October 31, 2019 — In many parts of the world, November is a rather gray month, so what better way could there be to start it off as with some colorful inspiration? Read more…

October 30, 2019 — This third part of the series will focus on adding a text-based client for the game engine that was created in part 2. Today, Fernando Doglio will explain basic architecture design, tool selection and code highlights by showing you how to create a text-based UI with the help of Node.js. Read more…

October 29, 2019 — Images are a big part of the web and, yet, they can cause a lot of challenges for the user experience if not properly optimized or delivered. It’s been almost a decade since Google introduced the world to WebP as a solution to this problem. As more of our browsers, devices and software support it, it’s time that web designers started adopting it as their default image format. In this article, Suzanne Scacca is going to show you What WebP is. Read more…

October 28, 2019 — The term COPE (“Create Once, Publish Everywhere”) is a methodology for publishing our content to different outputs (website, AMP site, email, apps, and so on) by having a single source of truth for all of them. Concerning WordPress, even though it has always shined as a Content Management System, implementing the COPE strategy has historically proved to be a challenge. In this article, Leonardo Losoviz will explore how to implement COPE using WordPress. Read more…

October 25, 2019 — As the language evolved, new artifacts appeared in the scene to allow asynchronous execution; developers tried different approaches while solving more complicated algorithms and data flows. In this article, Jeremias Menichelli is going to explore the evolution of JavaScript around asynchronous execution in the past era and how it changed the way we write and read code. He will start with the beginnings of web development, and go all the way to modern asynchronous pattern examples. Read more…

October 24, 2019 — At the heart of the JAMstack are static site generators that store your data as flat files. Sometimes, managing data this way can be overly complicated. Sometimes, we still need a database. With that in mind, Netlify — a serverless cloud database — collaborated to make combining both systems easier.  In this article, Bryan Robinson will create a personal bookmarking site using FaunaDB, Netlify Functions and 11ty data files. Read more…

October 23, 2019 — Welcome to the second part of this series. The the first part, we covered the architecture of a Node.js-based platform and client application that will enable people to define and play their own text adventures as a group. This time around, Fernando Doglio will be covering the creation of one of the modules Fernando defined last time (the game engine) and will also be focusing on the design process in order to shed some light into what needs to happen before you start coding your own hobby projects. Read more…

October 22, 2019 — You want to build a mobile website or PWA that converts visitors into leads or customers. But with Google and consumers alike becoming ever more demanding when it comes to loading speeds, what more can you do? ImageKit, a digital image optimization service, might have the all-in-one hands-off solution you need. Today, Suzanne Scacca will focus on how you can still design with as many images as you want without slowing down your website. Read more…

October 21, 2019 — When someone reads a story, they have certain expectations about how that story will unfold whether they know how to articulate them or not. The same is true about users coming to our websites. We can pull principles from storytelling to help us meet and, hopefully, exceed those user expectations. Today, John Rhea will pull out and discuss just a few examples of how thinking about your users’ stories can increase user engagement and satisfaction. He’ll look at audience expectations and how your site is meeting those expectations or not. Read more…

October 18, 2019 — In the fast-paced industry that designers and developers work in, it’s important to stay up to date as much as possible. Don’t worry, we’ve got your back with monthly updates to help you stay on top of things. This is the first monthly update that the Smashing team will be publishing, to highlight some of the things we have enjoyed reading over the past month. Read more…