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Seven and a half questions for Patrick Griffiths

Wednesday March 30, 2005

Patrick Griffiths

Patrick Griffiths is the owner of HTML Dog, proprietor of Vivabit, designer of CSS Zen Garden's Elastic Lawn, inventor of the Suckerfish Dropdowns, organiser of London's @media 2005 web standards and accessibility conference and author of the soon to be published XHTML and CSS : A Web Standards Approach... phew!

I had the pleasure of meeting Patrick in London last year but got so pissed I forgot much of what we talked about, I thought it was time to get some answers:

The questions on everyone's lips, what's with the nipple suction toys and have they been received as well as the dropdowns?

Well, first came the original Suckerfish Dropdowns, then came the Sons of Suckerfish collection and now we have Suckerfish - the nipple suction toys. It's the next big web standard. You'll see documentation on the W3C site soon.

Between yourself and a few other people of note, you've pretty much written everything that needs to be said about CSS and XHTML. Where do you feel that leaves people like me, who would like to write about standards but wonder if there is any point?

Most things I've written, and in fact most things most people have written about web standards, are simply (well, not simply ) translations of the nigh-on impenetrable W3C gobbledegook specs into English.

It's always worth new voices explaining things from their point of view because the more people that do that, the more chance there is that sensible arguments can be made and more chance that the message will get across and be understood.

And various tricks and techniques for achieving certain design effects are always going to be stumbled or improved upon now and then.

When IE 7 comes along, and when its popularity increases, some limitations that are currently forced on us will be lifted (well, let's hope there'll be better web standards support). Before you know it there will be a whole host of things you can do that weren't previously possible, just like when people accepted Netscape 4 was well and truly dead.

Disclaimer

Interpret the "before you know it" comment very loosely

And if you really want to take things to the next level, become a JavaScript guru. It's the next big thing.

I know you like to come here and have a bit of a swear in the comments, with the full canvas at your disposal is there anything you'd like to add?

I have to say in my defence that you did give me a personal and explicit invite to come to your site and swear to my heart's content :)

As the recent nipple related incident proved, some people just don't like sentiment that doesn't appear on every page of the Old Testament. Personally, I love "bad" language. I have held back from swearing on HTML Dog in the past to be eligible for a PG rating, but I think it has been impeding the transmission of my personality, so I'm considering a new approach. Maybe a Certificate 15.

Even in my short time as part of the web standards community, I have seen the overall quality of CSS based site design shoot through the roof recently, who's rocking your world at the moment?

When Doug Bowman says something everyone knows it's worth sitting up and listening. He's one of the very few examples of someone who was writing and teaching me things web standard years ago and is still doing so today. We're all waiting for a book, right? I'm sure he knows it and I'm sure certain book publishers know it too... :)

I think it's worth keeping in mind that there are LOTS of good web designers out there and what sets those in the web standards community apart is not the quality of graphic design, but the quality of code underlying it.

I don't think people like Molly Holzschlag or Anne Van Kesteren get enough credit from certain corners. The web standards community, which, like I said, is unique for it's technical focus, is dominated by designers, which I find fascinating.

Coming back to your question regarding design though, there's a long list of people I admire. A few recent designs I really like that are coupled with web standard code come from Martin Smith, and, dare I say it, your good self. The "Brit Pack" as a whole do pretty bloody well, in fact.

What's the next major step CSS based design has to take?

Multi-media springs to mind. Accommodating mobile devices in particular.

What music do you like to listen to when you are working?

I'm a soul man (Dada-dada dada-dada). Mostly the newer stuff (but not exclusively - Prince and Sly Stone are two particular old school favourites). Jill Scott, D'Angelo, Amy Winehouse etc. A bit of hip-hop now and again. I've been a long-time Outkast fan. Kid Koala amuses me. I like Britney Spears videos too.

How are preparations for @media 2005 going, any juicy gossip to be had?

They're going terribly! It's all turning to shit!

No, not really... it's going extremely well. Much better than I had anticipated, in fact. It's clearly not just Americans that are interested in this web design conference malarkey.

Going to SXSW was a great opportunity, not only to meet the non-UK speakers who are coming to @media 2005, but also to see them speak and to get a general feel for web design conferences. I've come away even more excited and confident about it than I was before.

It's also going to sell out, I'm pretty sure of that, which is a relief considering the initial risks.

Evening events, which I know is something particularly close to your heart, and additional speakers will be announced soon.

Well, thank you for taking the time to answer the questions Patrick, I have only half a question left to ask. If given half the chance... ?

...would you dress up in a monkey suit and run down Oxford Street shouting "Banana! Banana! I need a banana!"?

No. I don't think I would.

  1. Rob McMichael

    1247 days ago

    Heh great stuff, I will be checking out HTML Dog a lot more I think.

    Question though, how do you get any work done? I am struggling to work just reading half your posts!

    Keep them coming though!

  2. Martin W

    1247 days ago

    Now this is exactly what we need…the personality behind the name – you don’t get this level of insight from booknotes..non of that “born here, lives here and has a cat” rubbish we’re not interested in!

    You do realise, you’re going to get even more visitors because of these exclusives don’t you :O)

  3. Raven

    1247 days ago

    wonders if some radiation was applied to flowers, then puts on his radio-protective suite and starts to write a comment

    Heh, nice stuff you have there… :) Had fun with the “Suckerfish – nipple suction toys” (still don’t see where the problem was, it’s not even that offensive).

    Can’t wait to see the next one…

    starts to choke, crawls away while he can

    (John could you maybe provide the old flowers for download, so I could just set-up a local style and replace the flowers? :D Or maybe e-mail them to me, pretty please…)

  4. Raven

    1247 days ago

    Forgot about the Textile thingy, ah, well… :(

  5. Schultzy

    1247 days ago

    Dowload them yourself it aint hard.

    Cheers for the insight, I will belooking more at your site…
    Looked at the first tutorial and I didnt know half of it so if all are the same I will be coming round more often.

    Cant see why abit of weirdo fetish stuff would affend people it is your site. Reminds me of that Points of View program on the BBC long dead now but people used to write in and complain about programs.

    People will complain too much these days looks like your site provides alot of stuff and what do they do throw it in your face over abit of fun.

  6. Martin Smith

    1247 days ago

    This is a great idea John, makes really good reading!
    Hey Patrick! Thank you very much for the mention sir!

  7. Colly

    1247 days ago

    Swearing is great. A blog without swearing is like a bacon sandwich without any HP Sauce.

    If John and Patrick recall the drunken meeting last year, we did all agree to swear much, much more on our blogs. Patrick I think is lagging behind on that.

  8. Malarkey

    1247 days ago

    I really must object to the stuff that person said. People saying stuff like that is really out-of-order, and when they say even more stuff, it makes my blood boil!

  9. Rob Mientjes

    1247 days ago

    Nice. Finally some none-generic questions.

    Colly is right Patrick. Not Javascript but swearing is the next big thing.

  10. Schultzy

    1247 days ago

    Javascript for me has been and always will be a gimmick to me.

    It never has had the functionality of PHP.

    Even if it is coded well it always seems slow too.

  11. Abel Rios

    1247 days ago

    You’ve struck gold with this one. Great questions, and no beating around the bush tactics either. Very well done on both sides. :)

  12. AkaXakA

    1247 days ago

    Shultzy: That’s why remote scripting (xmlhttprequest, or Ajax) is so usefull. It allows to add Java, PHP or practically any other server-side tech in your javascript.

    Jon: Good questions.
    Pat: Not too bad on the answers.

    Disclaimer

    Interpret the “before you know it” comment very loosely

    Classic! And very true too, sadly.

    SWSX [..] to get a general feel for web design conferences

    Don’t forget scriv’s comments . Don’t forget to make it fun :)

  13. Mika

    1247 days ago

    Excellent stuff :)

  14. Jay-Dee

    1247 days ago

    Jamie here from Manchester.

    Great Article – I really enjoyed reading this and even more enjoyed the info about the “great british piss up”.

    If your ever in the area, drop me an email….We have plenty of pubs in this area.

  15. kartooner

    1247 days ago

    Good stuff, the part about the Suckerfish nipple suction toys is priceless.

    Maybe I’ll shoot over some “non-generic” (thanks Rob for the word of the day) questions to you, John, just for the hell of it. I’ll call it “5 questions or less”.

    Hmm…

  16. Tom Werner

    1247 days ago

    Great interview! I look forward to future editions!

  17. SteveC

    1246 days ago

    You missed out the legendary Orange Afro!

  18. dotjay

    1246 days ago

    John, you should’ve asked Patrick whether the @media conference bag is going to be like a Mac “Lucky Bag”. I wouldn’t mind an iPod… =)

  19. Patrick

    1246 days ago

    How the hell did you find out about orangeAfro? :P

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