Posted March 1, 2012 at 11:31 pm by Akshay
Web design is, contrary to some belief, an art form. It takes years of training, both off and on the job, and a lot of clients and prototypes to get to the level of quality a design company can label as their output. No five-minute fixes, no standard templates – each site needs to be unique, entertaining in its design, and useable without being patronisingly simple. This is a balance that takes professionals a long time and a lot of hard work to achieve, and it’s why your site is only safe in the hands of the best.
When someone first visits your site, the design is what’s really going to matter, in the same way a book cover will convince someone whether or not to pick it up off the shelf and read the blurb. Instantly, it’s a visual issue, and some websites can be really difficult to interpret, or just look plain unattractive. While functionality is a big deal, a company that puts a lot of focus on aesthetic and hooking visitors the moment the page loads – which should happen quickly, too, as slow sites are no good to anyone.
Clean code, custom designs and a close working relationship with the client is important to a good design team, and every design should be a consensus between what the client wanted to achieve, and what the company was able to grant them in terms of the finished site. You could be a new webmaster looking for his first step into site ownership, or someone who’s seen the clean designs of Facebook, Google, Amazon and partypoker and wants to have that same level of quality sitting proudly on their domain.
Lastly, it’s important to take into account the cost – sure, you can save money, but is it really worth it when a truly amazing site could pay for itself in ad revenue and loyal users who love the design and usability? Food for thought, certainly.
Posted May 24, 2011 at 7:39 pm by Akshay
I spent a while trying to complete the Themeforest.net author quiz, but while doing so I landed up compiling an answer key. Posting it here – just in case someone needs it:
- If you’d like to use an asset within your file that someone else created and you’re unsure whether you’re allowed to, what should you do? – Ask a lawyer or the asset’s license holder
- Who decides how files are priced? – The ThemeForest staff
- Who is responsible for copyright violations in submitted files? – The author
- What will happen if your submission does not validate (excluding browser-specific CSS)? – It will be rejected
- Who is responsible for testing files to make sure there are no errors? – The author
- Who is responsible for copyright violations in submitted files? – The author
- Which of the following would be an appropriate file title? – CoPilot – WordPress and Tumblog Theme OR 20 Tiled Wood Textures
- What should you do if another author has copied one of your files? – Contact Envato support
- Your file must work properly in which browsers? – All major browsers
- What will happen if your submission does not include documentation? – The item will be rejected
- What is most likely to happen if your file is visually unappealing? – It will get rejected
- What is most likely to happen if you copy someone else’s design, regardless of where you found it? - You will be banned
- When am I required to provide a help file? - When selling an Add-On, or any time a file requires advanced editing or contains an asset which requires attribution
- Who is responsible for copyright violations in submitted files? - The author
- If you’d like to use an asset within your file that someone else created and you’re unsure whether you’re allowed to, what should you do? - Ask a lawyer or the asset’s license holder
- When is it acceptable to upload a file type that’s on the files-we-don’t-need list? - When the file quality is especially high
Note: This may not be valid if Themeforest.net changes their author quiz. Last checked validity May 24, 2011
Edit – March 13, 2012: Added additional questions – thanks to Luki’s comment
Posted September 10, 2009 at 2:30 pm by Akshay
Google Docs offers an undocumented feature that lets you embed PDF files and PowerPoint presentations in a web page. The files don’t have to be uploaded to Google Docs, but they need to be available online.
Here’s the code I used to embed the PDF file:
<iframe src="http://docs.google.com/gview?url=http://infolab.stanford.edu/pub/papers/google.pdf&embedded=true" style="width:600px; height:500px;" frameborder="0"></iframe>
but you should replace the bold URL with your own address. As I mentioned, the document viewer works for PDF and PPT files.
Some other sites that offer similar features: Zoho Viewer, PdfMeNot.
Posted July 24, 2009 at 1:23 am by Akshay
Since the time I started writing code in bits and pieces, I always dreamed of creating at-least one major open source project. Although the Open Source conceptually still revolves more around GNU/Linux or like operating system, I personally feel that any piece of code released with its complete source code for general public usage can be broadly categorized as Open Source. For me, it simply gives me pride of being usable to someone whom you don’t even know. Its a blissful feeling to check your mail after days work to find appreciation notes, comments and suggestions on some plugin or widget you have developed.
This post is a small thanks giving note to all those you downloaded my WordPress plugins – Flash Photo Gallery and WP Web Scraper. In all these have received about 6,000 downloads in just about 5 months! Thanks for all your comments, suggestions, bug notifications and Donations!
Posted May 12, 2009 at 1:22 pm by Akshay
So. I’m officially here. In the blogosphere. Finally.
I struggled with what would be my first official post. It should be prolific after all this time, right? Grand in nature. Broad in scope. So, I struggled. And then I realized it’s just like walking into a room full of people you’ve never met – I’ll introduce myself to you. It seems like the most polite thing to do, right?
First an introduction for the unfamiliar. Web design and development (Web.D) is what I have been doing for a while now. Am sure most of you are not aware of this layer of me, but what the heck… some of you might not even be knowing me. So lets start from the scratch. I am Akshay Raje, a self thought freelance web designer and developer. I love travel and am a great movie buff too. Apart from the above, I try to spend the rest available time with my wife and also try to squeeze out of whatever time’s left for the Gym. Read further »
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Hi, My name is Akshay Raje. I am a self taught freelance web designer and developer. I love travel and am a great movie buff too. This blog is about my projects and experiments with web technologies. 
