zachstronaut

Let's not get all Gandhi here. You're not liberating a people from an oppressive colonial power. You are programming.

The newness of an idea does not indicate its objective "truth."

I'm saying that HTML and CSS can and should be brought "up to scratch."

I also disagree with your assertion that HTML, CSS, and JS somehow have some predefined subset of things that were intended to be built with them.

Do you have links so I can check out some web based word processors that deliver more of a desktop class experience than Google Docs does? Especially one where the UI is done entirely with Canvas?

Can you give an example of how Google Documents is falling short of being desktop class with their HTML/CSS based UI?

When we identify places that HTML/CSS are falling short for making desktop quality applications, and we bring those issues to the standards community, and we make HTML/CSS better, then we lift up everybody's applications. We make the whole web better. Together.

If we can get missing UI features into the browser, those UI features will have native implementations and APIs, and that will give all of us free functionality and better performance.

I'm attached to HTML and CSS because I remember UI programming before HTML and CSS. I'm attached to HTML and CSS because of the debugging tools for HTML and CSS UI. I'm attached to HTML and CSS because it allows for bookmarklets, and screenscraping, and browser plugins/extensions. I'm attached to HTML and CSS because it creates a beautiful separation between front end and back end code. I'm attached to HTML and CSS because UI designers can skin software built by JS programmers by tweaking a CSS file without having to know any JS. I'm attached to HTML and CSS because the web is HTML and CSS.

The Web is HTML. HTTP is Hyper Text Transport Protocol. I think you're advocating for a JSTP that just cuts out HTML and CSS entirely. And at that point, why not just serve up compiled JS since it will be less bandwidth, right? Goodbye open web.

Yes. I share your concerns. This attitude that HTML and CSS and browser UI somehow need to be replaced by a custom layer of JavaScript ultimately is a slippery slope towards things like applets and swfs... towards a byte-code compiled web. See also: Native SDK.

We've got all these mechanisms built up to deal with web UI that is constructed with HTML and CSS in terms of accessibility, in terms of search indexing, in terms of browser plugins and extensions, in terms of web services and bookmarklets, in terms of UI debugging... Also, the web UI you get with HTML and CSS inherits a bunch of standard behaviors and defaults that make for more consistent experience from site to site. Consistency in UI mental models is a great thing.

I can't think of a single argument FOR this idea of rendering UI entirely in canvas that shouldn't instead be met with a response of "so lets make HTML and CSS better!" Instead of improving the open standards of HTML/CSS, people are pushing towards proprietary solutions.

Sometimes even the best intentions can go awry. I don't think this is malice so much as ignorance.

I created the spotlight with a CSS3 radial gradient. I used pointer-events: none; on the element with the gradient so that mouse events would "go through" that element to the content below (the links). The lighting shadow casting effect is created via a box shadow and a text shadow. I'm adjusting the offset of the shadows based on the mouse position, and I'm also adjusting the blur on the shadows based on the distance of the "light source" for the content that is "casting" a shadow.

Sometimes there is a voicemail box for after hours calls. Fax works. Phone call works. Email works. Make sure to let them know you are a constituent. It helps to tell them your address.

I did that just for you in particular. I did it so you would call your congress members and tell them you oppose SOPA. And you made those calls for me, right? :p

The javascript does all the parallax motion of the shadow and adjusts the box and text shadow blur based on distance of "light source" from content. So the CSS and JS are rather intimately linked for the full effect. This is just the web nerd in my jabbering away. ;)

No worries, nicholas. This is the second time the link has hit the ycomb news homepage, so I've gotten plenty of attention already. Today is about stopping SOPA!

I can't believe how far my template has spread. I'm just really happy to help fight against SOPA.

shit... I should have read your whole comment.

Well, it was broken earlier. I guess you saw it after I fixed it. =)

A valid criticism, and I apologize, as I'm very interested in progressive enhancement. It was an omission, and I believe you will find that the page is readable in its default state without JavaScript now. (Mind you, I threw this thing together in the middle of the night last night on a creative whim, and wasn't exactly expecting to end up on ycombinator.)

Hilarious use of browser UI. I think the best touch is the scroll bar being the paddle.