The Beacon API is a lightweight and efficient way to log information from a web page back to a server. It is used for sending small amounts of data to a server without waiting for a response. Think of it like a postcard sent home when on vacation. You put a small amount of data on it, put it in the mailbox, and you don’t expect a response. In this article, Drew McLellan will help you find out how that can be used and what makes it so different from traditional Ajax techniques.
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Have you been looking for a way to create a notification system when using WordPress? Meet the ‘Notification’ plugin, an all-in-one solution for any custom WordPress notification system. In this article, Jakub Mikita will show you how to create your own notification system within minutes with the free Notification plugin. By notification, he means any kind of notification. Most of the time, it will be email, but with the plugin you’ll be using, you can also send webhooks and other kinds of notifications.
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Frameworks such as Espresso and Mockito provide easy-to-use APIs that make writing tests for various scenarios easier. The important thing to consider while writing tests is the units of responsibility that emerge as you design the new feature. The unit test should cover all possible interactions with the unit, including standard interactions and exceptional scenarios. In this article, Vivek Maskara will cover the fundamentals of testing and frameworks which developers can use to write unit tests.
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Images are powerful. They can provide key information and context to articles, or merely add humorous asides. They do anything for us that plain text just can’t by itself. But when there’s too much imagery, it can be frustrating for users on slow connections, or run afoul of data plan allowances. In this eBook, you’ll learn all about WebP: what it’s capable of, how it performs, how to convert images to the format in a variety of ways, and most importantly, how to use it. Meet “The WebP Manual,” our latest edition to the Smashing eBook Library that covers everything you need to know about the latest image format to sweep the web!
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In this excerpt from his eBook “The WebP Manual,” developer and author Jeremy Wagner will show you the many ways you can convert your existing images to the WebP format.
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We asked the Smashing Community for their favorite tips and tricks when editing text and code. With so many great suggestions, Rachel Andrew decided to collect them all into one article so you can add it to your useful bookmarks. Thanks to everyone who took the time to reply and share their best-appreciated tools and techniques — we sincerely appreciate it!
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With so much going on in the web industry, it can be difficult catching up with everything — especially with font loading and webfonts that greatly affect web performance. Search no further — we’ve got your back.
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We’re pretty excited by tools such as SVGator, which really speed up the process when you’re making simple SVG animations. Animated SVG files have become very popular, because they are entirely scalable, small and 100% code-based, which allows for so many transformations and tweaks. This, however, comes at a price: the steep learning curve for complete beginners. In this article, Vitaly Friedman will show you how easy it is to use and how you can get a great-looking animation in no time.
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Tired of hearing about cryptocurrency? It’s high time we took a closer look at hyperlinks and how they are one of the biggest currencies in the SEO world. With this quick field guide, Myriam Jessier & Stéphanie Walter aim to help you protect your website, improve your marketing or simply discover why so many people troll the comments section with strange links! You are about to go through a linkbuilding crash course.
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Persuasion is all around us, in our everyday lives. As designers, we can use ethical persuasive design methods to get users to take some action. With plenty of persuasive methods available, we have to be selective about what we use. The key to persuading your users is to keep it simple: using focused persuasive techniques and tactics that will work for your users. In this article, Lyndon Cerejo will show you everything you need to know about persuasion.
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