position: absolute - Design resources and inspiration.

A new issue of A List Apart is out. In issue no. 204, we are presented with two articles on the subject of columns: Multi-Column Lists (I’ve been looking for something like this!) and the CSS3 Multi-Column Module.

About A List Apart:

“A List Apart Magazine explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on techniques and benefits of designing with web standards.” (about page)

This has to be one of the most comprehensive collections of relevant links on the subject of web development that I have seen until now: The Web Developer’s Handbook.

It covers most of the essential links on creativity, CSS, CMS, color tools, SEO, semantics, typography, usability, and much more. Definately worth a bookmark.

Following the steps of the CSS Zen Garden, the recently launched CSS Table Gallery aims to display how the power of CSS can be used to make boring data tables look just as good as the rest of a site. It’s still a small collection, but it does sport a few highlights already. You’re invited to submit your own.

On a side note, it also shows that using semantic, accessible markup (such as <caption>, <th>, <tbody>, etc.) can give you more hooks to design things like headers seperately. It’s a win-win situation for both accessibility as well as design.

Many of us web developers use Chris Pedrick’s fantastic Web Developer Extension for Firefox. Wouldn’t it be great if there were such a tool for IE? Well, now there is, and it comes from none other than Microsoft themselves. Not quite as feature rich as Web Developer, but a step in the right direction, the Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar offers some features long missed by developers who have to fight with IE’s poor CSS support on a daily basis. Let’s just hope they update it regularly.

In Optimizing CSS presentation in HTML emails, Mark Wyner digs into the different email and webmail clients and presents how they support CSS, offering advice and workarounds to tackle the problem.

For a short time only: A List Apart’s XHTML Fist Shirt! Show them invalid code fools where the pain is.