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6.17.2003 ||>
Score one for feminism.
Okay, this is going to be a very technical thing that some people will just not get, so please bear with me while I share my two webby victories of the week.
Victory the first: my conquest of the font tag. I shouldn't even be admitting to it, because I feel so stupid that it took me how many years to figure this puppy out, but I was getting really frustrated with making tables in HTML because to make them look good, I had to use font tags for every freaking cell which is annoying to say the least when you're doing a million cells all by hand on notepad. Plus, the file sizes for the webpages were annoyingly big because of the extra taggage on the page. I kept trying to use CSS to no effect because while it would format outside the table, it wouldn't go in the table where I needed it. So it just occured to me like two days ago to put a font command inside the table tag and it would do it. Like:
< table style="font-size: x-small;" >< tr >< td >< /td >< /tr >< /table > instead of:
< table >< tr >< td >< font >< /font >< /td >< /tr >< /table >
Yes, it's taken me this long. But I'm not an idiot any longer, promise! I feel like a revolution has taken place where my workload for this volunteer website has just decreased 200%. I was so happy I did a little dance.
Victory the second: Today I was working at the summer school and it's at a Lycee that has computers (it's pretty rich). Well, one teacher there is working with the students on HTML web-design work. They have Dreamweaver, Photoshop, the works. How they afforded it all is beyond me, maybe a charitable donation or a grant, I don't know. Anyway, my new site mate who works at the Lycee told them that I do web-design work and know HTML. Being men, and especially Uzbek men, they were very sceptical, like "psh, she's a girl, how can she know this stuff!?!" They didn't believe him, but they sort of started to ask me questions anyway to prove him wrong. So here's a basic gist of the conversation:
Them: "So, uh, what program do you use?"
Me: "Well, I know Dreamweaver, but right now all I have is notepad to work on for the Peace Corps Volunteer website."
Them: "Wait. So you write the HTML?"
Me: "That's right. By hand mostly, but I also get some code off the internet, like DHTML tricks and CSS commands. It's just easier that way because some browsers don't support JavaScript and you have to make sure it's compatable with different computers."
Them: "Uh...." (a pause as the light dawns and then....) "Oh my goodness! Do you want to see our website?! Maybe you would like to help us or teach us?! How did you learn HTML anyway?!"
Me: "By myself, through a book and a lot of practice. I use Dreamweaver to make things faster, but I like to control my own HTML. I also use Photoshop for my graphics, so I know that too."
Them: (a big pause while they assimilate all this, then a sudden rush to show me everything they've ever done on the internet, begging for my approval.)
I think it's good though, because my biggest problem with boys (and some girls) is that computers and the internet are stereotypically a boys domain or whatever. So even in the States I sometimes get boys who know less than me about web design or computers get this "let me help you with that, little lady" attitude when I am perfectly capable, or girls who are like, "that's nice and all, but wouldn't a boy be better to fix this?" when I am better than the next available guy. (which is the worst for me since I am so embarassed for my gender at that point.) So in this overly male-dominated culture, here I am, proof that girls can do these things and do them better than the guys around her. And it's such a good, because it means that they won't turn into these macho bastards like the majority of the men around here. So I say: feminism, yay!
surfing: e-grrl.org
song in my head: lamya - empires
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