So, I think everyone wants to use <video>, right? But there are obvious challenges (like some browsers don’t support it, no browsers support all of the control features, and developers cannot reliably affect the appearance of the the player and its controls, to name a few). Well Kroc Camen has come up with Video for Everybody, a nifty, albeit quite verbose, version of the tag that claims to work across all browsers, without JavaScript… The length of the HTML required to accomplish this may scare some people off, but if it truly provides video for everybody, this might be a good stop-gap until <video> finishes growing up…
And speaking of <video>, how about this slick Ambilight effect made using <video> and <canvas>?
And in case you’re wondering when you can start using some of the great new features that HTML5 brings to the world, Alexis Deveira now offers When Can I Use…
Chris Heilmann, aka Mr. YQL, has done even more of our job for us, creating the YQL Geo Library. The library:
- Detects the visitor’s location with the W3C geo API and with IP as a fallback
- Finds the geo location from text
- Finds the location from lat/lon pair
- Finds locations in a certain web document (by URL)
- Gets the location for a certain IP number
Ajaxian does a nice write-up about Chris’ work.
I have never been accused of being a fan of Adobe Flash, at least not when it comes to full-Flash websites, but the dashboard interface of the new Tesla Model S electric car is an incredible use of the technology! Instead of “hard-coded” buttons, knobs, etc., a Flash-powered interface on the center-column touch-screen means Tesla can modify that screen down the road based on customer input, etc.
And finally, I haven’t been able to come up with any clever way to open this one, so… Suspended animation. There, I said it. But now that I’ve said it, no, it isn’t freezing astronauts so they can arrive safely millions of miles away, it is about slowing an injured person’s metabolism to a point that they are essentially dead, and then bringing them back to life when they are ready to be properly cared for. “You’re not dead until you’re warm and dead.” A well-worthwhile 18 minutes and 13 seconds. The first the “big wow” comes around 11:12 or so and the second comes at 14:12 or so.
Happy reading,
Atg