A word about Internet Explorer

This website utilizes elements from HTML 5 such as rounded-off corners, transparent color details and shadows, as well as the canvas and audio elements. It functions using all modern browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Opera or Safari) except for Internet Explorer. In other words, if you want to view this website in all its glory, then change the browser you’re using.

New

SVG Railway Station Clock

The simplest way to display a railway station clock on a website is via SVG. Neither JavaScript – already contained within the SVG file – nor plug-ins are needed. An SVG file and a simple HTML tag are enough. You can find out more here …

Segment display

Before the dot-matrix display marched to victory, segment displays could be found everywhere in everday life. These days their use is limited to areas where the point is to be able to read numbers quickly (e.g. clocks, meters and gauges). This segment display realized using JavaSript and a <canvas> element comes with source code, can be designed online and be used freely for your own projects.

Most Requested Topics

Background patterns for websites

During the early days of the Web background patterns were a popular means of sprucing up the pages on a website. Back then every webmaster had their own collection of more or less tasteful backgrounds. The patterns presented here stem from that time and can be tried out right away.

Oktaeder

Platonic solids

They have been known to mankind for over 4000 years. The 5 Platonic solids are perfect regular solids whose faces consist of equiangular and equilateral polygons of equal size.

Station Clock

Who doesn’t know what it’s like to wait for a train? The time refuses to go by yet the eyes stay glued to the second hand on the Station Clock. Slowly, steadily, the hand travels around the clock, then comes to a halt on the 12. For a brief moment time seems to stand still, but then the minute hand leaps forward and the second hand’s rotation starts all over again. Why this occurs and how you can display a completely individual station clock on your website can be read here…

“Metamorphosis II” by M.C. Escher

An animated depiction of the nearly 4-meter-long woodcut “Metamorphosis II” by Maurits Cornelis Escher. Escher created 3 printing plates comprised of up to 23 parts to accomplish the elaborate printing process in the colors black, green and brown.

iPhone/iPad Apps

myReturn

myReturn

The App “myReturn” (iPhone-Version and iPad-Version) was made for DONNER & REUSCHEL, a private bank. It can be obtained free of charge at the AppStore, at present only in German, and is targeted towards experienced users who can use the app to graphically illustrate the course of return for indices, commodities and shares, as well as for freely compiled portfolios.

Web Apps

Kuckuck

Cuckoo Clock

Its origins lie in the dark depths of the Black Forest. Written mention was made of it for the first time in the mid-15th century, and to this day historians dispute who built the first Black Forest cuckoo clock. Abroad the cuckoo clock has become a symbol for Germany. Small factories based in the Black Forest continue to deliver their hand-made clocks all over the world.

The hour aglow

The Set Theory Clock, also known as the Berlin Clock, makes use of the principle of set theory to depict the time. The time of day is displayed in a 24-hour format and can be determined by simply adding and multiplying the glowing lights.

Let’s see, at the moment it’s glowing .

Web application loan calculator

The idea for the loan calculator Web application ─ an RIA (Rich Internet Application) to be more precise ─ arose during an extensive IT project. The users enter loan queries in a Web front end. These are first handed over to a Java back end, then transferred from there to another server via CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture). The loan is now calculated and travels the same route back. A process like this takes its time, of course, and errors of a technical or content nature can occur at any stage which must be communicated to the user. But in the end, why not let JavaScript calculate a loan in the browser?

Editorial Content

Rüdiger Appel
Christian-Förster-Straße 34
D 20253 Hamburg

Contact: ruediger.appel (at) me.com

Thanks to Leigh Hoch for the translation.

My work is published under the terms of the Creative Commons 3.0 Lizenz. It may be freely used for private and commercial purposes when indication of the author or a link to this website is made.