Mime Types and the Internet

Officially Internet media type nowadays, the Mime type originated as a way of signifying additional files on email served via SMTP. Mime types are made up of two pieces of information: a type and then a subtype. Additionally, a charset parameter may inform of the character set of the file.

You will have used these before: when writing a HTML document, you’ve always written something like this:

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type"
  content="text/html; charset=utf-8"/>

The Mime type is the text/html bit.

Usually, when a web author links to a favicon on his page, he might define it as image/x-icon.

<link rel="shortcut icon"
  href="/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon"/>

While this is strictly correct HTML, it is telling the browser that it is linking to a nonstandard, ICO image.

The problem is that ICO images have been standardized and registered with the IANA for 6 years, and you really have to start paying them their dues.

The correct Mime type for ICO images is image/vnd.microsoft.icon. Thus, a fully correct rendition of a link to a favicon would be something like this:

<link rel="shortcut icon"
  href="/favicon.ico" type="image/vnd.microsoft.icon"/>

Respect to the Mimes, people!

The police system took a massive U-turn, and instead of the standard wanted-stars-which-never-go-away formula, they’ve mixed it up with inclusion of a search area. Sounds good? It’s not. It seems that the difficulty curve swerves massively up after three stars as pretty much all the police cars in Liberty screech after you. Even when you’re at a petty one the Random Placement Monster wants your blood more than a deranged rabbit, randomly spawning on-foot policemen and absolutely refusing to label these on the radar so the damn area is reset.

Driving’s also taken a turn for the worse in IV. All the cars—and I mean all of them—have terrible steering, and that just doesn’t work when the city has more sharp corners than a Rubik’s Cube which has been attacked by ninjas. Whenever you go somewhere whilst vaguely breaking the speed limit the gameplay pauses and steps aside to let the physics engine piss all over your face whilst you furiously mash the controls.

Now, understand me when I say that the game is truly amazing. The storyline is as immersive as a warm duvet and has a bit more depth than the comparatively shallow American-cheerleader stuff we’re used to. You’ll hear about your missions after a bit on the radio and can read about them on the Internet. The same dark sense of humour is there, right down to the logo of the bowling alley and the name of the drink vendors. The game still has some of the pin-ups of its predecessors: you can, for example, have fun with a prostitute and then step outside, gun her down and take back your money. Even the Pay ’n’ Spray is still there, although it is of dubious use unless you want to skip ahead a few hours in the game, which wouldn’t be necessary if the game didn’t decide to be a bitch and opening hours on the missions. The whore.

The combat system has been majorly revamped for the better, now emphasizing a duck-and-cover system. There are a couple of problems with it: Niko, the protagonist of arbitrary name, has a terrible tendency to take cover on the wrong side, allowing him to be riddled with more holes than a female cheese. That doesn’t subtract from the slightly sick fun of blasting people with a shotgun or watching them slowly burn when you litter the area with Molotov cocktails. The rocket launcher maintains its position as most destructive weapon, and I find myself subconsciously reaching for it because the explosions are so damn pretty. That’s right. They’re pretty. It’s beautiful watching drivers being cremated in their former vehicles. God, I need to get out more.

I haven’t yet found my ideal radio station in Liberty, but they make a comeback. Lazlow is back, and, although he’s a lot more obnoxious than he was in III, so he’s lost some of his appeal, but it is fun watching him toss around the term “Web 2.0”, which as is irritating and commonplace in the game as it is online.

Okay, I’m being a bit harsh. I love GTA IV, and not without reason. The immersion, wit and simple brilliance pretty much counteracts anything I could throw at it (apart from the driving: that will always suck.) I’m going to play on it a bit more. It’s amazing.

Keep your lives, though, lads.

I would be lying if I said I hadn’t been procrastinating—damn, I shouldn’t tell you that—and it has apparently been for no reason. Do you know how long it took to actually revise the site? One day! Putting off one day of work for less which pays off quite a lot and takes a load off my shoulders in the long run is…stupid. Yeah.

The database has been cleared, bar one post, the design has been updated to get rid of the accursed orange (hey, I liked it!), which means, technically speaking, I have no past.

That suits me just fine.

I should probably introduce myself, then. I’m a guy who goes by the name of the Cyan-Light. Don’t ask, ’cause I don’t know why either. I’m a bit of a web designer/developer/master/whatever the term is for us nowadays. My likes are relatively small and my dislikes disproportionately large: I’m a naturally born critic and proud of it. I do happen to have a girlfriend. I don’t know why. It just happened.

I’ve always been a strict grammar…ist. Unfortunately, my spelling skills, as a result, fell, so please excuse me.

I will be writing about everything from books to games, HTML to Windows.

And I will do so with style. Keep tuned, ladies and gentlemen.

The reason I haven’t been posting is more out of concerns of a detrimentation in my style and quality of writing than anything else. I’m guessing personal business just doesn’t cut it that much. My friend Jeremy Wilken once commented that mixing the entente of lives as both a web designer and, well, a human, resulted in a less-than-potent drink which doesn’t even have alcohol in. How dull.

Today, I shall be heeding his words.

I have been working on my friend Lara’s blog, and, strangely enough, paying for its existence. I have no idea why, except it seems to make her happy and results in me being able to kiss her.

Administrating, designing and constantly maintaining it has made me notice how little I’ve taken care of mine. The design hasn’t evolved or fixed, there are 404s dotted around everywhere like a six year old’s chicken pox.

Alas, what is one to do?

Most of the post database will be deleted. The remaining articles—the most popular, obviously—will be rewritten in a more appropriate voice and, probably, retitled.

The new design will also be instated, along with all the missing and unfinished pages. It shall be done as soon as I stick the rather undelightful WordPress stuff into it.

I’m aiming to get this done by the end of this month, when I get my new laptop. Exciting!

I’ll drop in the updates soon.