May 17, 2018 — Have you ever faced challenges when trying to sell Design Discovery to a potential client? As designers, it is important that we are equipped to be able to have conversations with senior stakeholders to be able to sell and justify the importance of the so-called “Design Discovery” within the design process. In this article, Kyle Cassidy takes a deep dive into the importance of research as part of the UX design process and the core purpose of Design Discovery. Read more…

May 16, 2018 — SVG supports the same kind of interactivity we’re used to with HTML. And with the addition of pointer-events, we can improve the way our SVG documents behave in response to user interaction. Every browser that supports SVG supports the property for SVG documents and elements. When used with HTML elements, support is slightly less robust. It isn’t available in Internet Explorer 10 or its predecessors, or any version of Opera Mini. In this article, Tiffany Brown will scratch the surface of pointer-events. Read more…

May 15, 2018 — Do sites that explain their ‘concept’ in a simple way have a better shot at mass-appeal with users? Being aware of the importance of ‘high-concept’ allows us — as designers — to really focus on user’s initial impressions. The most successful blockbusters are the ones that have an easy-to-understand concept that can be communicated in a single sentence. Web design should be approached in the same way. In this article, Andy Duke will show you how. Read more…

May 14, 2018 — Dynamic properties provide opportunities for new creative ideas, but also the potential to add complexity to CSS. Custom properties have a huge potential to change how we write and structure CSS and to a lesser extent, how we use JavaScript to interact with UI components. To get the most out of them, we might need a strategy for how we write and structure CSS with custom properties. In this article, Michael Riethmuller will show you how. Read more…

May 11, 2018 — WordPress can work as an excellent back-end platform for your next native app, especially if it is content-driven or an online shop. In this article, Muhammad Mushin will show you the foundations for building mobile apps with React Native and WordPress. You will learn how to build an e-commerce application for iOS and Android using the WooCommerce platform as your backend. This would be an ideal starting point for anyone willing to get into native cross-platform development. Read more…

May 11, 2018 — Smashing Magazine’s editor-in-chief, Rachel Andrew, attended the Google I/O 2018 event in Mountain View. We made sure you don’t miss out: Here’s a roundup of the announcements and launches that were presented at the event. To help you use the things announced, Rachel will be linking to the videos of those sessions plus any supporting material she’s been able to find. Read more…

May 10, 2018 — Search engines have evolved in leaps and bounds these past few years. This year, there are a number of things that need to be kept in mind with regard to SEO. There are some key SEO concepts that experts in the field struggle to communicate clearly to designers. This can create friction and the impression that most well-designed websites are very poorly optimized for SEO. In this article, Myriam Jessier aims to provide all the information you need to know. Read more…

May 9, 2018 — If you haven’t contributed to an open source project before, MDN is a brilliant place to start. MDN has been documenting the web platform for over 12 years and is a go-to resource for many. Its strength is the fact that it is a very straightforward, and an excellent way to give back to the community if you have ever found these docs useful. And the best part is that anyone can contribute and help to improve it. In this article, Rachel Andrew explains how. Read more…

May 8, 2018 — Have you ever wondered whether it’s possible to do anything on the web without JavaScript? How many sites use progressive enhancement in practice? In this article Chris Ashton will try to use the web under various constraints, representing a given demographic of user. A good core experience is indicative of a well-structured web page, which, in turn, is usually a good sign for SEO and for accessibility. It’s usually a well designed web page, as the designer and developer have spent time and effort thinking about what’s truly core to the experience. Read more…

May 7, 2018 — Some time ago, designers and developers built the same kinds of websites over and over again, so much so that they were mocked by people in our own industry. Today, the design landscape has changed completely. We’re equipped with new and powerful tools — CSS Grid, CSS custom properties, CSS shapes and CSS writing-mode, to name a few — that we can use to exercise our creativity. In this article, Zell Liew explains how. Read more…