the 200ok weblog

about ben buchanan

I entered the web industry the same way as most people I know: by studying something else (Journalism and Philosophy, in case you're wondering). I made a hobby into a profession when I discovered people were willing to pay me to stuff around with computers.

I'm passionate about accessibility and web standards. The technology exists to provide rich web communications which remain accessible to all people... I believe the web industry needs create sites for users, not in spite of them.

I currently work as Frontend Developer for Atlassian (Sydney, Australia). Previously I worked as Frontend Architect for News Digital Media; and before that as Web Standards Developer for Griffith University (in Brisbane).

speaking

• Presented at Web Standards Group (Sydney), September 2011.
• Presented at the Ed Directions workshop during Web Directions South 2009.
• Presented at Edge of the Web 2008
• Presented the second day keynote at Local Government Web Network Conference 2008, Sydney, 21-22 August.
• Presented at Open Publish 2008, Sydney, 30-31 July
• Presented at Web Standards Group (Sydney) on Thursday, 21st February 2008.
• Presented at Open Standards 2007
• Presented at Web Directions South 2006: "Moving your organisation to standards" (full details available at the WD06 website).
• Presented (via VOIP) at OZeWAI 2005
• Organised the WANAU Brisbane Web Accessibility Forum (August 29, 2005)
• Presented at Web Standards Group Brisbane meeting, 14 June 2005.

judging

• Member of the judging panel for the Australian Web Awards 2010.
• Member of the judging panel for the Australian Web Awards 2009.
• Member of the judging panel for the WA Web Awards 2008.

writing

• Contibuted articles to the Opera Web Standards Curriculum, which has since been adapted as the W3C Web Standards Curriculum.
• Had an article published in the inaugural Local Government Web Network magazine.

you may remember me from such events as...

You can usually find me anywhere that web geeks have gathered in Sydney. I also created Geeks on the Grass along with my partner in picnic crime Ajay Ranipetra.

I was definitely at Web Directions South 2011, Web Directions South 2010, Web Directions South 2009, Web Directions South 2008, Web Directions South 2007, Web Directions South 2006, Web Essentials 2005 and OZeWAI 2004.

qualifications

• Over a decade's experience creating websites. Plus a short course or two.
• Started a Graduate Certificate in Information Technology (Web Management) from the Queensland University of Technology, but that was cut short when attending the course opened an opportunity to move to Sydney and start a new job. Long story, ask me at the pub.
• Bachelor of Arts (Journalism & Philosophy) from the University of Queensland.

memberships

Web Standards Group

about the 200ok weblog

content

The 200ok Weblog is a space for me to write about Web Stuff™. Web developers are multi-skilled beasts, so it's a multi-faceted topic. It usually strays back to standards and accessibility, though.

tech

The 200ok Weblog is published using Blogger, since I am more interested in writing the blog than maintaining the blog tool.

almost valid

This site is almost valid.

Blogger unfortunately hard-codes some dumb things, which makes the markup less than ideal at times. The validation errors it creates are things that don't cause major issues (that I've seen, at least). It's mostly things like uppercase BR tags inserted in comments; unencoded ampersands and so on. Blogger's inline comments can be problematic; so as a workaround I've got a direct link embedded for screen readers and mobiles. I've had to trade markup purity for usability.

I'd love it if Blogger would come to the standards party, but it doesn't seem to be a priority for what is more of a mass-publishing tool than a standardista's dream. On balance it's still the best tool for what I want.

200ok?

200 OK is the HTTP status for "The request has succeeded." (RFC 2616 10.2.1). Need I say more? :)

about the stamp

So, what's the deal with the stamp you see on the site, various avatars, my business cards, stickers and badges? It's a stone stamp/stone chop with "200ok" translated as closely as possible in Chinese.

The top two characters are a direct translation of two hundred; the bottom two form "you can" in the sense of "you have permission" which I felt was a reasonably close interpretation of OK in this context (apparently there's no direct equivalent).

The translation and stamp were created by a lovely gentleman in Sydney who makes these stamps for a living. You can find him at the Paddington Markets on most Saturdays.

I do in fact stamp every one of my business cards, by hand, with the stone stamp. So, each card is slighly different.

disclaimer

opinions

Views expressed are my own and not associated with any view of an employer, client, associate, acquaintance, barista, busker or random person I met in the lift.

copyright

All material is copyright Ben Buchanan unless attributed to another source.

privacy

This site doesn't really collect private data, but even if it did I would use it only for good and not for evil.

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