Clippings

July 31, 2001 8:57 AM

Clippings is the GPL-ed code behind IHT's news-clip feature, which has been discussed on MetaFilter before. This is very cool code and I think any site with many front page links could benefit from it. Serendipitously found at smokinggun, which is not the smoking gun.
posted by icathing (19 comments total)

John Weir is a genius.
posted by ericost at 9:01 AM on July 31, 2001

Must be an IE thing...
posted by fooljay at 9:47 AM on July 31, 2001

It's an IE/Netscape 6/Mozilla thing.
posted by icathing at 10:10 AM on July 31, 2001

It's also used by Three.Oh
posted by riffola at 10:20 AM on July 31, 2001

There are times like this when I really don't have anything to say, except that this is beautiful.

(Well, I do have somthing else to say over here.)
posted by Avogadro at 10:32 AM on July 31, 2001

John Weir truly is brilliant. Incredible that he's making this code availble to everyone like this (though it was always possible to steal it - which a guy at my old firm did once).

I've not heard much about him though. Clearly, he's a web design and architecture heavyweight - anyone know more about what he's worked on, etc?
posted by aladfar at 10:36 AM on July 31, 2001

thanks for this post. I've used IHT's clipping thing for months as an example to clients and friends of what you can do with good, clean, professional code. I wish their was a way to paypal Weir a beer.
posted by foist at 11:09 AM on July 31, 2001

It's clean work that demonstrates what can be done with a standards-compliant browser. Pages are becoming applications.

My only tiny nitpick is I can't take my clippings with me when I leave the site! Maybe someone will hack together a version that kicks links over to an IE/Mozilla sidebar. Either way, it's great for sites that have a lot of daily content and links.

Weir's also got cool bookmarklet tools and demos, be sure to check them out too.
posted by scottandrew at 11:19 AM on July 31, 2001

It's clean work that demonstrates what can be done with a standards-compliant browser.

I use Opera is one of the most standards compliant browsers on the market and I get nada, zilch zip...
posted by fooljay at 11:50 AM on July 31, 2001

From the comments in the source:

Clippings only work with DOM browsers. Opera at this point does not have enough of the DOM to support clippings.

There is little or no feature/browser compatibiliy checking in this code, so use wisely.

The code has been tested on IE 5.0, 5.5, 6.0 on Windows, IE 5.0 on Mac, and various versions of Netscape 6.0 and Mozilla.

So I guess Opera's standards compliance is more in the realm of HTML and Javascript then the DOM.
posted by icathing at 12:45 PM on July 31, 2001

I use Opera and have problems with Javascript anyway. I'd switch to something else, but I like the way Opera handles multiple windows. Any other browser out there do it the way Opera does?
posted by Apoch at 12:56 PM on July 31, 2001

fooljay: you're right, I should have written "DOM-compliant browsers." Opera has great standards support for HTML, CSS and JavaScript but they only support a tiny subset of the DOM.
posted by scottandrew at 1:31 PM on July 31, 2001

IHT really is an elegantly designed and programmed site. I can't sing its praises enough.

I just wish they had an online crossword puzzle...
posted by ry at 1:59 PM on July 31, 2001

Indeed, what's been done at IHT is a real shot for the DOM and a great advertisement for intelligent use of browser scripting.

I've always suspected that the 'debate' about web standards-compliance (including the XML DOM) will become redundant when people wake up to what can be done with a little good design and planning using these technologies.

For that to happen, we need a few more competent developers doing just that and getting the product of their labor out there in the mainstream. Kudos to Mr Weir.

The good news is, it's happening. For example, the software company I work for is embracing DOM compliant thin-client, XML based GUIs, and I'm sure we're not the only ones.

<aside>Opera: Are they developing further DOM support? I love the browser but this keeps me from using it regularly.</aside>
posted by normy at 2:07 PM on July 31, 2001

normy, unless you frequent some really on-edge sites, Opera shouldn't be holding you back. I've used OPera now for a few months and have only rarely run into sites which had problems. Less than 1% easily. Usually they aren't compelling enough for me to open up IE...
posted by fooljay at 2:53 PM on July 31, 2001

Opera is a quality browser. especially on the Symbian paltform. God buy yourself a Psion series 7 or netBook, an IR mobile and check it out wirlessly. It's small footprint is a godsend for mobile working. Theres some stuff that it still handles increadibly dodgily, like the DOm and some javascript (try to login to excite with Opera for EPOC). They have that great mouse gestures, windows and a fun downlaod manager. Almost as good as Mozilla 0.9.2 my curreny day to day. There's really little need to use IE any more if you don't want to.

IHT is very fun, and finding this code is really great. A really, really good link. Thanks.
posted by nedrichards at 3:12 PM on July 31, 2001

As a developer, Opera's lacking DOM support keeps me at arm's length from an otherwise fantastic browser. And early versions of Opera 5 have quite buggy javascript implementations, which makes it an especially difficult browser to script for even when you try to stay within its level of DOM support. But man is it fast at launching and rendering pages.
posted by ericost at 3:16 PM on July 31, 2001

ah, the mouse gestures in opera! it's so akward whenever i switch to IE when I'm not at home, and i quickly do the right-button click, left-button click to go to the last page, and nothing happens.
posted by lotsofno at 4:54 PM on July 31, 2001

Clippings were created with the intent to allow a user to browse data, such as headlines, and select articles for later reading. Current methods of navigating a web site force users to follow one path, unless the user opens different paths in multiple windows. This is not an elegant solution.

But one that works perfectly well.
posted by lagado at 7:11 PM on July 31, 2001