Posts Tagged ‘web development’

What does a mature, end-to-end design system look like in a big, complex organization? What are all the moving pieces, and how do they hang together as a well-considered architecture? What’s required and what’s optional? Hold onto your butts, because […]

Containing multi-site management within a single codebase covers how one can apply atomic design principles in a React codebase.

Despite its hyperbolic title, The End of Front-End Development is a well-considered piece by Josh Comeau. I share many of the sentiments expressed here, though how things will actually shake out is anyone’s guess. In my view, this is one […]

Clever Code Considered Harmful is a great read. When it comes to day-to-day production code, here’s the barometer I like to use: will a junior developer, someone at the very start of their career, struggle to understand this code? In […]

This is fantastic. Great work, Dave. Source: The case for Flex applications – daverupert.com

Here’s Andy Bell with a post called the (extremely) loud minority.  Always remember that although a subset of the JavaScript community can be very loud, they represent a paltry portion of the web as a whole. This means that when they say something like “Best practices […]

You can’t learn the whole stack. Nobody can. Maybe it was possible in 1990, the day after the web was invented, but I’m not even sure about that. The stack grows and shifts and evolves every day. Very much agree […]

This is close to exactly what I’ve been wanting: a way to use web components like <product-card heading=”Product Name” price=”$30.00″></product-card>and have that card render as regular ol’ HTML. a new plugin for Eleventy that renders your Lit components as static HTML during […]

This is really good and fun. Source: 136 facts every web dev should know before they burn out and turn to landscape painting or nude modelling – Baldur Bjarnason

Here’s a break down how we build components with similar conventions across many different frameworks, written by my brother Ian (@frostyweather). All of these frameworks can have similar component structure, component user APIs, properties, state management, methods/functions, lifecycles, and more. […]

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 […]

The Great Divide is real, and I’m pleased that the terms “front-of-the-front-end” and “back-of-the-front-end” have gained traction ever since I quipped about them on the Shop Talk Show. A few of my clients have actually moved away from a culture […]

The more I author code as it will be run by the browser the easier it will be to maintain that code over time Source: Cheating Entropy with Native Web Technologies – Jim Nielsen’s Weblog

Well-documented code guidelines and standards are absolutely critical for creating consistent, cohesive code together. Especially in the context of creating a design system’s component library, it’s crucial to establish consistent API and code conventions to create an excellent user developers’ […]

Good read about letting “clean code” go. As the years go by, I increasingly err on the side of legibility over cleanliness. Sure, things could likely be tightened up, but does it really matter? If the code works, then there’s […]

Here are a few random stories from my last couple weeks of work. We have a datepicker field that has a calendar SVG icon sitting on top of the field. There was an issue where clicking the icon wasn’t triggering […]

I’m always amazed by the level of effort involved in web design/development. Adding a simple button to a UI can translate to weeks or even months of work. Behind every little bit of UI is a giant iceberg of technology […]

There are a lot of parallels between music and web design/development. Here’s how I see it: Art and science Call it the difference between Type A vs Type B personalities. Or Right brain vs left brain. Or whatever other split […]

Frontend designers create the HTML, CSS, and presentational JavaScript code that powers web products’ user interfaces. I see frontend design as helpful mortar that bridges the gap between design and development. Of course “frontend designer” may or may not be […]

I think this post and The Great Divide are two of the most important reads about the state of frontend web development right now.

When we’re evaluating technologies for appropriateness, I hope that we will do so through the lens of what’s best for users, not what we feel compelled to use based on a gnawing sense of irrelevancy driven by the perceived popularity […]

One of the best things about design systems is you can create components that have design, development, accessibility, responsive, performance, etc best practices baked right into them. By taking care of the boring stuff, users of the design system don’t […]

I love this classification of different kinds of web applications. It takes a more nuanced view of “sites vs apps”. I’d love to see this turned into a full-blown site with additional holotypes (airline, hotel chain, etc).

Where do you build UI code? That sounds like a dumb question, but it’s a deceptively important one. There’s a few ways to do it: UI code is authored within your application environment. If you’re working on a WordPress or Drupal […]

Performance budgets are awesome. So I made a thing to help you make performance budgets. The Performance Budget builder lets you lay out your template types, set a size budget for each template type, then plug in the sizes for each […]

Jake Archibald (@jaffathecake) wrote a really fantastic piece about progress and the Web, in response to a post by PPK (@ppk) called Stop moving the Web forward. PPK is concerned about the flood of features for Web developers to wrap […]

Emil Björklund wrote a very thoughtful follow-up post to my Primed and Ready to Go post about front-end prep work. Emil clarifies that it’s while it’s important to prepare as much as possible, it’s dangerous to jump in and start […]

It’s absolutely essential to treat front-end development as part of the design process. However, the (foolish, artificial) line between design and development “phases” gets in the way of true collaboration between disciplines. This often isn’t due to any malicious intent, […]

A few weeks ago I had the great opportunity to travel to my Alma mater to give advice to graduating seniors in the SMAD program. As students are gearing up for graduation and heading out into the workforce, I want […]