Technical Features of This Site
Here list some technical features of the site. These include programming features, design features, information organization features, usability features, etc. Hope they can be some kind of live learning examples. Related web resources are also listed.
ASP.Net master page
This site utilizes ASP.Net master pages; it applies a two-level hierarchical structure of master pages. For more information on ASP.Net master pages, visit:
AJAX and Jquery
The "Search" and "Free Software" section implements the AJAX technology, getting each section through an asynchronous call. JQuery is also used. For more information about AJAX and JQuery, visit:
Search API
The search functions are based on the Google AJAX search API and the Microsoft Bing Search API (SOAP) with some custom programming and configuration. For more information, visit:
RSS/Atom feeds
The content of the blog is mashed from blogspot.com using a XSLT file.
XML
This site uses XML for a number of data sources. One of these is an custom XML based file to manage the site structure (not the ASP.Net site map file). The menu on the left is dynamically constructed based on the XML file and the page a user is visiting.
An improved version of this XML protocol is under development.
XSLT
XSLT files are used to transform XML sources, include sitemap XML files and RSS feeds. The following XSLT files are for the sitemap XML at different places.
- Site menu XSLT source file (used for the main menu on every page)
- Site map XSLT source file (used in the "About -> Site Map" page)
- Site guide XSLT source file (used in the "Welcome" page)
- XSLT source file only for the "Cubicle H" section
CSS
The site also applies CSS for formatting:
- Main CSS file
- Default CSS file for the main menu (there are other style choices)
- A style sheet for printing. This is excludes header, footer, left menu column, and all kinds of fancy colors and styles. Try printing preview of this page (and any other page).