As a web developer you need to have at least some rudimentary skills with a image manipulation software such as Photoshop or Fireworks. These are two of the most common image manipulation programs for web developers. They were developed by Adobe and Macromedia respectively until Adobe purchased Macromedia. This aquisition lead to a CS3 Web Development suite where both Photoshop and Fireworks were offered side by side.

As a web developer I have been very fond of the Macromedia projects since I first started using them with the MX edition. My purchase of Macromedia Studio 8 left me with an even greater appreciation of the product that made my life as a web developer bearable. They had enhanced the PSD file editability so now the nested layers that my graphic designer was using show up in the same manner for me as they do for her. 

With renewed appreciation for Fireworks I decided to test out Photoshop. In the past I had found Photoshop difficult to use and that many of the functions that were somewhat simple in Fireworks were hidden or difficult to find in Photoshop. Of course this is to be expected from someone who has cut their teeth on Fireworks. I decided to open a couple of PSD files in Photoshop and and in Fireworks. One of those files was the layout for this website. When I cropped the images using Fireworks and exported them each image was more pixelated than when I exported them with Photoshop. I soon found out that there are some image manipulation effects in Photoshop that seem to port over well to Fireworks and some that do not.

So what is a web developer to do? I suggest you run both applications, legally. If you want to be successful, pay the money for the CS3 Web Suite and use both when necessary. They both have their strengths and weaknesses. I would never recommend a graphic designer to use Fireworks since it is limited in that realm but Photoshop can be cumbersome to work with and at times does not do what you'd expect it do do as a web developer.

This is just a bit of good news I wanted to share with the world. For my Master's project I suggested an Advanced HTML course for the Multi-Media minor offered through the Instructional Technology department at Utah State University. They already have an introductory course which contains excellent instruction and really helps people know what is going on behind the scenes when they are using a GUI web development tool such as Dreamweaver. Unfortunately it does not prepare students for much of they work they would do as a web developer.

The advanced HTML course outline was developed by searching Monster.com for descriptions of what types of knowledge would be required of a web developer. I took those bits of knowledge that seemed most important to an employer and created a course around them. Remember that this is a second level introductory course that will build upon basic knowledge of HTML. Since HTML could be the first programming they have ever attempted we build upon rudimentary knowledge and skills to give them a stronger base and another item in their portfolio that will enable them to be competitive if searching for a job as a web developer.

The course includes the following lessons:

1. Introduction, familiarization with assignment website, and review of basics of HTML
2. Integrated Development Environments (IDEs)
3. Dissecting a PSD File
4. CSS Positioning and Browser Differences (Tableless Layout)
5. CSS Menu with Javascript
6. Writing Javascript Functions and DHTML
7. Introduction to XML
8. Ajax with Prototype and Scriptaculous (GoogleMaps Optional - KML Files)
9. Introduction to Server Sided Programming Languages, Databases, and Hosting
10. What are SEO and SEM?

This should give students most of the tools they would need as web developers with the exception of knowing a Server Sided Programming Language. That was the top requirement of most of the companies searching for a web developer. I also proposed that USU offer some more robust courses on Server Sided Languages such as PHP, ASP.Net and Ruby on Rails. Perhaps they will offer a variety of Special Topics courses that would cover each of those in different semesters. If so, I would love to develop and teach the course on ASP.Net.

If anyone reading this is attending USU they can register for courses this summer and fall. I look forward to seeing you there! 

If you are a .Net programmer and you have not checked out the Microsoft ASP.Net 3.5 platform you are really handicapping yourself as a programmer. There are so many enhancements to the 3.5 platform that make programming in .Net something to enjoy more than you ever have in the past. Any .Net programmer should be subscribing to Scott Guthrie's blog as he explains some of the best kept secrets in the .Net world.

One of the newest additions to the 3.5 framework that makes my life as a ASP.Net developer enjoyable is the LINQ (language integrated query). LINQ allows you to write a simple query to pull data from the database, xml file, or other LINQ source. The query is based on a dbml file that models the datasource showing relations between the different tables you may have. You can then specify an object of one table and get it's children from another table using LINQ notation. LINQ does all the inner join statements necessary to pull that data back out for you. This is a great tutorial on LINQ to SQL.

My second favorite nugget of goodness with the 3.5 framework is the ability to extend CLR datatypes without having to sub-class the type. If you create your own static class you can just use the "this" keyword in the declaration of an object extend the methods applied to that object. Scott Guthrie again teaches us how to use that in his article here.

As I review this post I have realized that instead of reading this you should be reading Scott Guthrie's blog. So go! Read it! He has written some very cool stuff that will help you become a better ASP.Net developer.

There are many opinions as to what has been the biggest and best addition to the web programming. There are people who swear by Flash programming and other's who are convinced that embedding Java applets into pages takes the cake. While each of those embedded programs offer various enhancements to the web I personally enjoy javascript effects. Sure some malicious people have used Javascript to their advantage to make the internet a less safe place but there are others who have used javascript to mimic some of the functionality that exists in Flash or Java.

The people at prototype are a great example of taking Javascript to the next level. The people at scriptaculous took their ideas to an even higher level of beauty. And where would Ajax be without Javascript? The client sided nature of Javascript is integral into partial page updates.

The best part about Javascript is that your broswer already supports it. You do not need to download anything. You do not need to click a specific part of the page to enable the control. All you need to do is leave Javascript enabled for your browser and the quick and clean code executes. Many programmers post their javascript code for free. This is probably the first community to freely share their code with one another.

All of these reasons have pushed me to make Javascript my preferred method of delivering interactive content to the web.

Everyone is looking for the next killer app like YouTube or Amazon.com or Ebay or something along those lines where they can make the coolest web application and then sell it to Google or Yahoo for billions of dollars.

I am no exception. I would love to find the killer app that will have millions to billions of users and people just soaking up my content. Unfortunately, the killer app idea can be hard to come by and when you do come by it, you can spend countless hours trying to develop it only to have it fall short of the feature set that makes it killer. There are a couple of essentials to building the killer app in todays society. I intend to highlight a few of them here:

1. The app must be clean - You need a nice and clean design idea. No one likes clunky interfaces and they are not willing to invest the time to learn how to work with your difficult app.
2. The app must be unique - You need to offer something no one else has offered. YouTube providing the ability to post your own video content to the internet was very unique. Building upon someone else's work will usually not launch your app to the "realm of killer".
   
3. The app must have a social component - This can be as simple as rating and commenting to building a community online. Sites like MySpace are prime examples of purely social sites that have grown tremendously. Those sites where the users are allowed to create the content are some of the best around.
4. The app must be versitile - Many people are using devices other than computers to access the internet. The killer app will allow many different venues the opportunity to have access to the site and will cater to each technology.
5. The app must be well programmed - The killer app would be expected to have some bugs on first release. There are continued growing pains with the killer app but it is based on principles such as using SSL, encryption, and protection from SQL Injections. These are a must for the killer app to take the world by storm.

This was by no means intended to be a comprehensive list but was just to illuminate some of the key components to building the killer app. If you think you have the idea for the killer app but don't know how to go about getting it build contact my beautiful web design company and let me help build that killer app. Then perhaps we can do all this just for the fun of it!