Charles Gnilka’s Blog

Here is video explaining the uses for Adobe’s Apollo web applications and shows Apollo in action. It is about 13 minutes long, but worth watching.

Long before Apple used a guy in a tweed jacket and young hipster to compare the PC to Macintosh, there was this ad from the mid-80s that used actual computers. I have mentioned this ad to people who had never seen it, now I can display the real thing (slightly shortened unfortunately).

While advertising for Macs and Ipods primarily feature users who are young, surveys reveal that 45% of Mac users are over 55 years old, meaning those users were in their 20s and 30s when this ad premiered. I would not be surprised to find that this ad’s impact lingers to this day in the form of dedicated Mac users.

According to The Apple Insider, the new version of Adobe Creative suite, or CS3, now has an official launch date of March 27.

To promote the new suite, Adobe has posted this video on YouTube. A glowing cube is passed around by users in the video, representing the creative energy and flexibility of Adobe’s new software.

The Apple Insider also reports that there will be six versions of the the suite, offered at different prices and combinations of programs.

I know this will reveal my geek nature, but I think the glowing cube in the Adobe video does bear an unsettling resemblance to a dangerously radioactive alien buoy in the Star Trek episode The Corbomite Maneuver, featured in the preview below.

Let’s hope that the new version of Creative Suite is more friendly to designers than the glowing space cube was to the USS Enterprise.

Another disturbing take on the Adobe commercial is the slogan “What’s in the box?”. I’m sure they didn’t mean to make this comparison, but every time I hear “What’s in the box?”, I think of a gut-wrenching scene in the movie Seven.

Killer space cubes and references to gloomy David Fincher films aside, I am still happy that CS3 is almost here and how Adobe kept Fireworks around after buying out Macromedia.

Read/WriteWeb features coverage of the Engage event hosted by Adobe Systems, introducing the Apollo web application platform. According to the entry, Apollo mixes Flash, Flex, Actionscript, and XML to create Rich Internet Applications, or RIAs.

Another entry on Read/WriteWeb features more in-depth coverage of the Apollo introduction, including screenshots of Apollo applications in action.

PC World’s blog reports on the news the upcoming web-based version of Adobe Photoshop and what web-based applications might be on the the horizon.

The Google Inside AdWords blog features a story on how Google fights click-fraud. Google uses a three stage system to handle click-fraud. According to the story, less than 10% of Google’s clicks are fraudulent.

The Consumerist features a story on Flickr’s camera finder. The camera finder highlights photos taken with a particular brand of camera, letting you see the camera in action before you buy.

Now you can read the stories I share on my Google Reader account by visiting the link on the sidebar. I try to update it every day. Most of the stories I share are web design, computer, or marketing related. Sometimes I put a story about space travel or pop culture in there too.

The Apple Blog features a list of 6 tools for web design.

The list is meant primarily for Apple users, but does include the site for W3Schools and the Firefox browser extension ColorZilla which work anywhere.

There are many tutorials on how to create a multi-column site with CSS. I do not need many tutorials, I just need ONE that works, is easy to read, and gives me valid code.

It would seem simple enough to design a multi-column site in CSS, but do a Google search on how to create a 3-column or multi-column CSS code and you will be swamped with solutions.

Which one works best? I think this tutorial on The Design Edition explains it best, especially when it comes to making DIVs that expand to allow for more content.

Of course, I encourage anyone who thinks they have a better solution to share it. Send me an email at blog AT gnilka DOT com or post a comment.

Now that I have WordPress up and running, I want to change the look and feel of my blog. The Kubrick template is nice and clean, but I want my own personalized look.

I found the WordPress site features a docs section covering design and layout.

In the support section, there is forum offering reviews and feedback on blog designs.

As always, be careful to know what you are doing before tinkering with your blog code. If you do not know anything about using CSS, start with the CSS tutorial on W3Schools.