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Developing a website such as SDk and the magazine it hosts takes time. That's why we think contributors and others interested in what we are doing deserve to be kept informed on our progress. This page has been designed to do exactly that: to keep you up-to-date as to where we are. We're pleased to have you with us.
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A measure of the SDk project in terms of communications inputSDk Updates 
Fri 16 Oct, 2009.
At last, we're on the final run to launch. SDk has been a marathon, but as we've maintained all along, it will be worth it. As a measure of this marathon we have undertaken, email communication alone between Chris and Daryl, when compiled, now amounts to more than 500 pages (A4 format); this is in addition to communication by telephone several times a week and many meetings in person.
Technical issues with web development, and, lately, copyright permissions, have sapped enormous amounts of time. SDk is at the stage now, though, that "publish and be damned" is the reality. So we press on, and revel in the knowledge that, hopefully, we will indeed be damned by assorted rogues and scoundrels including but not exclusive of politicians, bankers, financiers, moralists, radical feminists… In general, that is, anyone of an overly censorial or authoritarian mindset. We'll enjoy the publicity.
Returning one last time to technical issues, we've had trouble developing SDk so that it performs equally well on Windows and Mac platforms. The root of the problem ultimately lies with Apple's pride and their insistence on managing and rendering fonts in their own, unique way. This was understandable 13 or so years ago, but the reality today is that a de facto standard is in operation for font rendering on the internet, and that standard is not what Apple use for the Mac OS. It is a similar situation to various web-browser manufacturers each claiming their browser is the standard, necessitating web developers to code in all manner of patches for a single website to work well with different browsers. The more complex the website – and SDk is extremely complex – the greater the difficulty in achieving uniform performance across different browsers. Throw the Mac OS's different font management into the equation, and the problem compounds.
The result? We have been forced to bow to practicality. Daryl uses a Mac. He is most upset. It means, as long as Apple obstinately refuse to recognise reality and go with the flow of the font rendering of the unfortunate 90 percent of web users, he will never see SDk at its peak on his own screen. It will not be the end of the world for Apple if they change their font management, but, in the meantime, if habit or convenience rather than necessity leads you, like the IT industry, into enslavement to the big M$ (not unlike the McDonalds golden arches), and you resent this fact, then remember all is not necessarily lost: my enemy's enemy is my friend.
