I imagine if web managers in libraries have even heard of HTML5 they consider it something to worry about in a few years. The truth is that it brings a lot of useful options that can be used now in most browsers, including IE6 (with a small javascript).
The thing that should make librarians happy is [...]

An Idiot’s Guide To Accessible Website Design | Web Design Ledger
If you are designing web sites in the UK, you probably already know that the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) mandates web sites be accessible by visually and physically disabled persons. But even if you work in a locale that doesn’t have any accessibility requirements yet, [...]

The Accessibility Checklist I Vowed I’d Never Write | Web Builder Zone
I have said on numerous occasions that there is no simple checklist that, when followed, will give you an accessible site without fail. There are simply too many variables. But, what do you do when you want to create accessible pages and you have [...]

Jeffrey Zeldman Presents : The Web Design Survey

Presenting A List Apart’s first annual web design survey. The information it collects will help us form a long overdue picture of the ways web design is really practiced around the globe. The more people who complete the survey, the richer and more detailed the picture will become.

Depending [...]

InfoTangle :: Information Design for the New Web :: April :: 2007
People are changing the way that they consume online information, as well as their expectations about its delivery. The social nature of the Web brings with it an expectation of interaction with information and modern Web design is reflecting that. There are now alternate [...]

hennepin county library’s bookspace

The ever resourceful Librarian in Black breaks a huge story about hennepin county library’s bookspace which is an online community based around books. I’m going to copy her list of things readers can do at bookspace:
* create their own account for Book Space
* sign [...]

Tomski: The BBC’s Fifteen Web Principles

Build web products that meet audience needs: anticipate needs not yet fully articulated by audiences, then meet them with products that set new standards. (nicked from Google)
The very best websites do one thing really, really well: do less, but execute perfectly. (again, nicked from Google, with a tip of the [...]

Building a Library Web Site on the Pillars of Web 2.0

Subtraction: Feeding the Hand That Fed Me
It took me a little while to get this all cleaned up and ready for release, but I’m finally making the expanded RSS buttons that we’ve started to use at NYTimes.com available to everyone. You can grab the PNG file here (right- or control-click on the image at [...]

The Form Assembly – Free Web Form Templates

Google Operating System: Test Internet Explorer 7 Without Installing It
There aren’t likely to be many more changes to the rendering engine so it’s safe to make changes based on the pre-release.

HigherEd BlogCon 2006: Know Enough to Be Dangerous by Steve Lawson

Know Enough to be Dangerous: Tools for taking control of HTML and CSS
A presentation for HigherEd BlogCon 2006 in the Websites & Web Development track by Steve Lawson, Humanities Librarian, Colorado College

Drupal is an open-source content management system for managing websites. It is also the basis for the most advanced library websites being published these days (Picture users only logging once and having access to their account and all of the library’s services.). drupalib is a site for the community of those lucky enough to have [...]

librarian.net » standards compliant library websites has some good links. I’ve put off posting this until I could put some real thought into it but that doesn’t look like it’ll be happening soon.
I can add that I converted our library web manager to standards when it took me 15 minutes to skin the library’s [...]

345 Free Online Programming Books

Building Best Practice Websites: 101 Must Have Checklists – New Web Site Essentials Book – web design Sacramento, web site design, development, accessibility graphics, Sacramento, Carmichael, California, accessible websites – SKDesigns
… a new book on essentials for Web sites, including planning, creating, designing, and long-term management. Now in production with the publisher, SitePoint Books, [...]

This three-part article series is intended to make it easier for non-experts to perform a basic accessibility check. I hope it will be helpful enough to make at least a few websites more accessible.

Evaluating Website Accessibility Part 1, Background and Preparation | 456 Berea Street
Evaluating Website Accessibility Part 2, Basic Checkpoints | 456 Berea Street
Evaluating [...]

blyberg.net » Library 2.0 websites: Where to begin?
Let me suggest five directives that may help get your creative minds turning. I want to talk about these not only because they represent common sense, good design, and patron convenience, but also because by using these directives as a kernel in your new project, you are [...]

As library websites evolve, will parts of them become online applications like Google maps and Flickr? I can almost visualize one for aggregated database and catalog searching that users could personalize to their needs. It could be a solution to the simplicity vs. power debate.
Digital Web Magazine – Usability for Rich Internet Applications
Rich [...]

Evaluating the Usability of Search Forms Using Eyetracking: A Practical Approach :: UXmatters

Clearly label input fields. Doing so won’t bother pro users, but is a great help to your novice users.
Drop-down lists are very eye catching form elements. You should always consider very carefully whether you should include a drop-down list in a search form. [...]

Browse through the sites below to find ideas or pieces of code to help in your next redesign.

Open Source Web Design – Download and upload free web designs.
Open Web Design

Get Tooled Up:’Evaluating Web Sites for Accessibility with Firefox’, Ariadne Issue 44

Often developers lack time or training and simply rely on one of the many automated testing tools such as WebXACT [5], Cynthia [6] or Wave [7]. But even those mechanical checks need to be supplemented (and, to avoid false positives, counter-checked) by manual checks.
Based [...]

LibrarianInBlack: Library Websites and Usability

Laura Solomon (webmaster for the Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library) conducted a usability survey of Ohio public library websites, using Jakob Nielsen’s usability criteria. Her study, “Sinking or Swimming: The State of Web Sites in Ohio’s Public Libraries,” shows that many libraries haven’t focused enough attention on putting the information [...]

Marylaine Block explains what she expects to find on library websites.
Ex Libris–an E-Zine for Librarians and Information Junkies — issue 259

In the process of researching my next book, I’ve been exploring library web sites, from the standpoint not of a librarian, but of a reasonably sophisticated user searching for specific kinds of information about those [...]

FavIcon from Pics is a service that takes graphics and turns them into those little pictures that pop-up beside your url in the browser window. Just upload the favicon.ico file to the root folder of your website and it should be found automatically.

Digital Web Magazine – The Principles of Design

peterme.com: Designing for the Sandbox

In fact, the best thing a designer can do is dictate *as little as possible.* Because the point isn’t to control, it’s to connect–to weave your offering into the complexity of people’s life experiences, to allow them to figure out how to make sense of your offering within their world.

LJ has a new website.
Steven bemoans the fact that they still don’t have any RSS feeds. This is really becoming an accessability issue. With the amount of information we have to go through each day, clicking through the website on a regular basis just isn’t going to work.
Bill found a blog. Complete with [...]

In an attempt to get my unread list in mt aggregator down to something managable, I present the inevitable link list (annotated because some librarians are born, not made).

ALA | Patriot Act Extension Debated at Closed Congressional Meeting

In a closed-door meeting May 26, the Senate Intelligence Committee failed to agree on a proposal that would [...]

Information Wants To Be Free » Library services to distance learners is a quick guide to getting started on Distance offerings.

YourTotalSite.com / Simple Design Tips for Non-Designers

Web design is an interestingly unique skill. Due to its infancy, it is a career in which many professionals have very little formal training. Designers may not have training in programming and programmers rarely have training in design. As much as I understand and appreciate design, [...]

In librarian.net:serving lower literacy users through effective web design, jessamyn mentions Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox as a great place to find useability information for creating webpages.
Though he is a well-respected advocate, occasionally Nielsen’s advice can border on the excessive. The best design is a balence between useability and the attractiveness associated with a professional and [...]

The Kitchen: How to Cook a Weblog � What is CSS? is a plain-language explanation of what Cascading Style Sheets are and why Geeks are so excited about them.

I’m clearing out my drafts folder since it doesn’t require a lot of reading.
Principles of Graphic Design is a flash slide show that steps you through some of the basics. It presents some good bits of information and explains some unfamiliar terms.

Digital Web Magazine – Accessibility From The Ground Up covers the broad basics from the web designers’s prospective.

gotomedia : goto guides are forms that provide website project management guidelines.

4GuysFromRolla.com – The XHTML Way argues in favor of using the XHTML standard for coding websites. Many designers are debating between XHTML and HTML 4 which doesn’t have the same restrictions that XHTML does. The basic argument is that you can do more things with HTML 4 that you would have to resort to javascript [...]

Digital Web Magazine – Introduction to Databases is an explanation of the nature of databases in terms that non-techs can understand.

Get Tooled Up:’Testing Web Page Design Concepts for Usability’, Ariadne Issue 40. Dey Alexander and Derek Brown demonstrate how the layout of a Web page has a direct influence upon users’ capacity and willingness to engage with a Web site.

When I first looked at the new Phoenix Public Library (PPL) web site I thought: nice job�they probably outsourced everything. Why? Because the site feels like a high-end commercial site. We’ve all seen the bells and whistles before�when buying a book, tracking a shipment, or performing any number of other complicated transactions online. Finally, my [...]

Assessing the accessibility of fifty United States government Web pages: Using Bobby to check on Uncle Sam by Jim Ellison
This study evaluates the current accessibility of U.S. Government Web pages for people with disabilities. Several Federal laws, and specifically Section 508 of the U.S. Rehabilitation Act, require Web pages of government agencies to be accessible [...]

[Developing With Web Standards] explains how and why using web standards will let you build websites in a way that saves time and money for the developer and provides a better experience for the visitor. Also discussed are other methods, guidelines and best practices that will help produce high-quality websites that are accessible to as [...]

Web Design References, University of Minnesota Duluth
This site is dedicated to providing knowledge of web design and development. It advocates accessibility, usability, web standards and many related topics by:

Imparting news and information on making web sites obtainable and functional to largest possible audience.

Providing topical news and information for designing web sites that are effective, efficient, [...]

optimal web design
Designing a website that takes into account the human element requires both an understanding of our nature as well as our physiological limitations. Usable websites incorporate human tendencies and limitation into its overall design. The questions below are meant to address some of the more important human factors concerns in the design and [...]

WaSP : Learn : Reference: Web Standards for Business
This article highlights the benefits of using Web standards for business sites (Internet, intranet and extranet sites). It is aimed at stakeholders from the marketing, communication and IT departments.

How To Conduct An Online Survey and Engage Customers In A Dialogue | ReachCustomersOnline.com
Because our websites are becoming increasingly important in interacting with patrons. They need to be as usable as possible.

Rapid Navigation in Online Documents make electronically delivered documents far easier and more practical and faster to work with, by expanding beyond the “help topics” design paradigm. This site covers information structuring; rapid navigation; and designing Help, Web pages, and documents.

Web Design References: Information Architecture has everything you might need to get started on IA.

Digital Web Magazine – Features: Web design and integrated marketing
One thing all libraries need to be concentrating on these days is marketing. The current generations of users have no idea what we’re capable of. And the Internet is an ideal method to use for its intrinsic “coolness” and low cost.

Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines
A book of research-based guidelines on web-design and usability.

Five Effects of a Site on a Service Business Brand
Good things to remember when designing or redesigning. Libraries aren’t businesses but the principles are still applicable.

Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines

Usability testing of library websites: Selected resources

University Library Navigation Enabled by Ekahau
“Wireless PDA based system called SmartLibrary helps users to find books and other material from the library collections. The help is provided in form of map-based guidance to the target bookshelf on a PDA. Ekahau Positioning Engine(tm) software is used by SmartLibrary system to pinpoint the accurate mobile client location.”
This [...]

Remote Online Usability Testing: Why, How, and When to Use It is a write-up of notes from a pair of web-developers who just went through the proccess. It’s good alternative when most of your website users are at a distance.

The Information Design approach to Web development from Digital Web Magazine is an interesting look at information management from a non-librarian.
It’s important to remember that the business world has realized that it needs our expertise, we just haven’t been very good at letting them know it is our expertise.

How a Travel Site Raised Sales Conversions 30% With 26 Little Site Design Tweaks
This might not look relevant to libraries but with the increasing importance of the Internet in disseminating information, the library’s website is becoming as important as the physical building for serving patrons. Optimizing the experience can bring users back again and raise [...]