. Show them how the coffee machine works. Show them where the toilets are. Give them access to the assets they need to do their job as well as possible.
3. Freelancers are human beings.
Treat them thus. They are not machines you hire to disrespect and treat like shit. Remember, freelancers know each other, they communicate on various forums and blogs. If your company get’s a reputation for treating them like shit, you will find it harder and harder to find ones that want to work for you.
4. If you have a problem with their work, consult the freelancer first.
Don’t be a tell-tale to their agency without airing your grievances or trying to solve the issue with them first. This could jeopardise their future job prospects and is incredibly selfish. It also makes you look like a bit of a cry-baby who has to tell tales in order to get what you want.
5. Be aware of (and make use of) their considerable experience.
Utilise, don’t patronise. Most freelancers have been around the block a few times. They have worked for both great and bad agencies in the past. They have pretty much seen it all and will have had to deal with problems that your company may never have encountered. This makes a freelancer your friend. They can solve problems far faster than your in-house staff as they have seen more problems, from a wider range of projects, in the past. Patronising them just makes you look naive and inexperienced. Be open to new methodologies and respect their skills.
Klix is a fullscreen WordPress portfolio theme that has two different color schemes included. Optional animated bokeh, floating particle, and starfield effects can be turned on/off on…KLIX
Klix is a fullscreen WordPress portfolio theme that has two different color schemes included. Optional animated bokeh, floating particle, and starfield effects can be turned on/off on any background image or image slide. 120+ Shortcodes from backgrounds to columns to images and video to nivo sliders and much much more.
Custom theme settings page with 50+ settings including changing fonts and easily allowing image uploads for making the site your own masterpiece. Custom AJAX contact form system with any amount of custom fields. Powerful lightbox based galleries that will show images, iframes, flash, youtube, vimeo, and hosted video.
DK for Photography is a beautiful fullscreen theme with 4 different homepage styles, 10 page templates, 6 gallery page templates, 7 custom widgets, tens of built-in shortcodes, various fonts and many more layout building options.
DK for photography uses Timthumb to adjust the size of thumbnails automatically. Theme supports unlimited number of sidebars, so you can create and select widgets individually for each of your page. It is compatible with all the major browsers and comes with PSD files for customizations you may need.
Delight is a powerful and professional WordPress theme with full screen background slideshow. It comes with with many jQuery effects (cycle, tabs, accordions, dropdown menus, tooltips, etc.). You have an ability to built unlimited number of different skins using the built-in color pickers and other useful tools.
Google web fonts, individual page and post templates, drag & drop functionality, form composer, ahuge number of shortcodes. These are all amazing features and it is only a bit of everything that can be done with Delight theme.
Photorific is a premium WordPress theme great for photography and portfolio websites but can also be used for other projects. With Photorific, you can set as many background images as you want for every page, post, & portfolio item. The image will be automatically stretched to fit the users browser.
This theme also comes with a color picker, 30+ shortcodes, 3 widgets, an AJAX contact form, unlimited sidebars and much more. You can also choose your own fonts for regular text, and choose from 7 pre-installed cufon fonts that look great.
Specere is a feature packed WordPress Theme aimed at creatives, photographers and people lookingto showcase photos and images fullscreen, producing maximum impact, no fuss! Fully automated gallery. Just add your images and the theme will do the rest! Specere comes packed with an easy-to-use white label Options Panel, documentation and a full screencast video tutorial link which can be found at the top of the documentation file.
Including a variety of options, King Size can suit any particular needs. Offering you five very different gallery styles (including 4 additional layout styles for ColorBox, FancyBox and prettyPhoto), with ability to blog about your photos (attach featured images) and etc.
Creating a Gallery / Portfolio canât be any easier. You just upload your images via Media Gallery (all explained in the documentation) and automatically those images are converted to the Gallery Typeyou have selected for that specific page. There are no extra steps, just upload your images and click publish.
Well documented and user-friendly, also including 8 video tutorials to walk you through a variety of steps. If at any time youâre stumped by something contact the developers, they are ready to help.
One of the distinct characteristics of Zagetti is its stylish and well-polished home page vertical slider that you can customize to showcase your beautiful portfolio. This WordPress theme is packed with several key features that can make you go ooh and aah. Go for more info to see the complete list.
The Zagetti WordPress theme can give your website or even you blog a very sleek, trendy, and clean look that can truly stimulate your visitorsâ visual appetite. You donât have to be a WordPress geek or expert in order to setup Zagetti. This theme has been designed for easy installation.
Teardrop theme supports video and audio playback in background as well as eye-catching image slideshows. iOS compatible, translation ready theme has a powerful admin panel to customize your site. 8 custom widgets, 55+ shortcodes, automatic thumbnails generation, etc.
Make sure you try magic portfolio in theme preview. âMagic portfolioâ always generates unique page layout by choosing it randomly. Try refreshing the page and you will see how does it work. The theme is well documented, so you wonât get lost.
If you love photography or general creativeness and want new interesting ways to display your work then this is really the theme for you. If you are not that familiar with WordPress the video tutorials will guide you through how to create everything you need. The theme also has helpful hints throughout to let you know what every feature does.
After purchasing this theme, grab a coffee and watch the framework installing everything for you. Access all curent google fonts and download additional fonts in the future using font manager. You are able to assign a different background or slideshow to each post/page/portfolio.
Chocolate WP is refined and elegant WordPress theme with complex and precise combination of light gradients and shadows. It was created to serve you as unique slideshow theme to showcase your work together with strong blogging component, powered by Woo Tumblog and Express App.
Outstanding fullwidth showcase-style slider for homepage, absolutely unique 2-level gallery, masonry-style layout, Tumblr-like post types, a set of custom widgets are a few of many features that are included within this theme.
Fullscreen Video & Image Background wordpress theme, perfect for photographers, designers or companies wishing to display their work in an elegant and modern way. Supports video embedding, HTML5 video, audio playback in the background.
40+ Cufon fonts to choose from, 30+ shortcodes for easy content building, sidebar generator, working ajax contact form, etc. Comes with extensive documentation, videos of how to setup and make the most of Zeus theme.
Invictus is a powerful Premium WordPress Theme for Photographer or Portfolio Websites. You can use Invictus just the way you like. The possibilities are endless! Its optimal for Photographers, Digital Artists, Designers or even Private Persons, who want to present their images in a unique Way.
Invictus brings you two different Color Schemes (Black & White), nice shortcodes, easy to use theme options, a custom post type for your Photos, unlimited Color Options with color picker and a huge Font Option Panel powered by Google Font API, etc.
ecoPhoto is a ground breaking WordPress theme tailor built for photographers! ecoPhoto lets you turn your WordPress into a stunning photo portfolio. It uses your high resolution photos to create a one of a kind, browser-wide photo slideshow automatically. Now you can spend your time being photo creative while ecoPhoto does all the work for you!
Minimalista is an Ajax WordPress portfolio theme, best suited for a profesional and minimal portfolio. The point of this template is to have a straightforward CMS like WordPress to manage a one page portfolio without any page reloading. Flash like interface, with animation for every single action you have on the website (hover, content loading, background transition, etc.). It will fit on any screeneven if you resize the window, unique fullscreen slider with squared transition.
Select up to 3 pictures per post or page, and your background will fade with the best transition ever on a Fullscreen Slider. Even if the URL got a hash in it, youâll be able to send the link to a specific post or page to twitter. Use of @font-face instead of Cufon to improve speed loading of the template. Youâll have the control of each template function without editing any code. Easy to setup with detailed documentation.
WordPress Zoom is the ultimate portfolio and product showcase theme. This theme is optimized for touch on the iPad and even supports keyboard control (arrow keys and spacebar). Once you install the theme, the home page becomes a setup guide with step-by-step instructions and videos! â the user manual is pretty helpful too
Adventure is a minimal photography WordPress theme with a unique look and functionality that completely ditches the standard layout. It concentrates on content and your imagery with a great range of shortcodes, theme options framework and more. Flexible custom page creation has never been easier with built-in BluePrint Page Composer.
Contrast is a premium WordPress theme which is suitable for photographers, graphic and web designers, corporates with a kickass features. If you are searching for something different and out of the line, it might be the one.
Now, the top selling premium WordPress theme is much more powerful with a new framework called Themolution. All the theme options are more user friendly and easy to use. There is no need to be a developer to use! Exclusive theme options panel, real-time update notifications and much more!
Sideways is a portfolio theme that offers both horizontal and grid layouts. It incorporates eye catching full screen background images that scale to fit all resolutions and window sizes as well as strong and elegant typography and design.
Valid & cross browser compatible HTML5, unique horizontal scrolling layouts, working AJAX / PHP contact form, flexible page templates, 20+ shortcodes, visual editor shortcode buttons, custom widgets, unlimited sidebars and a lot more features.
Multimedia Gallery âUniversalâ WordPress Theme is a premium WordPress theme that has built-in functionality to present your portfolio / gallery in professional way. MGU has ability to display many formats of the multimedia files â (Youtube, Vimeo, .MOV, .MP4, FLV and even MP3 ).
Itâs a high quality WordPress theme dedicated to those, who want to showcase eye-cathing images in the background of their sites. Fullscreen photography theme has a built-in background manager to manage the photos you want to display. You can be sure that the photos will fit any screen without involvement of flash stretching.
There is absolutely no need to have any coding knowledge in order to use and maintain this theme. It can be customized and adjusted very easily to fit your personal needs.
Simpolio WordPress fullscreen portfolio theme supports the latest WP features and has a lot more to offer. It is translation ready, supports having unlimited number of portfolios and video playback in background. Even Flickr photostream can be shown as a background slideshow. Image slideshow has 7 amazing changing effects.
Unlimited colors for headers, links and content. Easy to use color pickers are built-in. Over 50 shortcodes and shortcode manager are perfect for quick and easy content building. Cufon font replacement for headings with 37 sleek and modern fonts.
Black Label is a fullscreen WordPress portfolio theme that supports image slideshow and video playback in the background. There is also a possibility to set audio background to playback music while viewing images, so it might be a perfect solution for various kind of sites.
The theme was built on HTML5 & CSS3 and it is 100% compatible with all the major browsers. Over 30 custom shortcodes are included together with amazing shortcode generator. Black label theme is translation ready, has built-in contact form, cufon font replacement, jQuery dropdown menus. Video documentation and PSD files are also included in the package.
MediaReel is a powerful, premium fullscreen background WordPress theme, great for photography and portfolio websites but can also be used for other projects. There is an ability to upload unlimited number of images for each page, post or portfolio item.
This theme is very easy to customize using some simple tools like color picker. Choose your own colors for navigation links, dropdown menus, logo, text color, link color, headings and much more.Powerful slideshow options guarantee that the images are presented where you want them, how you want them to be displayed.
James is comprehensive and unique WordPress portfolio theme that speaks for itself. Fresh and extravagant look is ready to grab the attention of your audience. This theme contains everything you need to surprise and impress your clients. James also provides an easy solution to sell your work online.
Floating photo bricks, Light Box photo effect and various types of media is a stunning combination. There is an ability to choose from several pre-defined homepage brick formats. Fullscreen portfolio can be used to display a gallery of photos, videos, websites, maps, etc.
Atlas is a premium WordPress photography theme built with the latest WordPress features. Theme comes with 4 different homepage styles and fullscreen slideshow for your pictures. 30 header fonts are include and a font manager for custom fonts. Gallery manager is very easy use, supports multiple image upload.
Atlas has some interesting and unusual features like password protected gallery or unlimited sidebars. Portfolio content supports videos, images and text. 8 functional custom widgets to display social media profiles, twitter feed, Flickr photostream and more. Many shortcodes are included for rich content building.
Panorama is focused on showcasing high resolution and quality photos. If you want a paginated fullscreen background gallery on your homepage or inside the post, it is all done very simple with Panorama theme. By using this theme you can have a very well organized portfolio.
Many of the latest WordPress themes come overloaded with options gallore that transform a theme into a CMS inside another one. Itâs a bit confusing for unexperienced user, so Panorama developers tried to keep things simple and let the WordPress platform to be the leading part.
PictureThis is a powerful, premium WordPress theme, great for photography and portfolio websites, but can also be used for other projects. Fullscreen background image slideshow, you can upload unlimited images for each page/post/portfolio item. Choose your own colors with color picker.Flexible slideshow, lightbox and portfolio options to make sure the effects are used effectively, the way you want. Find a huge list of available features on PictureThis product page.
ANAN is the premium photography, portfolio, personal website template built with latest WordPress features in mind. Custom post type, unlimited colors and custom image uploader. Front-end has a beautiful full screen slideshow for a photo gallery, unlimited colors with built-in color picker, unobtrusive jQuery-powered effects, contact us page with validation and ready to use PHP mailer.
Theme has a feature-rich options panel, 30 different header fonts, built-in font manager, extensive galleries admin, 4 portfolio styles, 8 custom Widgets, built-in many shortcodes, Timthumb automatically thumbnail support, etc.
Flashlight is an elegant and flexible WordPress Portfolio and Photography Theme, suited for users with no coding knowledge as well as deverlopers. The theme comes with a plethora of options so you can modify layout, styling, colors and fonts directly within the backend.
The gallery managment is super easy and convenient. Just upload your images, select a gallery type and hit publish. The Fullscreen Slider will adapt to the screen resolution of your visitors and other than with other themes, will perform very fluid transitions, even on large screens with resolutions of 2500 pixels and above.
Fiat Lux is another elegant theme for making fullscreen image and video websites. Minimal design yet higly customizable in backend, Fiat Lux lets you create an unlimited number of color schemes and choose one of 11 pre-built templates when crafting your content.
Great for photographers, artists and basically everyone, who want to dislay high resolution pictures in the background of the site. Fiat Lux is WordPress 3.2+ compatible, ready to amaze its users with never-ending list of features. Find out yourself by clicking the âmore infoâ button.
Artboard is a fullscreen WordPress portfolio theme with a full featured blog that leverages the best that WordPress 3.2 has to offer. Powerful jQuery slider, stylish font replacement, responsive front page design.
No gimmicks, no feature bloat, just rock solid standards compliant coding and straight forward design that makes your work shine, whether it be photography, graphic design, illustration, or even video.
Studio Zen is a powerful theme dedicated to photographers and creative individuals. Theme features fullscreen slideshows with audio playback. It supports video playback from Vimeo and youtube, as well as any HTML5 video can be included.
Fullscreen focus view toggle clears all the other elements from the screen for the best presentation. Portfolio includes a horizontal slide scroller with captions. There is also a transparent fullscreen template where slideshow shortcodes and thumbnail galleries can be displayed.
Meshable is a professional and creative WordPress theme with high end features. This theme is designed with new valid HTML5 semantic tags and it works greatly on all leading browsers today. This theme is specially designed for photography and personal sites, however this theme will suit needs of most type of sites if proper background is used.
This theme is iPad compatible. It comes with 3 different background options â single image background, slideshow background and video background. Background audio with playlist and unlimited number of tracks for each page is also available.
Recently designed and built this simple WordPress site for the trust.
This is a site we created for Lost Tribe Productions a film production company based in London. They needed a site to flag up projects that they are working on, including new movie Comes a Bright Day and The Disappeared.
I’m back at Ogilvy Primary Contact after leaving here nearly 4 years ago! Not much is different, lots of old faces and a few new ones.
Looking through the archives, I managed to come across a load of other old work! I thought I’d post it here for posterity. A couple of these things are nearly 5 years old!
BlackBerry Pearl - HTML Microsite
Tia Maria - Flash Presentation
DHL - Jigsaw Game
DHL - Mission To Win Game