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10 Terrific Tech Blogs by Women

vdebolt — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 12:10:08 +0000

Tech tips, geeky how-tos, thoughtful analysis of issues, news about the latest gadgets, ideas for improving your blog—you’ll find it all in these 10 terrific tech and science blogs. They just happen to be written by women.

I. Hacker Chick

The Hacker Chick Blog is a beautiful starting point. I say beautiful because the graphics on this blog are stunning: everything from the image representing the hacker chick (software developer Abby Fichtner) to the icons and images used as illustrations are visually outstanding. Hacker Chick writes about designing WordPress themes, agile computing, programming, social media, and business.

In Build Your Startup From the Heart, she said,

The world, it seems, is changing. If you ask Daniel Pink, he’ll say that our “left-brained” aptitudes — logical, analytical skills, the types of things schools reward us for — are no longer sufficient if we want to remain competitive. These are, after all, the very things being automated by computers and outsourced at rates we can’t compete with if we want to pay our mortgages, or, say, eat.

If we truly want to succeed, we need to pull in those right-brained skills that our schools & employers have tried so hard to beat out of us — artistry, empathy, play, and story telling.

You don’t find many programmers who think this way, or who can pull it together the way Hacker Chick does.

II. Pars3c

Elizabeth Howell has her head in the stars with her blog Pars3c. The blog is pronounced “PAR-seck,” and astronomical term that gives you an idea of the topics you’ll find on the blog. This blog is about astronomy, spaceflight, science and telescopes. Big telescopes.

In 500 explosions, 500 reasons to love satellites, Elizabeth said,

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again — the greatest thing about space-borne observatories is they have 24-hour darkness to enjoy. This makes it easier to catch fleeting cosmic events, even explosions.

Like that moment last month when NASA’s Swift telescope saw its 500th gamma-ray burst.

III. Blogger Buster

Blogger Buster is for Google Blogger users. It’s written by Amanda Kay. Blogger templates and tutorials are the heart of this blog.

For example, you can learn about 90 Related Posts with Thumbnails for Blogger – New Version by BloggerWidgets

Aneesh of Blogger Widgets has developed a new “Related Posts” script for Blogger which displays thumbnails of images in addition to linked post titles.

In appearance, this Blogger “add-on” is similar to the LinkWithin script. Each section is highlighted in a complementary colour when the mouse hovers over it, and the entire section is clickable, leading to the URL of the “related post” displayed.

IV. Girl Developer

Girl Developer is written by Sara, a software engineer. Her topics range among .net and WAN, tech events, software reviews, and life as a developer. There’s always a dash of style and humor in the mix. Recently she wrote about Meeting Wendy Friedlander, a fellow developer who is undergoing cancer treatment.

Meeting Wendy prompted her to put together a fund-raising dinner:

I put this dinner together because I think it would be wonderful if we could all help Wendy a little as a community. She’s one of our own and it really could be any one of us. We’re having a dinner for Wendy, and if you’re in the NYC area and can make it we’d love to have you. It will be a great time of fellowship with other developers and I’m looking forward to it. If you can’t make the dinner or aren’t from the area there is a paypal link here for donations.

V. Do it Myself Blog

Do it Myself Blog is the work of Glenda Watson Hyatt, the left-thumb blogger—so called because she types only with her left thumb due to her cerebral palsy. Glenda writes about accessibility on the web and in life, about events she attends and speeches she gives with the help of her computer’s voice, about new technology, entrepreneurship, and trying to find an accessible bathroom while at tech events.

Lately Glenda has been searching for the perfect app for her iPad that will help her with chores like making hair appointments and ordering burgers. In The iPad as an Affordable Communicator: A Follow-up Review, she commented

While I was at the mall last Tuesday, i also made a hair appointment. In the old days I would have typed a note before leaving home. Or, I would have asked Darrell to call for an appointment.

Tuesday i pulled out my iPad, typed a message in the Proloquo2Go app and showed it to the receptionist. An appointment was made for the following day.

All is not golden with the Proloquo2Go app, however, as Glenda discovers when she tries to order food.

VI. Apophenia

Apophenia is danah boyd’s blog. This blog deals with big ideas. It focuses on issues: trends, analysis, data about how young people use technology, and topics like privacy.

In “for the lolz”: 4chan is hacking the attention economy , danah explains what 4chan is with a “Newbie Note” before she begins her discussion of the site:

Newbie note: If you have never heard of 4chan, start with the Wikipedia entry and not the website itself. The site tends to offend many adults’ sensibilities. As one of my friends put it, loving LOLcats or rickrolling as outputs is like loving a tasty hamburger; visiting 4chan is like visiting the meat factory. At some point, it’d probably help to visit the meat factory, but that might make you go vegetarian.

danah boyd is quite possibly one the the smartest people on the planet, so running big ideas through her mind and getting to read the results of her thinking on her blog is a true privilege.

VII. The Female Perspective of Computer Science

The Female Perspective of Computer Science is from Gail Carmichael, who is working on a doctorate in Computer Science. Her fields of study include educational entertainment and augmented reality, both of which get discussed on the blog. Other topics include visual computing, games, events, computer science, and women.

Recently she wrote about Getting the Hang of iPhone Development.

I needed to learn how to develop for the iPhone since the projects I want to work on next will be games for the device. This task was somewhat daunting, given that I hadn’t really even used a Mac before, let alone Objective-C or Xcode. Luckily, there are some really great resources out there that you should check out if you are also just getting started.

So far, the most invaluable resource for me has been the Stanford iTunes U lectures on iPhone development. After watching the lectures via iTunes, you can download all the course materials, including slides and assignments.

A free course from Standford so you can learn how to develop for iPhone? Dang, that’s great information!

VIII. Geek Feminism Blog

Geek Feminism Blog has over a dozen writers, mostly women. A few male feminists in the mix is a good thing. The range of topics you find there is as wide and deep as the minds of its many contributors. The frequent linkspam posts are a great source for exploring the blogosphere on topics related to technology and women. Other topics you might find explored there are comics, conferences, gender, open source, programming, star trek, and just about anything else you can think of that interests geeks.

In July 6th is the last day for super early bird rate for Grace Hopper Celebration, Terri tells us,

If you haven’t heard of GHC before, it’s a really amazing conference for women involved in technology (especially geek feminists!). Not only does it tip the usual ratios on their heads (hello, >90% women! And yes, that means men are welcome.) it’s one of very few conferences where I can say that even the most technical talks are interesting and well-presented.

IX. CSS, JavaScript and XHTML Explained and Standardista

CSS, JavaScript and XHTML Explained is by Estele Weyl. The title is self-describing, but doesn’t completely cover the range of what you find there. You might learn about conferences, girl geeks, browser quirks, accessibility and other web development related topics. Estele has another blog called Standardista: CSS3, JavaScript and HTML5 Explained that is similar but devoted to newer technologies such as HTML5. As the technologies move forward, the newer blog may get the most additions.

Estele is great at putting things in an organized matrix to help you quickly see what is what with a topic. For example, in HTML5 Input Attributes & Browser Support, she created a handy table to show which browsers support which of the new HTML5 form elements.

X. MacTips

I saved a great one for last: MacTips, the very helpful guide to Macs, iPhones and iPads from Miraz Jordan. The tips never end at MacTips. For example, Use Safari 5′s Reader for easier reading on the web and How to change app Preferences on an iPhone.

Miraz always has clear directions with informative illustrations and screen shots to guide you through all things Mac.

Cross-posted in slightly different form at BlogHer.

Useful Links: When can I, Ning news, IE9

vdebolt — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 12:11:00 +0000

When can I use provides compatibility tables for features in HTML5, CSS3, SVG and other upcoming web technologies. Very useful.

Ning Partners with Pearson to Sponsor Free Network Access for educators. Good news for educators. “Ning is announcing that Pearson, a education-focused publishing company, is sponsoring network costs for Ning Mini platforms for educators come July. Ning says the partnership will extend for three years.”

The IE9 Platform Demos are open for test drives. The big news includes support for canvas, audio, and video elements from HTML5.

Failure to Launch

vdebolt — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 11:38:32 +0000

There’s a browser monster on my computer, eating browsers. First I couldn’t get Chrome to launch after a normal installation. Tried a bunch of times.

Then I decided to upgrade Opera to the latest version. Download. Install. Click to open. Won’t launch.

What the heck is going on?

I run Disk Repair, have a few permission errors, fix them. Try again. Opera still won’t launch.

What do I do now? I’m stumped. And I’m quickly running out of browsers.

Useful links: site specific browsers, social media stats, Web 2.0

vdebolt — Sat, 08 May 2010 13:21:19 +0000

Fluid–Create Site Specific Browsers from ATMac is a new concept to me and has interesting potential.

This stat filled video about social media is eye-opening.

Speaking of video, O’Reilly Media has a lot of video from the Web 2.0 Expo up on YouTube, including this interview with a good deal of talk about HTML5, Flash, and other technology from Brady Forrest, Eric Meyer, and Ge Wang.

Useful links: Widgets, HTML5 & help me with Chrome

vdebolt — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 12:52:50 +0000

Keep WordPress Widgets from Appearing on Particular Pages from KnowIT is a terrific explanation of how to pick and choose which pages you want WordPress widgets to appear on.

HTML5 and CSS3 Readiness by Paul Irish and Divya Manian shows a display you can manipulate of HTML5 elements and which browsers already support them. Chrome and Safari 4 have almost complete implementation of HTML5, moving out toward various versions of IE, with very limited support. In addition to running your mouse around the information, you can also resize the display by dragging, because the page is done in HTML5.

Speaking of Chrome, I’ve tried several times to install it on my Mac (OS 10.5.8) and it won’t open. I keep getting errors. Anybody have any ideas what my problem might be?

Useful links: Text alternatives, IE6 funeral, accessible Twitter

vdebolt — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:35:35 +0000

HTML5: Techniques for providing useful text alternatives is a new draft from the W3C written by Steve Faulkner. It gives tips and many excellent examples of best practices in the use of alternative text.

How to have fun in Denver on March 4: attend the funeral for IE6. Yep, sounds like a fun party. Information at IE6 Funeral. May I add for all of us, “Good riddance!”

Accessible Twitter is now online in beta. Accessible Insights blog had A word with the accessible Dennis Lembree on Accessible Twitter talking about it, and offering a couple of interesting links.

Useful Links: iPad accessibility, Gmail, browser share, textbooks

vdebolt — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 14:39:16 +0000

ATMac tells about Accessing the iPad: Mouthsticks and Styluses with some tips for how a user with limited mobility can work the device. It’s useful to also read ATMac’s post Accessibility and the iPad: First Impressions.

In the category of “stuff I didn’t know you could do but it sounds really great and I want to try it” comes this news from Demo Girl: How-to: Google Search in Gmail.

Where did Internet Explorer’s Browser Share Go? in an interesting look at trends in browser usage. I tried to have an effect on this trending information by installing Chrome on my Mac, but it won’t open after it’s installed. Instead I just get error messages.

Yes, there will be textbooks on the iPad. At least according to this article in the NYTimes.

Site Testing Checklist

vdebolt — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 14:30:19 +0000

It’s wise to test your site as you’re building it. Check your pages for accessibility, for validity, for appearance and function as you go along. Don’t wait until you’re finished to think about things like valid code and accessibility.

Even when you do those things as a normal part of your process, you still need to perform a number of tests after the files are uploaded to a live server. Here’s a brief checklist of things you need to test when your site goes live.

Validate HTML and CSS
Run accessibility checks
Check every function and script
Check spelling and grammar
Check page appearance in a variety of browsers
Evaluate the site with CSS disabled
Evaluate search engine friendliness

Useful Links: Transitions and Transforms, the written word, Chrome

vdebolt — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 15:34:01 +0000

CSS3 transitions and 2D transforms by Opera’s Molly Holzschlag and David Storey is an excellent tutorial explaining these exciting new CSS properties. Browser support isn’t universal yet, but don’t let that stop you from making the most of CSS3.

The word is dead. Long live the word. Study: Rumors of Written-Word Death Greatly Exaggerated at Wired reports on a study finding that the rate of reading tripled between 1980 and 2009. Go see what they think the reason is.

Google’s Chrome grabs the No. 3 browser spot from Safari. In just 16 months, Chrome has outpaced Safari in browser numbers. Firefox is still at number 2, and IE remains on the top. But the good news that IE8 is overtaking the train wreck of IE6 in significant numbers.

Why Can’t Twitter Be More Like Facebook or Linked In?

vdebolt — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:59:04 +0000

It can. Are you looking for a way for Twitter to locate mutual friends or people who know people you know? I love this feature on Facebook and often find BlogHers or long-lost classmates based on the application’s suggestions as to people I may know because they know people I know. People who know people. Or some such.

Now there is a Firefox add-on that will help you locate mutual friends you may share with the people you follow on Twitter. (Yeah, sorry, it only works in Firefox right now.) It’s not exactly like what happens on Facebook, but it can be helpful.

Several tools for finding mutual friends on Twitter are described in the Web Worker Daily article by Doriano “Paisano” Carta at How to Find Mutual Friends on Twitter. The tool from the article that appealed to me is the Ul.timate.info add-on for Firefox.

It wasn’t just me who found it interesting. Heather squeeed about it on Twitter, so I thought I should give it a try.

Before I get too far into the description of what ul.timate.info does in Twitter, you need to know that it also adds features to Facebook, MySpace, FriendFeed, foursquare, and bit.ly.

Here’s what happened when I installed the add-on. It was a bit confusing at first. Normally, when you install a Firefox add-on, you set up your preferences for the new tool using the Preferences button in the add-ons window. But the Preferences button for Ul.timate.info was grayed out.

The instructions on the web site said to right-click (or ctrl-click on Mac) on a Twitter name or image to see a menu that would allow you to find mutual friends. I tried this about 50 times. It didn’t show me the menu! (The definition of stupidity; when it doesn’t work keep doing it the same way.)

Finally I noticed an ul.timate.info menu option way up at the top of my screen in the Firefox menu. Why didn’t the download instructions say this? Especially since it departs from the norm for add-ons? Application developers don’t spring for good technical writers to explain their new apps—one of my pet complaints.

I selected Settings, then entered my Twitter name and password. Now the magic worked. A right-click (or ctrl-click) showed me all these lovely new menu options, including the longed-for View Mutual Friends.

I tried out a few people to see how many mutual friends we have. I have zero mutual friends with singer @dianebirch. That’s okay. I just follow her in case she ever leaves New York and goes on tour somewhere close to me. I don’t care who her followers are. But I have 34 friends in common with @jenlemen. I care about who her followers are. We share some interests. I may check her followers (I can do that with the ul.timate.info menu) to see if she found someone I’d really like to follow but don’t. Yet.

I wish ul.timate.info would be more like LinkedIn or Facebook’s friend recommendations. I wish I could click on someone’s name and get a few suggestions as to who might be a good fit for me to follow. Even though it isn’t quite effort free to find mutual friends, I can still get some helpful tips and information from this tool. Plus, it stays out of the way when I don’t want to use it, always a good thing.

If you try it, let me know what you think of it.

Cross posted at BlogHer.