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Making an Audio Waveform Visualizer with Vanilla JavaScript
12.11.2019
As a UI designer, I’m constantly reminded of the value of knowing how to code. I pride myself on thinking of the developers on my team while designing user interfaces. But sometimes, I step on a technical landmine.
A few years ago, as the design director of wsj.com, I was helping to re-design...
Diana Smith’s Pure CSS Artwork “Lace”
8.11.2019
Diana is at it again with her absolutely unbelievable CSS paintings. This latest one is called Lace. Past paintings are Francine, Vignes, and Zigario.
She wrote for us last year if you'd like a little insight into her thinking.
Andy Baio looked at the painting in a variety of older...
Wufoo Cracks the Code for Forms So You Don’t Have To
8.10.2019
There was a lot of buzz about forms last week when Jason Grisby pointed to a missing pattern attribute on Chipotle's order form that could have been used to help-through millions of dollars in orders. Adrian Roselli followed that up with the common mistake of forgetting for and id attributes...
Awards That Look Beyond the Flashy
3.10.2019
Dan Mall is judging the Communication Arts Interactive 2020 awards. These types of things are usually a celebration of flashy, short-lived, one-off designs. Those things are awesome, but Dan has more in mind:
I’d love to award work that demonstrates creative use of the highest level of color...
Thinking in React Hooks
25.9.2019
Amelia Wattenberger has written this wonderful and interactive piece about React Hooks and details how they can clean up code and remove all those troubling lifecycle events:
React introduced hooks one year ago, and they've been a game-changer for a lot of developers. There are tons of how-to...
Branching Out from the Great Divide
2.8.2019
I like the term Front-End Developer. It's encapsulates the nature of your job if your concerns are:
Building UIs for web browsers
The spectrum of devices and platforms those web browsers run on
The people who use those web browsers and related assistive technology
The breadth of knowledge...
The Next Big Financial Meltdown Is Around the Corner, Many Voices Warn
25.7.2019
“The economy is looking great,” how many times have they told you that? And why do you usually hear it when you are late on a mortgage payment or during a downsizing purge at your company? Relying on your senses is always a safer bet than trusting the wishful thinking of those...
How I Created a Code Beautifier in Two Days
19.7.2019
I recently drew up a wireframe for a code beautifier. The next day, I decided to turn it into a real tool. The whole project took less than two days to complete.
I'd been thinking about building a new code beautifier for a while. The idea isn't unique, but every time I use someone else's tool,...
CSS Gradient Text
15.7.2019
Web developers know the fight we’ve all had to improve fonts on the web. Whether it be load time, odd strategies for using custom fonts (Cufon, anyone?), or just finding the right font itself, beautifying text on the web has never come easy. That got me thinking about fonts and CSS gradients, since...
Toast
3.7.2019
One day, all the sudden, I started hearing jokes about toast. I had no idea what the context was. I assumed some friends just got started telling toast jokes, which isn't rare by any means. But it turns out it was a whole thing. It got me thinking, jeez, if I can't keep up with this stuff when it's...
Three Predictions From the State of CSS 2019 Survey
27.6.2019
Running a developer survey like the State of CSS is a multi-stage process. First, you need to collect the data. Then, you process it into a usable shape. Finally, you come up with nifty ways to visualize it and release it to the world.
But then, once the dust settles and the traffic dies down...
Three Predictions From the State of CSS 2019 Survey
27.6.2019
Running a developer survey like the State of CSS is a multi-stage process. First, you need to collect the data. Then, you process it into a usable shape. Finally, you come up with nifty ways to visualize it and release it to the world.
But then, once the dust settles and the traffic dies down...
Spam Detection APIs
25.6.2019
I was trying to research the landscape of these the other day — And by research, I mean light Googling and asking on Twitter. Weirdly, very little comes to mind when thinking about spam detection APIs. I mean some kind of URL endpoint, paid or not, where you can hit it with a block of text...
Spam Detection APIs
25.6.2019
I was trying to research the landscape of these the other day — And by research, I mean light Googling and asking on Twitter. Weirdly, very little comes to mind when thinking about spam detection APIs. I mean some kind of URL endpoint, paid or not, where you can hit it with a block of text...
Getting Started with React Testing Library
22.5.2019
I can guess what you are thinking: another React testing library? So many have already been covered here on CSS-Tricks (heck, I’ve already posted one covering Jest and Enzyme) so aren’t there already enough options to go around?
But react-testing-library is not just another testing library. It’s...
How to Travel the World With Bitcoin Cash
19.5.2019
Traveling is on everyone’s minds as summer approaches and crypto enthusiasts are no exception. But for anyone thinking of a holiday trip, travel arrangements can be arduous. Crypto payments can make your life easier in that regard, particularly with bitcoin cash, which is a fast and cheap...
Integrating Third-Party Animation Libraries to a Project
14.5.2019
Creating CSS-based animations and transitions can be a challenge. They can be complex and time-consuming. Need to move forward with a project with little time to tweak the perfect transition? Consider a third-party CSS animation library with ready-to-go animations waiting to be used. Yet, you might...
The Thinking Behind Simplifying Event Handlers
9.5.2019
Events are used to respond when a user clicks somewhere, focuses on a link with their keyboard, and changes the text in a form. When I first started learning JavaScript, I wrote complicated event listeners. More recently, I've learned how to reduce both the amount of code I write and the number...
Currently Reading: Progressive Web Apps by Jason Grisby
3.5.2019
I’ve been reading Jason Grigsby’s new book on progressive web apps this past week and it’s exciting. Jason explains what PWAs are and how they work while while doing a bang-up job covering the business case for using them them, too. But perhaps you might be thinking that a PWA isn’t necessary...
Interviewing for a Technical Position Doesn’t Have to Be Scary
26.4.2019
Jacob Schatz (@jakecodes) is a staff engineer over at GitLab and was kind enough to share how he conducts job interviews for technical positions and his thinking process for them. Technical interviews are talked about often and can be a touchy subject for some, so it’s worth noting that this...