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IE bug forces a rethink

Up until now we've been quite happily using a custom CKEditor skin in its raw, unminified state. Then we received a call from a client, saying that she was getting weird errors when using the Smallbox admin interface in Internet Explorer. Turns out that she was being hit by a somewhat mind-boggling bug: IE--all versions--will only apply the first 31 stylesheets specified. When un-minified, the number of stylesheet files needed by the Smallbox CKEditor skin, combined with the number of Smallbox stylesheets, can exceed this limit.

One of the steps toward alleviating the problem is to minify (compress and obfuscate) our custom skin. However, CKEditor doesn't make it very clear how to do this, and there isn't much information out there on the topic. Which is odd, because this isn't the only reason you might want to minify a custom skin or plugin.

It's summer, and with summer comes the pain of having to stay in when it's so nice out. It doesn't really matter what your position is in design - if it's this kind of weather, the office is like a jail and wifi is like a ball and chain. Excuse the hyperbole - I imagine you can probably relate unless you hate nice weather. How do you get away from the screen and what do you do?

I just got back in from Trinidad and Tobago. Kenneth climbs up mountains in Nelson, and I'm not sure what Shawn does in Vancouver - take your pick of amazing outdoor activities there. The Smallbox office in Oak Bay is very close to Estevan Village and Willows Beach; great places to eat or grab a cold beverage, and then go for a walk on the sandy shores. I would have been walking there today if I hadn't rolled my ankle on the weekend playing tennis.

Is any of this work related? I suppose it could be. If you do plan on working for a company in a part of the world with summers as nice as this, be prepared to fight the urge to leave the desk and go outside and play. We're very fortunate to be working in this part of the world.

How about you, what are you filling your non-design time summer hours with?

Do you remember that thrilling moment when you first started using the internet? I don't either. OK, I have a vague recollection of sending my first email and experiencing internet addiction first hand after playing a multi-user dungeon (MUD) game in university for three straight days when I really should have been studying for finals. But, I don't remember which website I visited first. In all likelihood it was probably Microsoft, since I think I used an early version of IE for Mac as my first web browser.