Showing posts with label web design. Show all posts
Showing posts with label web design. Show all posts
Sunday, 3 August 2008
Affordable Websites
Sunshine Coast web design company, Ion e-Business, is back in Mission Beach. We've been working hard over the past 6 months to come up with affordable solutions for small businesses. Now we've got several products that every small business can afford. Check out our website and see what's going on: www.ionebusiness.com.au.
Monday, 16 June 2008
C4 Cassowary Conservation
As part of our annual work intake we select non-profit organisations for whom we think a new web design would benefit them. We have recently been speaking with the cassowary conservation group C4 in Mission Beach and have offered them a new state-of-the-art web design which we will be building them for free. We're hoping that in doing so we may be able to obtain more online coverage for them and take the plight of the cassowary to the nation.
Friday, 30 May 2008
Microsoft Not Buying Yahoo
The boss of Yahoo has said Microsoft is no longer interested in buying the company but that it "makes sense" for the two to discuss working together. In his fullest comments since Microsoft dropped its $47.5bn bid this month, Jerry Yang admitted a merger would have had a "tremendous amount of power". He insisted that it had been Microsoft which had broken off talks over price. But Mr Yang said Yahoo was still "listening" to proposals being put forward by its rival.
Read more here.
Posted by Ion e-Business Web Design.
Thursday, 16 August 2007
Mission Beach Website Design
Ion e-Business are the local web site design company in Mission Beach and are specialists in content management systems and the integration of reat-time booking systems.
Tuesday, 29 May 2007
A Decade Of Good Website Design
The web looks very different today than it did 10 years ago.
Back in 1994, Yahoo had only just launched, most websites were text-based and Amazon, Google and eBay had yet to appear.
But, says usability guru Dr Jakob Nielsen, some things have stayed constant in that decade, namely the principles of what makes a site easy to use.
Dr Nielsen has looked back at a decade of work on usability and considered whether the 34 core guidelines drawn up back then are relevant to the web of today.
"Roughly 80% of the things we found 10 years ago are still an issue today," he said.
"Some have gone away because users have changed and 10% have changed because technology has changed."
Sites for sore eyes
Some design crimes, such as splash screens that get between a user and the site they are trying to visit, and web designers indulging their artistic urges have almost disappeared, said Dr Nielsen.
"But there's great stability on usability concerns," he told the BBC News website.
Dr Nielsen said the basic principles of usability, centring on ease of use and clear thinking about a site's total design, were as important as ever.
"It's necessary to be aware of these things as issues because they remain as such," he said.
They are still important because the net has not changed as much as people thought it would.
"A lot of people thought that design and usability was only a temporary problem because broadband was taking off," he said. "But there are a very small number of cases where usability issues go away because you have broadband."
Design decision
Dr Nielsen said the success of sites such as Google, Amazon, eBay and Yahoo showed that close attention to design and user needs was important.
"Those four sites are extremely profitable and extremely successful," said Dr Nielsen, adding that they have largely defined commercial success on the net.
"All are based on user empowerment and make it easy for people to do things on the internet," he said.
"They are making simple but powerful tools available to the user.
"None of them have a fancy or glamorous look," he added, declaring himself surprised that these sites have not been more widely copied.
In the future, Dr Nielsen believes that search engines will play an even bigger part in helping people get to grips with the huge amount of information online.
"They are becoming like the operating system to the internet," he said.
But, he said, the fact that they are useful now does not mean that they could not do better.
Currently, he said, search sites did not do a very good job of describing the information that they return in response to queries. Often people had to look at a website just to judge whether it was useful or not.
Tools that watch the behaviour of people on websites to see what they actually find useful could also help refine results.
Research by Dr Nielsen shows that people are getting more sophisticated in their use of search engines.
The latest statistics on how many words people use on search engines shows that, on average, they use 2.2 terms. In 1994 only 1.3 words were used.
"I think it's amazing that we have seen a doubling in a 10-year period of those search terms," said Dr Nielsen.
Back in 1994, Yahoo had only just launched, most websites were text-based and Amazon, Google and eBay had yet to appear.
But, says usability guru Dr Jakob Nielsen, some things have stayed constant in that decade, namely the principles of what makes a site easy to use.
Dr Nielsen has looked back at a decade of work on usability and considered whether the 34 core guidelines drawn up back then are relevant to the web of today.
"Roughly 80% of the things we found 10 years ago are still an issue today," he said.
"Some have gone away because users have changed and 10% have changed because technology has changed."
Sites for sore eyes
Some design crimes, such as splash screens that get between a user and the site they are trying to visit, and web designers indulging their artistic urges have almost disappeared, said Dr Nielsen.
"But there's great stability on usability concerns," he told the BBC News website.
Dr Nielsen said the basic principles of usability, centring on ease of use and clear thinking about a site's total design, were as important as ever.
"It's necessary to be aware of these things as issues because they remain as such," he said.
They are still important because the net has not changed as much as people thought it would.
"A lot of people thought that design and usability was only a temporary problem because broadband was taking off," he said. "But there are a very small number of cases where usability issues go away because you have broadband."
Design decision
Dr Nielsen said the success of sites such as Google, Amazon, eBay and Yahoo showed that close attention to design and user needs was important.
"Those four sites are extremely profitable and extremely successful," said Dr Nielsen, adding that they have largely defined commercial success on the net.
"All are based on user empowerment and make it easy for people to do things on the internet," he said.
"They are making simple but powerful tools available to the user.
"None of them have a fancy or glamorous look," he added, declaring himself surprised that these sites have not been more widely copied.
In the future, Dr Nielsen believes that search engines will play an even bigger part in helping people get to grips with the huge amount of information online.
"They are becoming like the operating system to the internet," he said.
But, he said, the fact that they are useful now does not mean that they could not do better.
Currently, he said, search sites did not do a very good job of describing the information that they return in response to queries. Often people had to look at a website just to judge whether it was useful or not.
Tools that watch the behaviour of people on websites to see what they actually find useful could also help refine results.
Research by Dr Nielsen shows that people are getting more sophisticated in their use of search engines.
The latest statistics on how many words people use on search engines shows that, on average, they use 2.2 terms. In 1994 only 1.3 words were used.
"I think it's amazing that we have seen a doubling in a 10-year period of those search terms," said Dr Nielsen.
Thursday, 17 May 2007
More Than Just Web Design
At Ion e-Business we're more than just the experts in web design in Mission Beach. We can also help you improve the general I.T. in your business by recommending and purchasing new hardware, networking your machines, sharing peripherals in your office and generally helping you with office automation tasks.
We've just helped Mission Beach real estate specialists, Andersons Real Estate, incorporate new Windows Vista machines into their network and brought their Microsoft Office technologies up-to-date by introducing Microsoft Office 2007.
We've just helped Mission Beach real estate specialists, Andersons Real Estate, incorporate new Windows Vista machines into their network and brought their Microsoft Office technologies up-to-date by introducing Microsoft Office 2007.
Wednesday, 16 May 2007
Malware Hijacks Windows Updates
Courtesy of the BBC.
Virus writers may be able to smuggle malicious files onto a computer using Microsoft's security patch updates, experts say. At least one program is in circulation that can hijack a key component of Windows Update to introduce malicious software that could be used to hijack a computer.
The method bypasses users' firewall, allowing files to download undetected.
Ion e-Business can give you advice on the latest threats to your computers and web design technologies.
Virus writers may be able to smuggle malicious files onto a computer using Microsoft's security patch updates, experts say. At least one program is in circulation that can hijack a key component of Windows Update to introduce malicious software that could be used to hijack a computer.
The method bypasses users' firewall, allowing files to download undetected.
Ion e-Business can give you advice on the latest threats to your computers and web design technologies.
Tuesday, 15 May 2007
Open Source Infringes Microsoft Patents
Microsoft has given the most detailed description to date of the number of open-source computer programs it says infringe on its patents, but the company says it still prefers licensing deals with open-source developers, software distributors and users instead of legal action against them.
"There is no reason why any segment of the industry needs to be exempt from intellectual property rules," Horacio Gutierrez, a Microsoft vice president for intellectual property and licensing, said in an interview on Monday.
At the most basic level, open-source software is distributed free of charge to consumers or businesses to use on their computers, and to programmers to modify, build on, and distribute again - also for free.
While proprietary software companies like Microsoft make money by selling licences for programs, open-source companies give away the program and usually make money selling support services.
Open-source programs step on 235 Microsoft patents, the company said. Free Linux software violates 42 patents.
Graphical user interfaces, the way menus and windows look on the screen, breach 65. Email programs step on 15, and other programs touch 68 other patents, the company said. The patent figures were first reported by Fortune magazine.
Microsoft also said Open Office, an open-source program supported in part by Sun Microsystems, infringes on 45 patents. Sun declined to comment on the allegation.
Microsoft is the dominant maker of software that powers servers and desktop PCs, but the company views the free or low-cost Linux operating system alternatives "with a great deal of concern," said Al Gillen, an analyst at the technology research group IDC.
"It's one of the few operating systems that represents a viable threat that Microsoft has a great deal of difficulty containing," Gillen said, because the developers share their code.
"Microsoft can't drive a company out of business and make Linux go away," the analyst said.
Instead, Microsoft has struck a number of patent-licensing deals with companies that use open source code, most notably Novell last November.
In one aspect of the deal, Microsoft agreed to sell Novell's flavour of Linux, called Suse. It also agreed not to sue the customers who bought it, even though it claims the open-source software infringes on its patents.
"Microsoft could have chosen to litigate many years ago, but we have decided not to do that," Gutierrez said. Instead, in the interest of making sure programs that include open-source technology work well with Microsoft products and vice versa, the company will continue to pursue similar deals.
Courtesy of Sydney Morning Herald.
Contact Ion e-Business in Mission Beach for the latest web design technologies using Microsoft and open-source products.
"There is no reason why any segment of the industry needs to be exempt from intellectual property rules," Horacio Gutierrez, a Microsoft vice president for intellectual property and licensing, said in an interview on Monday.
At the most basic level, open-source software is distributed free of charge to consumers or businesses to use on their computers, and to programmers to modify, build on, and distribute again - also for free.
While proprietary software companies like Microsoft make money by selling licences for programs, open-source companies give away the program and usually make money selling support services.
Open-source programs step on 235 Microsoft patents, the company said. Free Linux software violates 42 patents.
Graphical user interfaces, the way menus and windows look on the screen, breach 65. Email programs step on 15, and other programs touch 68 other patents, the company said. The patent figures were first reported by Fortune magazine.
Microsoft also said Open Office, an open-source program supported in part by Sun Microsystems, infringes on 45 patents. Sun declined to comment on the allegation.
Microsoft is the dominant maker of software that powers servers and desktop PCs, but the company views the free or low-cost Linux operating system alternatives "with a great deal of concern," said Al Gillen, an analyst at the technology research group IDC.
"It's one of the few operating systems that represents a viable threat that Microsoft has a great deal of difficulty containing," Gillen said, because the developers share their code.
"Microsoft can't drive a company out of business and make Linux go away," the analyst said.
Instead, Microsoft has struck a number of patent-licensing deals with companies that use open source code, most notably Novell last November.
In one aspect of the deal, Microsoft agreed to sell Novell's flavour of Linux, called Suse. It also agreed not to sue the customers who bought it, even though it claims the open-source software infringes on its patents.
"Microsoft could have chosen to litigate many years ago, but we have decided not to do that," Gutierrez said. Instead, in the interest of making sure programs that include open-source technology work well with Microsoft products and vice versa, the company will continue to pursue similar deals.
Courtesy of Sydney Morning Herald.
Contact Ion e-Business in Mission Beach for the latest web design technologies using Microsoft and open-source products.
Sunday, 13 May 2007
Sitemaps
One often overlooked area of search engine optimisation is sitemaps.
Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters to inform search engines about pages on their sites that are available for crawling. In its simplest form, a Sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional metadata about each URL (when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how important it is, relative to other URLs in the site) so that search engines can more intelligently crawl the site.
Web crawlers usually discover pages from links within the site and from other sites. Sitemaps supplement this data to allow crawlers that support Sitemaps to pick up all URLs in the Sitemap and learn about those URLs using the associated metadata. Using the Sitemap protocol does not guarantee that web pages are included in search engines, but provides hints for web crawlers to do a better job of crawling your site.
In Mission Beach web design work performed by Ion e-Business never forgoes the use of sitemaps.
Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters to inform search engines about pages on their sites that are available for crawling. In its simplest form, a Sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional metadata about each URL (when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how important it is, relative to other URLs in the site) so that search engines can more intelligently crawl the site.
Web crawlers usually discover pages from links within the site and from other sites. Sitemaps supplement this data to allow crawlers that support Sitemaps to pick up all URLs in the Sitemap and learn about those URLs using the associated metadata. Using the Sitemap protocol does not guarantee that web pages are included in search engines, but provides hints for web crawlers to do a better job of crawling your site.
In Mission Beach web design work performed by Ion e-Business never forgoes the use of sitemaps.
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