The Konami Code (or Konami Command) is essentially a cheat code that cropped up on a lot of Konami’s games. It was first used in the mid 80’s on a game called Gradius which was released on the NES.

The Konami Code is used by pausing the game and then hitting the following buttons:

You can find a full list of games that used the Konami Code here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Konami_code_games

Konami Code Sites

The list of sites that use the Konami Code can be found be cracking the code on this site: http://konamicodesites.com/. But if you’re feeling lazy and can’t be bothered, here is the list so far:

The site I got the fix from is http://homepage.ntlworld.com/bobosola/ and is worth checking out for more detail. I’ll briefly run through how to use the fix.

The main advantage of using PNGs is to get the alpha transparency going. There is also the option of two-dimensional interlacing which produces profressive display.
Adavantages of using a GIF are that they are more widelysupported. It also supports animation and everbody loves animated GIFs….right?

1. Download the png_fix file that can be found here.
2. Insert the code below into the page you want the PNGs fixing.
<!–[if IE 6]>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”pngfix.js”></script>
<script type=”text/javascript”>
DD_belatedPNG.fix(’.png_bg’);
</script>
<![endif]–>
You can name the class inside the function call anything you like.
3. Then simple apply the class ‘png_bg’ to the element you want the transparency to work on. For example on an image <img src=’image.png’ alt=” class=’png_bg’ />

An example of the menu I did with the PNG fix can be found here on a work in progress site we are doing at 9xb. If you hover over ‘Venues’ in the main menu, you will see the dropdown in action. It also uses the fix on the semi-transparent overlay in the main box and on a few PNGs throughout.

I then wondered if it were possible to create a little icon like the favicon to put in place of that, much like the ones the apps have on there already. A quick google found that I could indeed do this….and here’s how.

1. Create a 57 x 57 png of the icon you want to be displayed and name it apple-touch-icon.png
2. Upload that to the root of your site much like you would a favicon.

Now when you navigate to your site on your iPhone and choose to ‘Add to home screen’ after a couple of seconds, there will be the icon you uploaded. What’s more it will automatically add the nice little corners and wipe to the icon for you How simple is that?

An example of what my site looks like saved to the iPhone can be seen to the right.

Hold on tight….

The is currently a holding page set up (on the left) at bethemiddleman.com. Here you can view our Twitter feed, signup to receive updates on when the site is put live and any future progress before then.
You can also sign up as a beta tester, to have a proper good crack at breaking things and reporting any bugs back to us before the site goes live. So sign up and help us out!

Savings calculator…

We have plugged in a simple calculator gives you an idea of how much you could save when selling your house privately as oppsed to selling your house through an agency. This money is saved mainly from the agents fees and how much commission they will charge for the privilege.

Floaty light….

One aim of the site is to make things easy for the user when selling their property. But as it is the buyers and people wanting to rent/find a room who will be driving the site, the main focus will be on making the searching easy for them. Using the Google map API will help us a great deal, but also using technologies such as jQuery and AJAX should create a ‘light’ feel to the site and encourage the user to return.

We aim to cover all areas of people wanting properties, so will have a section for house buyers, prospective tenants looking for housing and people looking for single rooms in shared houses.

So keep an eye on things and the launch of the site which will be coming soon…