That Net Site

If you read my first part on Sea/Tree change you will know that we went through the process of ensuring we were going to make the right choice, and as part of that choice we involved the whole family in the discussion.

The second part of our Tree Change (note no longer Sea/Tree change as we were moving to the country) was to identify where we would like to live, this involved;

• identifying what climate we wanted to live in
• what rough area/location we wanted to live in
• the rainfall in the area/location
• the schools in the area/location
• the services, hospitals and other amenities in the area/location
• distance from family and friends
• location from which a business could be run

These main factors gave us a starting point to work from, we were not looking for an actually property at this point but rather a location we will be comfortable in and do wish to live.  We already knew we wanted to live in the South West of Western Australia (WA) as we preferred the cooler temperatures and cooler nights than what we have now.  We wrote to and research schools in the South West of WA and listed the services and amenities each location had.  One vital component was a local hospital due to my own ongoing ill health.  We made a map of the South West of WA and shaded the annual rainfall areas in on the map and then selected a point we considered central to where we wanted to go and then drew a circle around that to idenity possible town sites we can take a look at as possible locations to move to.  We did not want to live on the coast and we did not want to go too far south or too far east so it was a central location we selected to start from.

Map of the South West of WA

Area selected

This gave us the starting point and so we then started to go out for a drive each weekend to look at possible locations.  As can be seen by the larger map, this was some 250 odd kilometres away from Perth so it was a day trip each time as we drove into a town and then ventured out from the town to have a look around at the land.

We quickly decided we did not want to live close to the main highway (South West Highway) as the amount of traffic was too high for our liking.  We also wanted to make sure the house that was on the property was complete and was not too old and needed little to no work.  With water also being an issue, as in most places there is a dependancy on water tanks for water, we also had to make sure the selected property had plenty of access to water.  The property had to have some acreage but not too much, neither of us want to be farmers but we would like to have room for a few animals such as horses, sheep and maybe even a few cattle.

Our driving around the areas soon made us feel we really did want to make the tree change and the kids also loved the areas we visited.  Each location we visited we marked down what was good and bad and then afterwards contacted local services such as schools to get more information about what was and what was not available.  The main issue for schools was the year 11 and 12 at high school as most high/middle schools in nearly all towns only went to year 10 and then the kids had to go to another school for year 11 and 12.  During our extensive research it was decided that Manjimup Senior High School will be the preferred school for our kids for year 11 and 12 due to the fantastic reputation and school record.  We then had to make sure where the bus service would go to so our kids could go to that school, this then reduced our range a little more which started to make the choice of possible living locations easier.

After several weeks of driving around we came across Boyup Brook, it was a little east of where I was thinking but we quickly felt this was a great location to live in, and it was on a second visit to the area we located a possible property to buy.  It was by chance the owners of the property noticed us looking at the property and invited us onto the property to take a look around.  It was 33 acres, had a tidy renovated home placed on top of the hill with magnificant views all around, plenty of water from an underground spring, massive dam, and council approval for chalets to be built on the property if you wanted to start a holiday style business, it was easy at that time to feel this would be the place for us.

To ensure the children liked Boyup Brook we took them out of school for a day and went back to Boyup Brook and showed them around the area and past the property we liked.  We drove around the adjacent areas, past the schools, the swimming pools, the sporting areas and so on and stopped and had lunch.  They like us felt a connection here.

We then went about arranging to visit the schools on the next visit to take the kids through and have a look at the schools.  This happened a few weeks later and the schools were quiet, small class sizes and the staff very pleasant and happy.  It was something our kids noticed as well as they commented on how happy everyone looked, teachers and kids.  Asking our kids later could they see themselves going to school there they said yes and this sealed it for us as this was our location of choice.

You may have noted that the above is written in past tense, this is because we are already living in Boyup Brook, I just had not made a post for quite some time (refer to my last post).  I will make another part of our Tree change soon, so bookmark my site now and come back soon.

For anyone that frequents my site and is wondering why the site has not been updated for a while, it is simply because my ongoing illness often stops me from doing a lot of things and there have been other things occupying my time.  However I want to keep this site up and running and will be trying to make more frequent posts as I can with posts being created over several days.

If you read my earlier post about Adobe killing of Homesite you may have thought so what will I (and others) use now.  I am very happy to say and recommend a great product called TopStyle.  Initially developed by Nick Bradbury of whom was the original developer of Homesite, TopStyle is now being further developed by Stefan van As.

As a long time user of TopStyle Lite that was included with some Homesite installs I can happily say that the latest version, TopStyle 4, is a remarkable product.  Originally designed to be for css documents, Topstyle 4 has now been expanded to cover most web code formats from html, xhtml, php, asp and so many more.

Stefan also provides great support via his newsgroups and the community in general is happy to pitch in and help others out.  The price for TopStyle is also great at only $79.95 for a new licence and only $29.95 for TopStyle 3 users.  When you compare it to other editors available on the market the price is very affordable… but the best thing about TopStyle is that you can expand on it yourself – add your own toolbars, common bits of code and a host of other user editable features – many of which I am still finding as I use it.

I am so impressed by TopStyle 4 I looked for a ‘Made with TopStyle’ badge – I did not find one so here is a set I have made up that hopefully Stefan can use and others will grab and support Stefan and his continued development of TopStyle.

Oh the link to TopStyle…  http://www.topstyle4.com/

Other sizes can be made on request

I am sure many out there that develop web sites have had the annoying need to keep tweaking styles and code for Internet Explorer 6 (ie6), I know I have and enough is enough.

There has to be a time where web developers must make a stand and say no more.  For me this is now, I feel people have had more than enough time to update to a better browser and for those that still use ie6 (or less) then they need to be told to update.

My reasons are simple, I have better things to do with my time than to keep trying to tweak web sites to suit a smaller group that continue to choose not to update their web browser.  There are many other obviouse reasons that if your nodding your heading you are already aware of, if not then go and read up on why by doing a Google search for ie6 hacks…

So how do we do this, it is simple really we add a message for ie6 users only to the top of your web page, something like this;

<!--[if lte IE 6]>
   <div class="ie6message"><img src="images/noie6.png" width="577" height="109"
alt="EEK! you're still using Internet Explorer 6!" /><br />
   <span class="ie6text">We are sorry but we do not support Internet Explorer 6 (IE6).<br />
   Please update to a newer web browser and start experiencing what the internet can really
show you.</span><br />
   <span class="ie6text">Please download, install and use one of the following browsers;<br />
   <ul><li><a href="http://en-gb.www.mozilla.com/en-GB/" target="_blank">
Firefox 3.5</a> (<strong>recommended</strong>)</li>
   <li><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/ie7/"
target="_blank">Internet Explorer 7</a></li>
   <li><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/default.aspx"
target="_blank">Internet Explorer 8</a></li>
   <li><a href="http://www.apple.com/safari/" target="_blank">Safari</a></li>
   <li><a href="http://www.opera.com/" target="_blank">Opera 9</a></li>
</ul></span></div>
<![endif]-->

Of course you will need to use your own noie6 image file or you can download this one

You will need to add some css styling for this message to your style sheet, here is what I have used (and this is simply for ie6)

.ie6message {
font:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
width:600px;
text-align: center;
margin:20px auto;
padding:12px;
background-color:#FFF;
border: 10px solid gray;
color:black;
}

.ie6message a {
color:blue;
}

span.ie6text {
text-align:left;
font-size: 18px;
}

span.ie6text ul {
margin-left: 15px;
}

span.ie6text li {
list-style: disc inside none;
}

The result is something like this;

We are sorry but we do not support Internet Explorer 6 (IE6).
Please update to a newer web browser and start experiencing what the internet can really show you.
Please download, install and use one of the following browsers;

• Firefox 3.5 (recommended)
• Internet Explorer 7
• Internet Explorer 8
• Safari 4
• Opera 9

The more people do this and make it clear that ie6 is no longer a supported web browser the more people will move away from it.  If we keep creating ie6 specific style sheets and other code just so ie6 users can browse the web then we will never be rid of it.

So help me and many other web developers and add the code above to your web page and let every ie6 user know it is time they updated to a newer web browser.

Adobe kills off Homesite

It is sad news, my beloved XHTML editor is now dead no thanks to Adobe with them announcing the death of Homesite as of the 26th May 2009.  They acquired Homesite from Macromedia (2003) and simply let it die, without even a hint of updating it or letting anyone know it would be abandoned since they took it over.

While other editors exist and will have to take the place of Homesite, at this stage there os no product (yet) that is as good as Homesite.   Adobe have simply said use Dreamweaver, but if I wanted to use Dreamweaver I would already be doing that.  The benefit Homesite has over Dreamweaver is that Homesite is light weight and very customisable – which is very different to Dreamweaver which is well over priced (as are all Adobe products) and is over bloated with extensions and tools and add-ons that for the most part are not needed.

I have made a post in their forums to ask why and also to see if they could release the software as open source, I will not hold my breath on that one as Adobe have never been on the side of goodwill intentions… Maybe (yer right) Adobe might release the final version (5.5) as a free download – but the downloads still show Homesite trial only as a download.

I find it very dissappointing in that it has taken them several years since taking over Macromedia to announce Homesites death, I will assume that many still bought it whilst also realising that number would have reduced over time since no updates or word on updates were provided by Adobe at any time.  There forums for Homesite (http://forums.adobe.com/community/homesite) while little used were there for some communication between users, but Adobe themselves never responded to any requests for where Homesite was going.

It is a sad day that this has happened and while it may not affect many I am sure there are some like me that had a faint hope that Adobe would release an updated version.. alas that is not to be