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It’s a pleasure to introduce some changes to the Independent.

First, we’ve moved to a dedicated virtual private server at Rackspace. You should see improved performance on our new server, which allows us to accommodate growing traffic.

Second, I’ve been watching with interest what our colleagues at the Boston Globe have been doing with web design. Led by the Filament Group and Ethan Marcotte, the Globe has unveiled a ‘responsive design.’  What that means is that with a single codebase, bostonglobe.com responds automatically to various web browsers, window sizes, and devices.

I’ve assiduously copied and mimicked the work of Ethan Marcotte and others, albeit with a humbler talent and skill set. Now, the Independent will adjust its layout automatically based on the browser window. And I’ve taken a ‘mobile first’ approach, in which the primary code is optimized for a small mobile screen. Using media queries, then, the layout adjusts upwards for larger canvases.

So this technique is based squarely on wonderful web projects out there, like the HTML5 Boilerplate, the Less Framework, an others.

And like all things, this is a work in progress, and I welcome your feedback.  Mahalo.