We have been part of the Web revolution right from the start. Before the first copy of Mosaic was even released to the public, we were already working to find new ways to push the Web to its limits. And, since the Web is constantly changing and improving, we have continued to find new ways to push it to the limits for our clients. From an alphabet soup of languages and utilities, we choose only the fastest and most reliable for our clients.

Unix

Much like a traditional building, a Web site needs a good foundation to be safe and long lasting. To help keep your Web site from crumbling to the ground, we start with the most solid foundation available, Unix. The Unix family of operating systems has been in constant development since the mid-seventies. We have worked with a wide variety of Unix variants including Linux, BSD, IRIX, SunOS, and VMS. Currently, we use a mix of Linux and BSD for our server architecture. Our remotely located servers run BSD for its outstanding networking speed and reliability, and, we maintain a local Linux server which performs nightly maintenance on the sites we host and which generates your sites statistics.

Standards Compliance

To build a strong base for your Web site and to ensure your site appears as close as possible to the original design, we carefully adhere to the latest and most accepted standards for the underlying code. We use HTML 4.0 compliant markup to design your pages logically, making them easier for search engines and alternative browsers to understand. Then we use CSS2 compliant style sheets to make the pages equally attractive and functional for visitors with more traditional browsers. And, by using the proper tools for the proper job in the proper way, we build sites that appear the same regardless of what browser or operating system your visitors use and which are easily indexed by the major search engines. This also makes your site more future-proof since we do not use any proprietary extensions that may not be supported down the road.

JavaScript

We offer custom java scripting which allows a Web site to interact with your visitors without any extra plug-ins or additions to their browser. With JavaScript, we can control any aspect of a Web page including forms, text and graphics. Plus, we can control the size and location of the browser window itself. JavaScript also allows us to make these changes in real time based on user input such as clicking or moving the mouse. Because many people disable JavaScript, we recommend its use primarily for extra features or non-critical design. This way, your important message is not lost during delivery.

Flash/Shockwave

We also are capable of producing custom Flash and Shockwave content. Like JavaScript, Flash and Shockwave allow full interaction between a visitor and your site in real time. However, Flash and Shockwave require the user to have a plug in for their browser. At this time it is estimated that nearly 90% of the browsers in use have this plug in. We recommend the use of Flash and Shockwave for things such as miniature video games or interactive animations and demonstrations.

Databasing

For speed, reliability, searching and update capabilities, nothing beats a database backed Web site. We have experience working with a variety of databases including MySQL, mSQL, and Postgress. We also offer hosting of your database on our servers, allowing it to fully interact with your Web site. Database backed Web sites can be easily updated from your own browser and offer outstanding search capabilities. For online stores or anyone with a large number of similar products displayed on their site a database is nearly a necessity.

Perl

Working behind the scenes, most Web sites today rely heavily on a number of scripting languages that allow them to do things that were never imagined when the Web was first conceived. For many of these tasks we rely on one of the most proven languages in use on the Web, called Perl. Perl was designed for working with large amounts of text-based data and preparing meaningful reports from that data. The ability to prepare well-designed reports from raw data is very similar to many of the common tasks performed on a Web site. This makes Perl a perfect fit. We use Perl on almost every site we create to solve many common tasks in a quick and efficient manner.

PHP

In our constant quest to find new and better ways to create powerful Web sites for our clients, we are constantly evaluating new technologies and languages. One language we have recently become very impressed with is PHP. Like Perl, PHP is used to perform many common tasks such as processing forms, formatting data from a database and helping a site become self-updating. However, since PHP was designed for use on the Web from the start, it is a very efficient and powerful language for creating Web pages. We use PHP on nearly every site we create to help make future updates and redesigns easier and faster.

PDF

If you are looking to provide interactive Web content that your site visitors can print out in a high quality format, then PDF is the option for you. Much like a normal Web page, PDF provides a way to share information regardless of what platform is being used. Unlike a normal Web page, PDF can have fonts and graphics embedded within it. This is necessary for a high quality printed pages. To view or print a PDF file, the Adobe Acrobat Reader is required. This is freely available from Adobe and ships with almost all common browsers and utilities. If you've ever bought a piece of software that included the documentation on disk, you probably already have a PDF viewer. Unlike most Web design firms, we can also go one step further and create on demand PDFs that change dynamically based on your users actions. This allows us to link a form on your Web site to a blank PDF and create professional looking printouts from your site. This can be used to create resumes, receipts, custom catalogs, or anything else you can imagine.

Realmedia

We also have experience in preparing audio and video content for the Web. One of the more popular means of providing streaming media is through the use of RealVideo and RealAudio that our servers fully support. And, while most hosting providers can offer this server, not many are equally skilled at adjusting the compression of your video and audio to achieve the highest quality with the quickest download. We take extra care to ensure that your multimedia content is presented in a way that shows off its original quality while not keeping your visitors waiting too long for it to download.

MP3

In addition to RealAudio, we also recommend the use of MP3 compression to make music and other audio available on the Web. Much like RealAudio, the settings used when compressing your source audio can greatly affect the quality of the resulting MP3 file. MP3 compression results in very small files with surprisingly high quality from most audio sources.