Imagine is first UK publisher to launch title for Apple’s iBooks 2

Imagine Publishing has launched a new digital-only, Multi-Touch ebook, iCloud For Beginners, specifically designed for Apple’s iBooks 2. Featuring slideshows, interactive images and more, it is one of the first ebooks of its type in the world.
Using iBooks Author’s revolutionary Multi-Touch technology, iCloud For Beginners teaches everything users need to know about iCloud, the free new back-up and sync service. From how to set-up your free iCloud account to sharing your information across your Apple devices, the ebook uses cutting-edge technology to deliver enhanced, easy-to-use tutorials.
“At Imagine, we’re always excited by cool new ways to deliver our world-leading content.” said Editor In Chief Aaron Asadi “iBooks Author is another great opportunity for us to create more products we love for a whole new type of audience. It’s this sort of game-changing innovation that makes us do what we do. ”
“With the speed that the publishing industry is changing, there’s nothing more exhilarating than grabbing hold of new technologies and seeing how we can get the most out of them to serve-up the content we’re so passionate about” added Ross Andrews, Head of Design “What could be better than going from saying ‘we should try that’ to a fully published product in just a few days? It’s hard to think of a more exciting time for the industry.”
iCloud For Beginners is available now on iTunes and iBookstore worldwide.
Imagine Publishing is one of the UK’s fastest-growing multimedia content producers. Formed in May 2005, Imagine now publishes 20 regular print magazines, 30 digital apps, 25 websites and thousands of articles every month in the technology, videogames, photography and knowledge/science markets. An Imagine magazine is purchased every ten seconds.

HOW IT WORKS DAILY GETS BRAND NEW SITE DESIGN

How it Works is the most exciting science & technology magazine in the world today, and is now a well-respected globally successful brand comprising of a magazine, bookazines, website, mobile app and many licensed editions.
The official magazine website at www.howitworksdaily.com has just been given an exciting revamp, introducing a modern and dynamic design for housing a wealth of content spanning news, facts and competitions.

How It Works’ web developer, Andy Leon, said: “There’s something for everyone in How It Works, so we’ve focused on making it easier for readers to find content that interests them. The continuous-loading homepage means that it’s near impossible to run out of fascinating articles to browse. These are also now more engaging, with interactive illustrations that take the reader inside some of the awesome technology. Plus, sharing with friends is now effortless, with social networks and aggregator sites available on-the-page.”

As well as using WordPress to serve the content, the site utilises a jQuery plugin for WordPress called Masonry to achieve the unorthodox layout. Designed by web designer and front-end developer David DeSandro, the plugin  enhances CSS Float methods to pull elements together and make them stack more tightly, as the official developer page explains:
“Masonry is a dynamic grid layout plugin for jQuery. Think of it as the flip-side of CSS floats. Whereas floating arranges elements horizontally then vertically, Masonry arranges elements vertically, positioning each element in the next open spot in the grid. The result minimises vertical gaps between elements of varying height, just like a mason fitting stones in a wall.”

HTML5 PLEASE GIVES DESIGNERS & DEVELOPERS TOP TIPS ON NEXT-GEN MARKUP

Prolific developer and Opera Web Opener Divya Manian has beautifully constructed a brand new website called HTML5 Please – offering invaluable help on mastering HTML5 coding the right way. With a focus on conveying responsible techniques that adhere to desirable standards, the site offers a serach filter for drilling down to the finer details you want answered, whereas more casual browsers can access specific points via an accordian-type design. You’ll then reveal actually tag and snippet examples, working demos and links to the best developer resource sites for taking your knowledge to the next level.

http://html5please.us/

Some of the world’s most influential women in digital design and technology will come together in a unique, mostly online conference, to discuss and promote collaboration and innovation and showcase female excellence in the industry.

Titled ’The Emerge Mini-Conference,’ the three day series of talks and workshops is organised by newly formed not-for-profit Web Heroines and hopes to address the gender imbalance in the industry by engaging more women with design and technology. The Emerge Mini-Conference will also showcase the fantastic work by women from within the industry and aims to share ideas, opinions and solutions.

Hosted in partnership with The British Library Business and IP Centre and supported by the Big Lottery Fund, The Emerge Mini-Conference will take place over 16th, 17th and 18th January 2012.  There will be ten virtual sessions followed by a networking session and a finale pivotal panel debate on the evening of the 18th January which takes place at the British Library in London.

The panel debate is open to all with a limited number of tickets available for purchase at £10 each on the Emerge website. Attendees of the event will come face-to-face with four inspirational female panellists, who are renowned professionals in the field of digital design and technology.

Online sessions will include workshops, podcasts and inspirational talks by influential women in the industry including Naomi Atkinson who has worked for Audi and BT and was named “The Next Big Thing” at The Critters.

Keri Lambden, Senior Member and Founder of Web Heroines, added “This is a unique accessible event which reaches out to women from all backgrounds particularly those who have suffered hardship and want to get their lives back on track by learning new skills, adding strings to their bows and meeting like-minded peers. We are delighted to be working with some of the best and most established female practitioners in the industry and hope that our unique showcase and information exchange will inspire women to take the leap, make their ideas happen and keep innovating”.

Julie Howell, a guest speaker at the conference who has been honoured four times for her influence on the digital industry, added, [this is an] “exciting new initiative that champions the role of women in design and technology industries”.

The Emerge Mini Conference is for anyone who loves digital design programming, mobile apps, graphics, UX/UI and gaming, and while it is aimed at addressing the gender imbalance men are more than welcome too!

The Emerge Mini Conference is organised by Web Heroines and forms part of a wider strategy and mission by the newly formed, Norfolk based not-for-profit to showcase and encourage more women into the digital and technology industry.

For more information about the Emerge Mini Conference, details on all of the sessions and to book your place, visit the microsite today: http://webheroines.com/emerge/

Join the conversation on Twitter by following @webheroines and use the hashtag #WHemerge

About Web Heroines

Web Heroines is a not-for-profit organisation which formed as a cooperative in 2011 after a group of like minded people were concerned by the lack of women in design and technology. Web Heroines’ mission is to inspire, engage and inform women about the digital industry and increase the number of women working in the field. Web Heroines also hopes to inspire women to start their own businesses, get better jobs and not feel isolated. For more information about Web Heroines visit: www.webheroines.com/about-us or refer to the press pack which can be downloaded here.

As part of our HOT 100 special in January, we’ve decided to give you a chance to get involved with a quick reader poll that looks back at 2011 and forward to 2012.
First up we want your vote for which of our thirteen favourite Lightbox sites from each issue should be crowned overall Site of the Year. We’ve provided each one right here, reminding you of the URLs and designers, as well as providing a quick screenshot to illustrate each example’s greatness.

Secondly, we want to know which web agency from our Pro File roundup over the past 12 months is not only your favourite, but crucially could be the one to watch out for most in 2012.

Cast your votes now to have your say!

ISSUE 179
Firstborn

URL: www.fborn.com

ISSUE 180
Driftlab

URL: www.driftlab.com

ISSUE 181
Liquid Light

URL: www.liquidlight.co.uk

ISSUE 182
Mutado

URL: http://mutado.com

ISSUE 183
Hi-ReS

URL: http://hi-res.net

ISSUE 184
Critical Mass

URL: www.criticalmass.com

ISSUE 185
Flightless

URL: www.flightless.co.nz

ISSUE 186
Session Digital

URL: www.sessiondigital.com

ISSUE 187
GR/DD

URL: www.grdd.co.uk

ISSUE 188
2Advanced

URL: www.2advanced.com

ISSUE 189
ORM London

URL: www.ormlondon.com

ISSUE 190
Underwired Amaze

URL: www.underwired.com

ISSUE 191
Ultranoir

URL: www.ultranoir.com

Cast your votes now to have your say!

Creating a data-driven website can be challenging as designers come to terms with data manipulation to deliver content to the browser. Alpha Five Version 11 can connect to any of the common web data sources, from MS Access to MySQL from SQL Server to Oracle, it’s just a matter of “connect and deliver” Once you are connected to your data source, Alpha Five comes to life as it responds at lightning speed using codeless Ajax to deliver information to your site visitors. Another exciting feature of Alpha Five is its ability to allow you to effortlessly integrate image galleries, intelligent platform-aware video, as well as data-aware maps without writing a single line of code. All this, with the added benefits of support for gestures, orientation, swiping, pinch-zooming and momentum scrolling on touch-driven devices.

For a free 30 day trial please visit; http://alphasoftware.co.uk/free_trial_download.a5w?d=000194

Looking for something to inspire your creative side? Our sister magazine Digital Artist has just released Volume 1 of its complete collection, featuring issues 1 to 20 on one handy interactive disc. It’s now on sale in the Imagine Shop, priced at just £19.99.

These issues are now out of print and, for the most part, completely sold out, so they’re incredibly hard to get hold of. You can now get all 20 issues as high-res PDFs that you can view on a Mac or PC and even print out so that you can follow along with the tutorials comfortably. There are over 1500 pages of digital art goodness in here featuring the world’s top digital creatives working in a range of programs including Photoshop, Corel Painter, Illustrator and many more. The eMag disc has an easy-to-use Search function which you can use to find your way to the content you want, from digital painting to graphic design and the latest in illustration.

The Digital Artist team has also thrown in some fantastic extras including textures, stock photos and Photoshop brushes. This is a great way to get all the content from the first 20 issues of the magazine… and it also makes a delightful present for artists, illustrators, designers, or anyone who’d like to get more from their creative side. But hurry – stocks are limited!

Digital Artist: Volume 1 is exclusive to the Imagine eShop and can be purchased here: https://www.imagineshop.co.uk/dvds/digital-creativity/digital-artist-emag-vol-1.html

It seems that everyone has a blog these days. But there is a big difference between having a blog and having a successful blog. In Bloggers Boot Camp, a new book from Focal Press, blogging experts Charlie White (Mashable) and John Biggs (TechCrunch) show bloggers how to go from run-of-the- mill to exceptional blogging.
Bloggers Boot Camp shows bloggers how to build a great blog from the ground up. This isn’t a book about technology — it’s a book about engaging millions of readers. Bloggers Boot Camp shows bloggers how to:

•    Uncover a niche for the blog, and realize key factors about each individual blogger that they need to know before they write a single word.
•    Gather the ideal tools for blogging, without spending too much or approaching it underequipped.
•    Discover the best ways to spread the word about the new blog.
•    Find the most compelling stories to write about, and get the information before anyone else does.
•    Transform writing by learning the subtle art of constructing a compelling, engaging blog post.
•    Stimulate readers to directly participate in the two-way conversation, perhaps the most exciting part of this new way of communicating.

In addition to Bloggers Boot Camp, the book, White and Biggs share their secrets as part of an online companion course. In the 12-week, online social learning program, Biggs and White will personally lead the course (in real-time) in a unique social learning environment powered by Simversity. With the book and online course, bloggers will be able to make their blogs world-class.

SPECIAL PROMOTION OFFER FOR BARNES & NOBLE CUSTOMERS!

Save 40% on select Focal Press web titles (Bloggers Boot Camp, HTML 5, Mobile HTML 5, Interactive Indesign, Flash Mobile)

Bloggers Boot Camp and Mobile HTML 5 are both new releases (September), see www.bn.com/focalweb

(Applies to all B&N stores and BN.com, sale ends 16/11/11)

About the Authors:
Charlie White is Senior Editor of Mashable, one of the top 5 most powerful blogs in the world with more than 10 million readers. He’s written for Wired, Maximum PC and Popular Science magazines, was Senior Associate Editor for popular gadget site Gizmodo for two years, and for three years was Deputy Editor of NBC Universal tech site DVICE.

John Biggs is editor of TechCrunch Gadgets. Biggs has written for the New York Times, InSynch, USA Weekend, Popular Mechanics, Popular Science, Money and a number of other outlets on technology and wristwatches. He is the former editor-in-chief of Gizmodo.com and lives in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

ALPHA FIVE VERSION 11 LAUNCHES

Alpha Software, leading developer of online database application solutions, in partnership with Avanquest, one of the world’s foremost software developers and publishers, announces the launch of Alpha Five Version 11. The “create-once, use-everywhere”, rapid application development platform for today’s data-driven business applications running on intranets, the web and any web-enabled mobile device.
Alpha Five comes with a complete development environment, a powerful object-oriented language and a full client and server side event model. From desktop to netbook, from tablet to smartphone, Alpha Five encourages a unified approach to information delivery over the web. With the introduction of new calendar-based scheduling support, geo-mapping capabilities, and stunning new video and image gallery components, Alpha Five now takes web application development to the next level but it doesn’t stop there. V11 also offers HTML reporting, great charting capabilities and an open door policy welcoming the integration of .net components. Along with gesture support for touch-driven devices, Alpha Five Version 11 is quite simply a virtual Swiss army knife that no self-respecting web app developer should be without. We think it’s fair to say that Alpha Five Version 11 represents the future of web application development in your hands TODAY.

In these challenging economic times, it’s all about delivering robust, agile applications to market quickly and efficiently. Alpha Five v 11 lives up to its name as a rapid application development platform. This enables the client to feel more part of the process, as the developer is quickly able to respond to refinement requests etc. Whilst there can be no substitute for a comprehensive specification, Alpha Five gives the developer the peace of mind that changes don’t have to lead to the derailment of a project or budget.

The focus of this year’s festival theme is Media, Freedom and the Web. And how the web can make us more creative, collaborative and connected in an age of broadcasters big and small. The Festival will gather leaders in news, media and the arts with technologists and open web developers for brainstorming, design challenges and sprints that will shape the future of media and the web.

Who will be there?

Developers will have the opportunity to meet and collaborate with media leaders such as the BBC, The Guardian, Al Jazeera and the Boston Globe. Along with leaders in the open web and technology space such as Mozilla Labs, SoundCloud, Ushahidi, Creative Commons, and Participatory Culture Foundation.

Who should take part?

To make the festival work,the organisers need people of all different skills and persuasions. If you’re a development ninja, come flex your skills and make something innovative. If you’re a design thinker, come and challenge assumptions about how these technologies will be used. Or just share your real-world insight on how we should build new tools for media makers.

There’s specific design challenges tailor-made for:

MEDIA-MAKERS: journalists, citizen journalism editors, interactive news editors, news entrepreneurs, live bloggers, network theorists, social media reporters, localizers, news bureau reporters, translators, data journalists, open data experts, podcasters,radio journalists, video editors

DEVELOPERS: news hackers, front end web developers, jQuery developers, news app developers, CAD users and developers, Javascript developers, WebGL developers, HTML5 developers, database developers, Processing.js developers, audio hackers, video coders, Popcorn developers

DESIGNERS: interface designers, user experience designers, data visualization designers, infographic designers

Whatever your passion, join in the global effort to keep the web a public resource that everyone can use to make and share a whole galaxy of web media. FIND OUT MORE