I just opened CSSEdit and, as I usually do when a program wants to update itself, I automatically clicked “install and relaunch”. Yeah, woop-de-doo an updated version. Well, CSSEdit 2.5 is genuine hotness and an exciting upgrade.

The new tabbed interface is great. I really appreciate the new ability to have tabs on the stylesheet editor window in addition to the preview window. And you can drag them around in really cool ways.

The X-ray Inspector is fantastic. Better than the plain X-ray from the previous version, X-ray Inspector shows you all the styles applied to the selected element. It even works across multiple stylesheets.

The Selector Builder is also extremely sweet. It acts like Mail rules to let you build complex selectors visually.

CSSEdit was already a major tool in my tool belt, but this update really makes me happy. If you design with CSS, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

CSSEdit

A few things are very satisfying to see at the end of a long day. Here’s one of my favorites…

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet…. Some designers could probably recite the rest of the paragraph.

Ah, the life of the Lorems and the Ipsums. Invariably, when I used to show a client a design that represents a block of text containing the ubiquitous “Lorem Ipsum” text, their first response was

Wow! What language is that?

Followed sometimes by

That can’t stay in the design. Joe, did you send over the text for the design?

And even occasionally by

Oh good, Latin. Can we keep that? It will make people think we’re more sophisticated.

Alas, the everpresent, ultra-convenient pseudo-Latin paragraphs have been banished forever from use here at Art of Mission. It is just too distracting. Instead of focusing’ attention on the design, it detracts from the design’s subtleties by bringing up thoughts and plans of copy-writing in anyone who sees the design for the first time

The absolute best filler text for design is the actual text copy that will be in the final version, or something close to that. If the actual copy cannot be acquired, a second best (distant second, I might add) is something recognizable in plain English. I sometimes use the selected passages from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, which can be gotten in its entirety at Bibliomania. Alice in Wonderland is fairly easily recognizable and is not likely to be mistaken for final text, and it’s playful enough that the reader will (hopefully) immediately understand that the text is meant to serve as representative filler text.

The rabbit-hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down what seemed to be a very deep well.

Good-bye Lorem, hello Alice.