Holovaty.com

Online chat tool on kusports.com

My first project at my new job debuts Wednesday afternoon. It's a Web-based chat application that simulates a dynamically-updated, real-time chat room -- without using Flash, Java or clunky meta tags. It uses a combination of JavaScript DOM tricks and server-side programming to make dynamic updates.

Most Web-based chat applications, such as washingtonpost.com's Live Online chats, use meta auto-refresh tags to give the illusion of continual updating. Those are easy to implement (a single line of code in your page will do the trick), but they carry major baggage: Every time the page refreshes, the browser must reload the entire page from scratch. Of course, in a chat setting, user-generated content doesn't change; rather, more content keeps being generated. In other words, it's redundant to reload an entire chat if you know none of the text has changed; it's much more efficient to load only the newest stuff.

And that's precisely how the new ljworld.com / kusports.com chat system works. When you join a chat, it'll load all the messages posted up to that point. From then on, JavaScript will make frequent remote calls to the server to check whether any new messages have been posted. Your browser will only have to download a message if you haven't downloaded it already.

It's a lot like Glen Murphy's dchat, which was my inspiration, but there are a number of differences -- namely, chats on ljworld.com will be moderated. (An editor will OK each comment.) Also, the JavaScript degrades cleanly into a meta-refresh page for browser that can't handle modern JavaScript techniques.

The first chat we've got scheduled is Wednesday (today) at 3:30 PM U.S. Central Time. The chat guests are four of the Women of KU (a group of calendar models that our Web site sponsors). Should be an interesting conversation. Check it out, if you've got a chance. It'll be linked off of kusports.com.

Smarter search results

No site review tonight, because I've been busy with a few new Holovaty.com features.

Both features have to do with helping people find what they want. I've programmed my search engine so that result pages highlight your search terms -- each word in a different color, just like Google. For example, try a search for auto refresh home page and check out the highlighted terms.

Of course, sometimes you just plain don't need text highlighting. That's what the aptly named "Remove highlighting" link is for.

If that isn't exciting enough, here's the coolest part: Following webmasterworld's lead, I've added a Google-specific highlighting feature. If somebody lands deep within Holovaty.com via a Google search, that person's Google search terms will automatically be highlighted on my site. (And, again, there's the option to turn them off.) Plus, there'll be a link to search only Holovaty.com for the search terms -- an improvement on webmasterworld's system.

Eventually I'll add support for Inktomi, AlltheWeb, Altavista and maybe a few other search engines, but Google is the most important, in my opinion.

If news sites did something like this, people would consider them a heckuva lot more useful. I recall hearing an absurdly large percentage of hits to news sites come via search engines. Why not lend a helping hand to potential readers?

Auto-refresh on news home pages

I was taking my merry time while browsing the headlines on a news site's home page late last night, and suddenly the page reloaded on me.

I hate it when that happens.

Yes, some news sites' home pages are set to refresh automatically after a certain number of seconds. Here are a few offenders, ranked by number of seconds between refreshes:

Boston Herald -- 300 seconds
Los Angeles Times -- 300 seconds
ABC News -- 600 seconds
Boston Globe -- 900 seconds
New York Times -- 900 seconds
Wall Street Journal -- 900 seconds
CNN -- 1800 seconds
Denver Post -- 1800 seconds
Denver Rocky Mountain News -- 1800 seconds
USA Today -- 1800 seconds
Washington Post -- 1800 seconds

I can only assume the producers of these news sites do this for two reasons: to make sure their users see the very latest headlines, and/or to drive up their page views. Let's tackle these reasons one at a time.

Using auto refresh to ensure users see the very latest headlines. Oh, please. Let's give users some credit. I think it's safe to say that the majority of Web users know...

how to use a "refresh" button
that pages they're viewing are only current as of the second they loaded the page

If users want the latest news, they'll hit "refresh." And if they're confused enough not to know how to use the "refresh" button, just think how confused they'd get if their page automatically reloaded in their faces.

Using auto refresh to drive up page views. This, like related "strategies" (e.g. making users click through several pages just to get content, in order to get more page views), is incredibly ridiculous, unethical and just plain sneaky in the worst ways possible. Any online journalist who does this willingly should really reconsider his or her career: Try spamming, telemarketing, etc., instead. It's more up your alley.

But back to auto-refresh. Not only does it offer no advantages, but it presents several disadvantages in your site's accessibility and usability.

Let's start at the top. The World Wide Web Consortium, in its "Techniques for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0", flat-out says:

Until user agents provide the ability to stop the refresh, do not create periodically auto-refreshing pages.

This is a Priority 2 guideline, which means Web developers should do this. There are browsers that do provide the ability to stop auto-refresh, but I don't believe this feature isn't readily available in mainstream browsers yet -- at least the three or four Mac and PC browsers I use. (Please correct me if I'm wrong by posting a comment below.)

Why the guideline? The W3C gives an example of a "retiree with several aging-related conditions" who tends to avoid sites that auto-refresh because he can't get through the site without having the carpet pulled out from under him via an auto-refresh. It's not just retirees; some people read slowly, period -- and couple that with the fact that, people read 25% slower from computer screens than paper. Has anyone given some serious thought to how many people auto-refresh pisses off?

So, we've established auto-refresh is bad. But what to do? Simple. Make it an "opt-in" option. The Simplified Web Accessibility Guide offers this solution:

[W]hen using a continually updated page, inform the users that they should reload the page often...If using auto-refresh is unavoidable, provide a single line of text at the top of the page stating that the page contains changing information and will automatically reload itself after a certain amount of time. Also, provide a link to the next screen for those browsers that don't support the feature.

Or, if you insist on auto-refresh for whatever diabolical reason, fess up, and provide a way out. Digital Web Magazine suggests, "If you must create an auto-refreshing page, warn the user and allow them to request more time, if possible."

Good examples of this are washingtonpost.com's Live Online chats, during which users may specifically designate "Automatically Update Page" (in the left rail). But the default pages do not automatically update.