funkatron.com

Remember when you went to SXSWi last year, and you said “I love the parts where I meet cool people and eat free food and drink free booze and throw up, but I wish the presentations and panels weren’t so goddamn fluffy?” Me too. That’s why Alex Payne (aka “The Guy Who Has Actual Name Recognition”) and myself submitted the talk “Security for the Social Set.”

The idea is that we give some solid, useful information about the security problems social networking apps have to deal with, and how to deal with them. While we can’t get too focused on specific languages and frameworks, client-side defense with JavaScript will certainly be demonstrated, and I intend to show examples in PHP and probably a couple other platforms (coughRailscough). It will be hard to get into heavy detail within the alloted time, but it’s my hope that we can kickstart awareness and understanding of fundamental secure web app programming techniques.

Plus, I need a justification for dropping the coin for hotel and air fare on this boozefest, so please, vote for us.

• Security for the Social Set (SXSW 2009)

Oh, and a few other meaty talks you should consider include:

• Practical JavaScript Development
• More Secrets of JavaScript Libraries (this was packed last year)
• 200s, 304s, HTTP Compression, and You
• Hackproofing Ruby-on-Rails Web Applications
• Functional Programming Without A (Strictly) Functional Language
• Unit Testing Back to Front: Prove it Works!

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years as a grown-up, it’s this: Don’t make assumptions. All too often, things I’ve thought were no-brainers turned out to be questionable at best, like:

• John Romero will make an awesome game on his own
• Sony and Microsoft have made Nintendo irrelevant
• Women will find my company tolerable

I often see techie types making assumptions based on their experience, like “program A is unusable” (because on his rather oddly set-up system, it crashed on install) or “no real programmers write in Ruby” (because he doesn’t know anyone personally who do) or “only a tiny fraction of Mac users browse with Firefox” (because it’s the default browser out of the box, and average users always use the default, right?).

It was this last assertion, and the accompanying statement “I don’t have to prove something so obvious” that inspired this article. I wouldn’t have been particularly surprised if Safari had a majority of the Mac browser market, but my personal experience had been that a fair number of non-techie Mac folks use Firefox. Beyond that, I wanted to get some real data, and not make assumptions. If you can’t provide some basis for your assertions, they’re not worth much. It’s a clear sign of a bad argument, and little gets me more worked up than weak logic.

The audience for a web site has a pretty significant impact on what browsers we see visitors using. Tech-oriented sites tend to have a higher percentage of users running alternate browsers like Firefox. You’ll get more Camino users on a Mac-oriented site, and Konqueror will show up more often on sites with content for Linux users. That means we have to at least take into account the content of the site when drawing conclusions from the numbers.

Here’s what I’ve found myself, and what others have shared with me, so far. Understandably, some folks shared their stats with me asked to remain anonymous, or that the site they come from not be revealed. I’ve described them as best I can. Also note that in some cases I received just info on Mac browsers, and others I had data for all browsers. I’ve calculated a ratio and “winner” at the end of each entry.

Is this data conclusive? Of course not. It’s a small sample of a handful of sites, and not particularly popular ones at that. But, it does seem to at least indicate that Firefox may be quite a bit more popular among Mac users than I – and certainly other people – thought.

If you’d like to contribute data, just drop me a line or leave a comment.

Funkatron.com

This site, obviously strongly tech-oriented, but also gets a decent amount of sport-oriented search engine traffic

Approx ratio: 1.5/1 Firefox

• Screenshot

Sorority web site

Non-tech focused, active site for members of sorority

Approx ratio: 1.1/1 Safari

EricaBaker.com

Personal blog, significant tech/mac content

Approx ratio: 1.3/1 Firefox

Abandoned non-tech subculture site

Very low, mostly search engine traffic

Approx ratio: 1/1

• Screenshot

Abandoned personal blog

Some tech/mac content

Approx ratio: 1.7/1 Firefox

New sports blog

Approx ratio: 1.1/1 Safari

Abandoned sports web site

Very low, mostly search engine traffic

Approx ratio: 2/1 Safari

• Screenshot

Low-traffic, non-tech site

Approx ratio: 3/1 Firefox

A relatively major new release of Spaz.AIR, version 0.2.0, is now available. This version has a number of new features:

• New “borderless” window
• Multiple themes
• User-defined CSS “overrides”
• Event sounds, using the Tokyo Train Station soundset by Dominik Dimaano
• Debugging tools and logging

I’m really happy with this new version, and anxious to hear what you think. Please check it out, and let me know your impressions. Remember that you can contact me on Twitter at twitter.com/spaz

• Download the latest version of Spaz.AIR (Requires the Adobe Integrated Runtime)
• More information on Spaz

Developing themes for Spaz can be kinda tough, because you need to restart the app each time you make a CSS change. To make things easier, I’ve put together a template that you can load in your browser and use with standard CSS editing tools.

• Spaz Theme Development Template

Check the enclosed README file for more information.

I use a little service called 103bees to track keywords and questions people ask of search engines that deliver them to my site. The weekly reports are always good for a laugh:

Funkatron.com Phrases

• put things in penis
• shot a load to that.
• not safe for work

Funkatron.com Questions

• what is a wop
• where to put penis