With the first full week of work in 2012 for many people, there were lots of great posts and articles. Here are some of my favorites:

CSS

• The Lowdown on :Before and :After in CSS: I loved Joshua Johnson’s clear explanations of the syntax and examples on how to use the :before and :after pseudo-elements in CSS.
• 40 CSS Reference Websites and Resources: A great collection of CSS cheat sheets, resources and compatibility tables.
• Responsive Data Table Roundup: Chris Coyier highlights different developers thoughts on how to manage responsive data tables, including my southeast Michigan colleague Brad Czerniak’s Rainbow Tables proposal.

WordPress

• 20 Free WordPress Plugins That Every User Should Have: With over 17,000 plugins (as of Jan 2012) to choose from , how do you know which one to choose? ManageWP has put together a list of useful plugins to consider.
• Safer Email Link Plugin: Kudos to Andrew Norcross for creating this plugin. Safer Email Link hides the email address so only browsers can view it, and jumbles the email address in the source code.
• Head to Head: Yoast’s WordPress SEO vs All in One SEO Pack: Read this review of the pros and cons of two of the most popular SEO plugins.

Accessibility

• How to Structure an Accessibility Review: Joe Dolson points out the key items to include in an accessibility review.
• Keyboard equivalent of “looking”?: A screenreader user (who formerly had full vision) describes how he looks on a page using a screen reader.
• Are You Confused by HTML5 and WAI-ARIA Yet? by Everett Zufelt and Confusion over HTML5 & WAI-ARIA by Karl Groves are two articles that will answer many questions about the use of WAI-ARIA in HTML5.
• Web Accessibility Myths: Part 2: Jonathan Hassell, the lead-author of British Standard BS8878, covers ten more important myths about accessibility. His tenth myth Accessibility is Just About Blind People points out that people who are blind comprise only 1.6% of the disabled population in the United Kingdom. 

User Experience

• 5 Things Every Mobile Design Should Have: Planning the mobile strategy for your websites? Keeps these five things in mind.
• Why Scrolling Is the New Click: While in the past users would rather click than scroll, users now find clicking a chore and would gladly scroll for information.
• Beware the Dark Side of UI and What A/B Tests Don’t Tell You: Interesting case study of a re-activation marketing email message from Sears and leading customers down the wrong path.
• Usability Design for Online Web Forms: Make your online forms simple, easy to use, secure, and ask the minimum number of questions.

What I Found Interesting

• The 17 Rs I Learned About Mobile Marketing: My notes from this week’s Mobile Marketing Workshop webinar hosted by HubSpot.
• Five Essential Google Analytics Tips for Designers: Focus on funnels, check for exceptions, and learn from the successful pages to improve your other pages.
• LinkedIn for Students and Recent Graduates: Thanks to my online colleague Sarah Bourne for sharing LinkedIn’s special section which includes internships and jobs for students and recent graduates.

One of my 2012 goals is posting a weekly resource article on web design and user experience. Last year I started a weekly resource post, but didn’t manage to maintain it. So I’m going to give it another try. Hope you find the resources useful.

Wish me luck!

CSS

• Seven things still missing from CSS: Excellent post from open web evangelist and web standards advocate Molly Holzschlag. Despite the advances seen in CSS over the years, we’re still missing basic options and have accepted concepts that force us to use kludges.
• Fullscreen Background Image Slideshow with CSS3: Pretty amazing CSS animations; check the comments for suggestions for improving speed and code.
• Introducing the New Cursor Styles in CSS3: Wow. I had no idea there were so many new cursor styles in CSS3. Did you know you can create your own cursor graphic?

Accessibility

• An In Depth Analysis of HTML5 Multimedia and Accessibility: Good tutorial on improving accessibility in HTML5 multimedia with a focus on WebVTT.
• PDF Techniques for WCAG 2.0: Published this week by the W3C, 23 techniques for improving the accessibility of PDFs.
• Wayfinding: Writing for Accessibility: Tips on crafting accessible content, using the Transport for London website as an example.

WordPress

• 25 Things to Do After Installing Your WordPress Blog: If you don’t have a checklist for what to do after you install your WordPress blog, start with this list.
• Why You Shouldn’t Use Plugins: No tool is all-in-one. Plugins bring functionality and features that make it easier for you to maintain and upgrade your site in the future.

User Experience

• Common Website Usability Mistakes: The worst thing to do is to ask someone to take a look at your just released website. Want answers? Ask these specific questions.
• 20 Free eBooks You Need to Design an Outstanding User Experience: So glad these are available as eBooks, I have many of them on my bookshelves. Now you can download them for free. Get your pick from books by Jenifer Tidwell, Shawn Henry, Mark Boulton, and more.
• Customer Experience vs. User Experience: Leisa Reichelt recommends user experience practitioners could benefit from understanding the structure as well as the discipline and business focus that customer experience professionals bring.
• How to Write a Great User Experience Resume: Include the basics, list your skills (wireframes, personas, HTML/CSS,) and list your projects with URLs.
• It’s Complex to Make a Product Simple: A reminder to keep it simple for users, they shouldn’t be aware of the complexities behind the services and products we build.

What I Found Interesting

• What Journalists Need to Know About SOPA: Confused about what SOPA means? Good article explaining SOPA.
• SOPA vs. PIPA vs. OPEN: Excellent chart showing the differences between the three proposed US bills on Internet privacy.
• Dropbox Automator: Automate your Dropbox with the many different features Dropbox Automator provides. Save your Word document to Dropbox and have it automatically converted to PDF. Upload a photo to Dropbox and have it automatically uploaded to Flickr. And many more options.