In this section
The Code Style site has evolved by gradual refinement and accumulation of features and content. This review is part of a fully backdated site log and archive that sheds light on when, why and how particular features were implemented.
This log is sometimes updated several times per week, sometimes with a long overdue backlog of items. Many log entries refer to the Code Style Java package that delivers the servlet services and utilities used to manage this site.
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Reverse chronology
30th November 2001
Corrected accesskey attributes on the footbar navigation menu that were out of step with the sidebar menu.
29th November 2001
Web server logs show that Internet Explorer 4.01 for Mac incorrectly requests @import rule URLs relative to the source document, rather than the primary stylesheet in media stylesheet test cases 2, 3 and 6. Two workarounds exist; a server side redirection to the appropriate location or to specify the proper path to the imported stylesheet. Applied directory level URL redirection using the Apache rewrite module for the time being, so that it can easily be switched off temporarily for subsequent testing.
# Switch on rewriting
RewriteEngine on
# Declare the working URL path
RewriteBase /css/media
# Redirect requests for stylesheets in this directory to the right one
RewriteRule (^.*\.css) http://www.codestyle.org/styles/test/media/$1 [R=seeother]
Limited the robots.txt file exclusion to only test case 5, for which there is no workaround.
# Unsafe for IE4.01 Mac, don't go there!
User-agent:*
Disallow:/css/media/all-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/aural-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/braille-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/embossed-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/handheld-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/print-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/projection-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/screen-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/tty-Test5.shtml
Disallow:/css/media/tv-Test5.shtml
27th November 2001
Started writing up Internet Explorer 4.01 results for the CSS media monitor subsection. The original test case numbers 2, 3, 5 and 6 crash this browser because it incorrectly handles @import rules and falls down when it receives a 404 error document in return. Drafted an update to the robots.txt file to block search engines from indexing these documents and a warning to add to the document metadata to steer affected Mac users away.
26th November 2001
Added a couple of books to the Anchor Points: Java books section in a new draft definition list format.
25th November 2001
Changed include file prefixes in the CSS media monitor subsection to distinguish results for Windows and Mac systems and added test case results for Netscape Navigator on Mac to the set.
Realised that the site's XHTML documents were not being served as UTF-8 and corrected the MIME type in the root level .htaccess file accordingly:
# Serve correct type for (X)HTML
AddType "text/html; charset=UTF-8" html
AddType "text/html; charset=UTF-8" htm
AddType "text/html; charset=UTF-8" shtml
24th November 2001
Created 15 pixel square Mac 
, Windows 
and Unix 
icons for the CSS media monitor subsection to distinguish test results for different platforms.
20th November 2001
Finalised the pop-up font comparison functions for the Code Style font sampler section in sampler-FontComparison.js. Includes quite extensive method checking in the script to ensure fail-safe operation. If all else fails, the script relies upon reassigning the window.location property, so the onclick event handler checks for this as well as the main function (reformatted):
onclick="if((window.compareFonts)
&&(window.location)){
compareFonts('CenturySchoolbookL',
'CenturySchoolbookL');
return false;
}
else return true;"
The first argument is the CSS class for the font, the second the URL-escaped font name. Javascript enabled browsers that don't support external script files should just click through to the anchor's URL.
Various last minute adjustments to the markup and CSS for the FontSampler servlet version 1.5 including feint grey border-top and border-bottom rules for the comparison text declared inline (Netscape 4 doesn't appear to tolerate more than one value in a single class attribute).
16th November 2001
Installed the recent Opera version 6.0 beta and reviewed a selection of pages. On first appearances the media stylesheet implementation is identical to Opera 5.11, but some changes seem to have been made to the default user agent stylesheet. The code element does not appear to default to white-space: pre and the margin-right property of the sidebar menu ul selectors was exceptionally large, so made these explicit in the site stylesheets:
CSStdLayoutCommon.css
UL.Menu{
margin: 0em 0.2em 0.5em 1.5em;
padding-left: 0.2em;
padding-top: 0.5em;
}
UL.Menu UL{
margin-left: 1em;
margin-right: 0.2em;
padding-left: 0;
}
CSStdLiveryCommon.css
CODE{
letter-spacing: 0;
white-space: pre;
}
14th November 2001
Removed Mac OSX Japanese fonts from the Mac font survey as their names were evidently declared incorrectly and had none had been reported in the survey submissions to date.
11th November 2001
Created a lens icon, 
, for pop-up font comparison for the Code Style font sampler and surveys section.
10th November 2001
Changed all references to Anchor Points to initial case throughout the site. So much for forward thinking! Also created a top Anchor Points listing for inclusion in the Code Style site statistics page and Anchor Points section.
Implemented recommended getParameters() method for checking the request types for the FontSampler servlet and created separate methods to concatenate the markup strings for output separately from the main program logic, including a new comparison output:
-
imageSampler -
textSampler -
compareSampler
The main doGet method now checks an additional parameter, compare, which accepts values of normal or popup to adjust the markup accordingly. Removed the "Font sample:" prefix to page titles in the FontSampler servlet. Corrected the accesskey attribute on the #Footbar Help link.
Applied 16.6% left and right margins for the main #Content area in the CSStdLayoutNN4.css and CSWideImport.css stylesheets to create a 1:4:1 horizontal proportion for wide pages.
7th November 2001
Abandoned the separate article updates page and incorporated these into the What's New listing, with a permanent redirect from the deleted document. Revised the section link navigation, standfirst and Code Style section contents page to remove updates links and added the contents page to the section links navigation.
Removed an invalid alt attribute from the general feedback form and added a file name comment to the head of the CSWide.css stylesheet.
6th November 2001
Archived the October 2001 site log and updated the standfirst text for the Code Style site statistics; 1500 page requests per day and rising.
5th November 2001
Discovered Mac Internet Explorer 4.01 does not properly regard print media attributes on stylesheet links and renders print styles in screen mode. Also seems to crash with several test case documents in the CSS media monitor section. Further investigation with minimal test case documents required.
4th November 2001
Finalised the new Font sampler and survey FAQ and updated the Windows font survey results and Mac font survey results. Removed the Papyrus font image from the two Mac pages because the Windows version by Esselte is subtly different.
Further refined and tested the new form handler configuration. Added the new Anchor Points: DOCTYPE interpretation section to the Anchor Points: Cascading Style Sheets section. More browser links added to the Anchor Points: browsers and cross-compatibility section.
3rd November 2001
Configured and tested new Soupermail form handler script using a temporary adaptation of the standard article feedback form and disabled the installer script. Developed basic configuration, form status and email templates.
1st November 2001
New http://www.codestyle.info/ domain set up and operational, email forwarding configured in advance.
Previously on Code Style
These backdated pages record detailed changes to the Code Style Web site since July 2000, when development first got underway. Some pages may refer to documents or features that have since changed or are no longer part of the site, but the archive is checked to ensure there are no dead links.
Site log, origins to present
For a summary overview, see the annotated site log contents.
