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A halfway solution to a design pattern that I see often, but have yet to find an easy way to implement: text that wraps so it is always fattest in the middle, and thinnest at either end.

I just fell down a rabbit hole learning about Dark Patterns, thanks largely to a link in an, as ever, well thought out Adactio post. To be clear, I knew what a Dark Pattern was, I just hadn't come …

Building a tooltip? A carousel? A password input? I can strongly recommend checking if the Component Gallery has a page on whatever UI pattern you're working …

Notes from my second fully remote conference, this time Sparkbox's UnConference. Being able to freely access talks from the US is a rare bonus of everything going on right now, and this did not disappoint. Musical cameos, great talks on UX, accessibility, design systems, and amazing speakers. Great event (despite the time difference).

I am an …

I enjoyed reading this article, written by Ethan Marcotte. It makes some interesting points, aligns with my own cognitive bubble and provides some deeper insight into areas of stuff that I …

I keep running into the same problem: how to set a style attribute in the CMS and have that be dynamically rendered on the front-end, without relying on inline styles. Turns out it's a great use case for CSS variables!

The GOV.UK UX and design team are fascinating. Every time I've had to use the website I've found it a breeze, which is an enormous achievement on their behalf. Better yet, they're incredibly …

In which I start off asking a simple question: what content categories should I use on this website? Four hours later, I've discoverd information gardening, now pages, digital-me libraries, and oh so much more. And yes, I think I've answered that first question. Fancy a trip down the rabbit hole?

Well, it only took about a week of dazed puzzling, data tables, and tearing my hair out in clumps, but I think I may finally have a rough content taxonomy for theAdhocracy. A rough first version, that is. Let me explain...

The search page is live, the index is populated, but it all looked a bit rubbish and it didn't quite work as well as I wanted. Now it's using custom-styled components, queries are tracked/stored via the URL for persistence, and you can filter results based on category.

A great breakdown from Dave as to why the typical card UI pattern has some inherent issues. Some elements – like making cards all the same height and dealing with responsively collapsing card lists …

Marketing needs versus user experience is a topic that I have some deep misgivings over, but a recent post made me want to try and boil some of those thoughts down into their underlying rationale. I'm not sure I totally succeeded, but there we go.

Notes from the 2020 Jamstack Conf. Some interesting dives in the Jamstack community and various applications of Jamstack technologies, with tweet threads as usual.

Just after the 10-year anniversary of his Responsive Design article on A List Apart, Ethan has published some interesting thoughts on the nature of seams within …

Noah explains what it's like working in web design with colour vision deficiency (CVD). Gives a great overview of what CVD covers and why some people can see more/fewer colours than the average …

The infamous frontend divide, the feeling that JavaScript-everywhere has caused a schism in what a frontend developer is. Should they be split into JavaScript Engineer and UI …

The new dominant layout methods in CSS – grid and flexbox – have solved a lot of issues. Still, sometimes the ideal layout is somewhere in the middle: a flexible grid-like mashup. With a bit of outside-the-box thinking, you can there from either angle.

... otherwise known as the Great Vulture Failure of 2020 …

A sobering look into the history of the UX industry. I think the outlined three "phases of UX" seem pretty on point from my own experience: from idealistic, trusted advisor; to oft-ignored and …

Making the case for the title UI Engineer as a meaningful descriptor for those of us that consider our work in front-of-the-front-end terms.

I love Andy's new design over on Stuff & Nonsense. A large part of that are the cleverly diverse page layouts. Turns out, underneath that perceived diversity is a consistent grid, made …

Heydon's video is an excellent overview of their much-loved owl selector and "stack" layout pattern. I actually didn't realise that Heydon was the original "inventor" of the owl, though it makes a …

Some very clear criticisms of the whole "comedy shouldn't be censored" mentality. Comedy absolutely should not be censored, but it should be able to be critiqued. As Thought Slime puts it, (some) …

A fascinating series looking into how to turn a modern React eCommerce front end into as fast a page as possible. The conclusions are not what I had …

After a month on the Fediverse, what parts have I grown to love, which parts would I like to see changed, and what has surprised me the most.

I've been saying for a couple of years that we are on the brink of a "fluid design" revolution in front-end development, similar to what happened around the late 2000s with "responsive design". …

Maggie's writing is always fantastic, and their thoughts on digital gardens are always worth reading. The history here is nothing new to me personally, but does present it in an ideal manner. I also …

I read the entirety of the EAA – including all supporting documentation – so you don't have to.

The color-mix property enables a lot of interesting functionality when you realise that you can use it to mix transparency into colours, including design tokens.