Google Video Search

It’s still in beta, but Google Video Search is beginning to provide search of recent TV programs. They say, “Our mission is to organize the world’s information, and that includes the thousands of programs that play on our TVs every day. Google Video enables you to search a growing archive of televised content – everything from sports to dinosaur documentaries to news shows.”

I have a new friend who taught in Naperville, IL and is now living near me. The other day on the Ellen Degeneres show I saw a young boy from Naperville who found $9000 in the street and returned it. I tried to tell my new friend about this boy, thinking he might have been one of her former students, but couldn’t recall his name. So I tried out the new Google Video Search and found the Ellen segment and a photo of the boy immediately.

The search results are a script of the part of the program containing the terms you searched for. HBO has a funny ad about how they have improved the water industry by provoking conversations around the water cooler about HBO programs. Google is set to become an integral part of all those, “Did you see…” conversations we have at work.

I thought it was pretty amazing when they started digitizing entire libraries. Now every word from TV is going to be searchable. Librarians who can teach kids how to find and evaluate information using search engines are quickly becoming the most important people on a school staff!

Tip: Using a backslash in CSS hacks and workarounds

You may have seen the backslash character ( \ ) used in CSS, often without any explanation as to why it works.

I’ll give you an example, and then I’ll explain when the backslash can be used. In setting a width for a div, you see CSS rules like this:

#somediv {
width: 682px;
w\idth: 680px;
border: 1px;
}

This example uses two width declarations because of IE5.x for Windows’ broken box model. (In Quirks mode, IE6 also uses the broken box model. In Standards mode, IE6 uses the correct box model.) Assume the width you really want for the div is 680px. Adding a 1px border on every side of the div adds two pixels to the width of the div in a browser with a broken box model. A standards-compliant browser includes the 2px border in the 680px specified for the div. As you might have guessed, this use of the backslash to set width is known as the box model hack.

It is important to notice that the declaration (w\idth: 680px;) for compliant browsers follows the declaration for broken-box-model browsers in the Cascade. Here’s what happens. IE.5x reads the width: 682px; declaration but skips over the following w\idth:680px; because it doesn’t understand a property with a backslash. A compliant browser reads the first declaration, but implements the second declaration. The compliant browser implements the second declaration because it does understand a property with a backslash, and because the declaration is later in the Cascade.

Why does the backslash work? It turns out that the backslash is an entirely legal character. In fact, it will not stop your CSS from validating. There is one restriction on its use. You cannot place the backslash before any letter used for the hexadecimal color codes–a,b,c,d,e or f–or unwanted effects will befall you.

No Child Left Behind, except with internet-based curricula

WebAIM’s response to the National Education Technology Plan “WebAIM applauds the plan with the exception of one prominent omission. The plan does not mention the critical need for accessible technology for millions of students with disabilities. Because this need is not identified, nor addressed, there are no apparent plans to remedy this ever-increasing digital divide. Perhaps there was a lack of input from the disability, or technology access, community. It appears that these stakeholders were not included in the work of the committee.”

Thinking beyond the visual

Digital Web Magazine – Web Design for All the Senses by Dirk Knemeyer is an interesting article about stimulating the 5 senses in web design. He says, “the real reason the Web and other digital networks and interactions are such a hollow, flat experience is we are not being innovative and creative enough. Happily, this is something that we can easily take control of and change.”

I find this interesting because I recently had an epiphany of my own to the effect that web design is both engaging and interesting because it allows the creator to exercise both the left and right brain simultaneously. You have the analytical experience of writing HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc., to stimulate one side of the brain. And you have the visual experience of planning a color scheme, a layout, graphics, etc., to stimulate the other side. This bit of insight came to me after I signed up to take a Photography and Journaling class, which promised to involve my whole brain with both art and words.

One of my past career paths was to write several books about cooperative learning and multiple intelligences as they apply to the writing process. The Write! books were published by Kagan Cooperative Learning, run by cooperative learning/multiple intelligences guru Spencer Kagan. I’m making quite a leap from the five senses to multiple intelligences here, but stay with me. I’m wondering if there is a way to move from the experiencing of a web page with more than one sense into the teaching of the skill and art of making a web page by using more than one or two of the identified intelligences.

To refresh your memory, the multiple intelligences are Linguistic intelligence, Logical-mathematical intelligence, Spatial intelligence, Bodily-Kinesthetic intelligence, Musical intelligence, Interpersonal intelligence, Intrapersonal intelligence, and Naturalist intelligence.

I haven’t heard of anyone trying to teach web design in a way that brings all the various intelligences into play. Drop me a line if you know someone who has, or if you have some ideas about how it could be done.

MIT Program for HS girls

MIT Women’s Technology Program “The WTP is a residential summer program in the MIT Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science to introduce high school girls to EECS in the summer after 11th grade.

Their goal: increasing high school girls interest and confidence in pursuing electrical engineering and computer science.

The four-week program includes classes in computer science, electrical engineering, and mathematics taught by women PhD candidates in the MIT EECS Department, and allows girls to explore through hands-on experiments and team-based projects.”

Podcasts

Podcasts caught my eye today. Friend Marilyn Matty said she thinks they will replace e-Books and RSS feeds. She sent me a list of resources on the topic.

Doc Searls has also done a lot on his blog about podcasting – a search should give you some good results. And the US public radio station, NPR, has been covering and doing podcasting for a while.

Even more resources have come in since Marilyn povided hers. Check these out, too.