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Find and Change Default App for File Type from Command Line
23.10.2018
There are few things more frustrating to any computer user than files opening in an unwanted application. Sure you can use the Open menu item in the desired application but we all just want to double-click a file and see it open in the application we expect. I recently got to thinking about this...
How to Get and Set CSS Variable Values with JavaScript
8.10.2018
CSS variables are a very welcome addition to the language, despite them being incredibly basic. Sure we could use SASS or stylus but languages should never count on developers relying on frameworks and toolkits to accomplish what we know we need. And just like every other part of a webpage,...
Sometimes `sizes` is quite important.
27.7.2018
Paraphrased question from email:
I just read your article Responsive Images: If you’re just changing resolutions, use srcset. In the age of "responsive websites," srcset does not help in certain situations. For example, I have a popular products slider. On mobile, I have one image per slide where...
Create the Google Button Effect with CSS
27.7.2018
I always found Google’s branding simple but grew to realize that was the beauty in their design; there’s something about “just enough” that is the perfect balance between bland and over the top. GMail’s design grew old over the years and Google just got around...
Teaching Your Clients How to Use The Website You Built Them
27.7.2018
I share my own thoughts on how you might go about educating someone you just built a site for. But it turns out I had a lot of fun putting together a ton of other people's thoughts as well. I tweeted about it and got a flood of responses, so this article is an amalgamation of all that.
Direct...
Did you know that style and script tags can be set to display: block?
25.7.2018
The other night, Amit Patel mentioned that you can set script tags in HTML to display: block with CSS and then edit that code inline with the contentEditable attribute. This means that you can then see it all update live in the browser as you type. Shortly after, Marius Gundersen replied that...
Developer Roadmaps
23.7.2018
The path to becoming a front-end developer, as looked back upon by anyone who self-identifies that way, is likely a very windy one full of thorn bushes and band websites. Still, documenting a path, even if it's straighter and far cleaner than reality, is an interesting exercise and might just...
Font Playground
20.7.2018
This is a wondrous little project by Wenting Zhang that showcases a series of variable fonts and lets you manipulate their settings to see the results. It’s interesting that there’s so many tools like this that have been released over the past couple of months, such as v-fonts, Axis-Praxis...
Weird things variable fonts can do
20.7.2018
I tend to think of variable fonts as a font format in which a single font file is capable of displaying type at near-infinite variations of things like boldness, width, and slantyness. In my experience, that's a common use case. Just check out many of the interactive demos over...
CSS: A New Kind of JavaScript
19.7.2018
In this wacky and satirical post, Heydon Pickering describes a wild new technology called Cascading Style Sheets that solves a lot of the problems you might bump into when styling things with JavaScript:
A good sign that a technology is not fit for purpose is how much we have to rely on workarounds...
Accessibility for Teams
19.7.2018
Maya Benari:
Accessibility is a crucial part of government product design. First, it’s the law. Federal agencies face legal consequences when they don’t meet accessibility requirements. Second, it affects us all. Whether you have a motor disability, you sprained your wrist playing dodgeball,...
The div that looks different in every browser
13.7.2018
It's not that Martijn Cuppens used User Agent sniffing, CSS hacks, or anything like that to make this quirk div. This is just a plain ol' <div> using the outline property a la:
div {
inset 100px green;
outline-offset: -125px;
}
It looks different in different browsers because browsers...
Scrolling Gradient
13.7.2018
If you want a gradient that changes as you scroll down a very long page, you can create a gradient with a bunch of color stops, apply it to the body and it will do just that.
But, what if you don't want a perfectly vertical gradient? Like you want just the top left corner to change color? Mike...
Search Git Commits Between Dates
12.7.2018
One of my weaknesses as a developer is relying on UIs to provide me the data I need. It’s not a fatal weakness but it does hamper me a bit. One prime example is relying on GitHub’s interface to review changes; git’s command line provides the information needed with commands...
Emojis as Icons
11.7.2018
There are lots of unicode symbols that make pretty good icons already, like arrows (←), marks (✘), and objects (✂︎).You can already colorize these like a normal font glyph. Then, there are emojis, those full-color suckers we all know about. What if you could take just the shape of an emoji...
The CSS Paint API
9.7.2018
The CSS Paint API is extremely exciting, not only for what it is, but what it represents, which is the beginning of a very exciting time for CSS. Let’s go over what it is, why we have it and how to start using it.
What is the CSS Paint API?
The API is just one part of a whole suite of...
Writing Good Support Requests
2.7.2018
My take on trying to be helpful to a support staff.
One bit is just as relevant for learning development:
Writing out a ticket will help you figure out the problem.
Sometimes when you have to take a second to collect your thoughts and explain something, the problem will become clear and maybe even...
What is SVG good for?
21.6.2018
Y'all probably wouldn't be surprised if I told you it's pretty awesome for icons, and icon systems. SVG icon systems can, and perhaps should be quite easy. I'm a fan of just inlining those suckers, particularly when they are pretty simple.
But what else?
Logos is a classic example! A lot...
Centering: The Newest Coolest Way vs. The Oldest Coolest Way
20.6.2018
This isn't a comprehensive guide to centering things. We have that!
This is just a little observation about old and new. One of the trickier things related to centering in CSS is when you need to center both vertically and horizontally and you don't know the width or height of what you...
Don’t just copy the @font-face out of Google Fonts URLs
19.6.2018
I don't think this is an epidemic or anything, but I've seen it done a few times and even advocated for. This is what I mean...
You go to Google Fonts and pick a font like Open Sans, and it gives you either a <link> or an @import with a URL there in which to ready this font for usage...