Words that would otherwise be coming out of my mouth

Defensive CSS by Ahmad Shadeed does a great job breaking down a lot of common (and not so common!) CSS issues when working with dynamic content. Super helpful for people building design systems. I’m happy to report we put most […]

This article is a fantastic reminder to live our whole lives, not just our work lives. So ask yourself this: Who would you be if work was no longer the axis of your life? How would your relationship with your close friends […]

We often talk about design systems as singular entities. “The design system saves time and increases quality.” “Oh, the design system provides that.” “Update to the latest version of the design system.” The reality is that a design system is […]

I had the privilege to speak with Rachel Weissman on the Design To Be Conversation podcast about mental health. I shared my family’s own recent experience with mental health issues and talked about mental health issues facing the design/tech industry […]

Using a design system made a simple form page 47% faster to develop versus coding it from scratch. It’s super tricky to measure the value of a design system, so the folks at Sparkbox had a great idea. They raced […]

Back in March, I shared that I started volunteering with an organization called Project Healthy Minds. PHM’s mission is three-fold: End the stigma around mental illness Get people access to mental health care Make mental health care an integral part […]

One thing we run into a fair amount in our design system work is the need to clarify the difference between “dark mode” and “components rendered on a dark background”. What is actual dark mode? prefers-color-scheme is a CSS media […]

Here’s a great talk about web components from Dave. We’ve been building a lot of web component-based design systems with our clients, and I’m bullish about their future. I think if you were using Web Components before 2020 you were […]

This is phenomenal.

Subtitle: How a Wisconsin-based wastewater management magazine forever changed the trajectory of my life. In early 2010, I was hired as a “mobile web developer” at R/GA at a time when the iPhone 3GS was brand new, Android was still […]

Your docs belong in the code repository It needs to be next to the code so that authors and contributors can update/read the docs while working on the code or docs. Providing it in a separate repository or otherwise separated […]

Fantastic read from Rachel that you can take time off — even extended time off — from the fast-moving frontend landscape and still come back and be alright. Source: I completely ignored the front end development scene for 6 months. […]

Holy shit this is absolutely fantastic. One of the most frequent, confusing conversations w/ designers is “No, the pink lines that overlay design comps aren’t all that helpful for how things actually work in the browser.” Grid and layout might […]

in our society, there seems a general rule that, the more obviously one’s work benefits other people, the less one is likely to be paid for it Source: STRIKE! Magazine – On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

I love making stuff. I’m always going to want to make stuff. Long after anyone wants to see my stuff, I’ll want to make stuff. Source: Conan O’Brien on His Late-Night Legacy and Future

What an amazing demo. Source: Container Queries in Web Components | Max Böck

Container queries are going to change how we build design systems. Super pumped that they’re finally on the horizon. Source: Say Hello To CSS Container Queries

A design system’s reference website (such as lightningdesignsystem.com, polaris.shopify.com, and a slew of others) serves as the center of gravity for the design system. It rounds up all the design system’s ingredients and serves a watering hole for different disciplines, […]

However, as the roles of the front-end developer have stretched into the realms of ‘engineering’, it has created a split: Front-of-the-front-end: UI focused Back-of-the-front-end (referred to as ‘Engineering’ from now): Integration focused(Terms coined by Brad Frost)Again, this isn’t a bad […]

I’m thrilled to announce that I’m joining Project Healthy Minds, a non-profit focused on destigmitizing mental illness and getting people access to mental health care and resources. There is a growing global mental health crisis that has been exacerbated by […]