Moving from one image for all kinds of devices to the common one-size-per-form-factor approach is definitely a step in the right direction. The downside is that, from a performance perspective, the approach is too general. There is more juice to be squeezed. However, from a development and maintenance perspective, it might make sense because three image sizes, or breakpoints, are manageable. In this article, Jon Arne Sæterås will look closely at how well the one-size-per-form-factor approach really works and how you can use smart content delivery networks to improve image performance.
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Apple’s GameplayKit has several algorithms and data structures that make it easier to follow game development best practices. When you develop a game, you need to sprinkle conditionals everywhere. If Pac-Man eats a power pill, then ghosts should run away. GKRuleSystem, lets you build up complex conditional logic from smaller pieces. By structuring your code around it, you’ll create rules that are easier to change or reuse for new levels. In this article, we’re going to take typical game logic code and learn how to represent it as a rule system.
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As a designer, you will be facing more demands and opportunities to work with digital systems that embody machine learning. To have your say about how best to use it, you need a good understanding about its applications and related design patterns. In this article, Lassi Liikkanen illustrates the power of machine learning through the applications of detection, prediction and generation. To help you get started, he has included two non-technical questions that will help with assessing whether your task is ready to be learned by a machine.
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What’s going on in the industry? What new techniques have emerged recently? What insights, tools, tips and tricks is the web design community talking about? Anselm Hannemann is collecting everything that popped up over the last week in his web development reading list so that you don’t miss out on anything. The result is a carefully curated list of articles and resources that are worth taking a closer look at.
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The beauty of Jekyll is in its simplicity. While WordPress can match many of the features of Jekyll, it often comes at the cost of complexity through extra plugins or infrastructure. In this article, Mike Neumegen will take on the role of a web developer building a website for a fictional law firm. WordPress is an obvious choice for a website like this, but is it the only tool we should consider? Let’s look at a completely different way of building a website, using Jekyll.
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Javier Cuello started using Sketch a few years ago, as a replacement for his favorite design software back then, Fireworks, which had been discontinued by Adobe — leaving a whole generation of designers broken-hearted. In this article, Javier will outline how to make use of symbols in Sketch in order to unleash their full potential, going from the most basic situations to some more advanced use cases. He’ll also include some tips and tricks that he has learned along the way.
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In this article, Serg Hospodarets will teach you more about CSS custom properties, including their syntax, their advantages, good usage examples and how to interact with them from JavaScript. You will learn how to detect whether they are supported, how they are different from CSS preprocessor variables, and how to start using native CSS variables until they are supported across browsers. This is the right time to start using CSS custom properties and to prepare for their native support in browsers.
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Our industry has exploded with new thinking, patterns and approaches. In this article, Chris Poteet wants to look specifically at the issue of responsive navigation. He will first talk about information architecture, then the purpose of navigation, and finally he will look at three responsive navigation patterns that have served well over time.
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The “User Experience Revolution” book is a practical battle plan for placing the user at the heart of your company. Companies desperately need to change, and this book shows you how to help them do that. This is why we are releasing a new book today called “User Experience Revolution,” a practical battle plan for placing the user at the heart of your company. Companies desperately need to change, and the book shows you how to help them do that. Get the book now!
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IoT is a vast topic, and there are many ways to approach it. In this article, Svetlin Denkov will introduce readers of different backgrounds to prototyping IoT experiences with minimum code knowledge. This article assumes you are using a Mac, but much of the content carries over to Windows systems as well. For the coding sections, he will be using Arduino’s integrated development environment (IDE) and the C/C++ programming language. There are different ways to get to the same result, so pick the board and programming language that you are most familiar with. There is a lot of ground to cover, so let’s jump right in!
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