Andy Budd is a firm believer in cross-functional pairing and thinks that some of the best usability solutions emanate from the tech team. However, at some point the experience needs to be owned, and it shouldn’t be owned by the last person to open the HTML file and “touch the truck”. If designers are happy for developers to “own the code”, why not show a similar amount of respect and let designers “own the experience”? After all, collaboration goes both ways. So if you don’t want designers to start “optimizing” your code on the live server, outside your version control processes, please stop doing the same to their design.
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In the previous article, Clayton Anderson showed you how React Native can help you make iOS and Android apps with a shared code base, without sacrifices in quality. But what about the web? React Native for Web is intended to let you write a single app that runs in a browser using standard web technologies, or on iOS and Android as a real native mobile app. While I don’t think the project is ready for production use yet, its potential success could mark a massive change in how large multi-platform applications are built. Let’s jump in!
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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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We publish articles because we love sharing what we learn and what others learn, too; we love discovering unique points of view and surprising design strategies, as well as just understanding how our colleagues out there solve difficult UX and front-end problems. Every single Smashing article goes through a thorough editorial review, including multiple passes for editing and refinement, before being published. In this series dedicated to our upcoming 10th anniversary we will explain our workflow and introduce the people behind the scenes!
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Holiday or no holiday, our need for some fresh inspiration never stops! This month, Vitaly Friedman has found some real treasures! As a designer, Vitaly feels that there is so much that he can learn from the techniques and color combinations in these little gems. Let’s dive in, and get inspired to leave your comfort zones for your next designs!
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In this article, Filip Bartos will share his notes about installing and configuring a critical-path performance optimization using Express and Handlebars for an isomorphic React website. This website was developed using React, running on an Express server, and it was going well, but Filip still wasn’t satisfied with a load-blocking CSS bundle. So, he started to think about options for how to implement the critical-path technique on an Express server. Throughout this article, Filip will be using Node.js and Express. Familiarity with them will help you understand the examples.
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For the Build 2016 conference, David Rousset had to create a small 8-bit drum machine, with 8-bit sounds and graphics. Building it might sound trivial, but it raises some interesting questions. For instance, how do you guarantee the same experience across all devices and browsers, accounting for resolution and touch support? In this article, David Rousset is going to share some tips he followed to build it.
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Static site generators are wonderful, even though they have to deal with work for which they weren’t initially created for. Learn how to provide aid wherever necessary for them to become more productive than ever.
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Experience and the memory of experience are related but systematically different. Everyone has two selves, the experiencing self and the remembering self, but the remembering self does the learning, judging and deciding. Memory is a collection of snapshots that gives extra weight to the most intense moment and the final moment of an experience. In this article, Curt Arledge is going to provide some tips for designing for experiences that leave a lasting positive impression.
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On a quest to cater for wallpapers that are a little more distinctive than the usual crowd, we challenge you, the design community, to get your creative juices flowing and produce some interesting and inspiring designs each month anew. This post features wallpapers to get your desktop ready for August 2016. They all come in versions with and without a calendar and can be downloaded for free. A big thank-you to everyone who tickled their creativity and contributed their ideas!
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