In this introductory article, Slava Fomin II will show you the most important parts of the Sails framework and give you some specific examples to get you going. Of course, if you want to use it in your daily work, you will have to spend some time mastering it and taking it to the next level. The good news is that Sails comes with pretty solid documentation and an active community. The creator of Sales even answers questions on StackOverflow personally. He’ll neither confirm nor deny that Sails is being developed by a giant smart octopus, but he will do his best to guide you from the humble ensign to being the confident captain of your own ship! You will not be alone.
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In this second part, Yury Vetrov will show you how he made his “Bootstrap on steroids” more powerful. A framework like this has many benefits, but the main result is a transition from large redesigns every couple of years to constantly updated designs. We can spend more time evolving a product rather than doing endless design maintenance. Moreover, product designers stop thinking in screens and become less like “Photoshop/Sketch people”.
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The number of Flux implementations available can feel overwhelming, but overall Jim Cowart finds it an encouraging development. Solid and successful patterns like Flux will, by their very nature, encourage multiple implementations. In this article, Jim will take a look at some of the key lessons he has learned about React and Flux. Whether you’re new to React and Flux, or going as far as building your own Flux implementation, Jim thinks you’ll not only enjoy this journey, but find some thought-provoking questions and wisdom you can apply in your own endeavors.
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Because Foundation for Apps was only released at the end of 2014, it hasn’t yet seen widespread usage, so there are few good sources of information on using the framework. In this article, Stephen Saucier brings you a comprehensive guide to build a functional web app with Foundation for Apps from start to finish. The techniques detailed here are fundamental to building practically any kind of app for any client, and this tutorial also serves as a strong introduction to the wider world of AngularJS and single-page apps.
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Bugs erode trust, which in turn loses customers. So when Ben Gremillion began updating Foundation, a responsive CSS framework, he wanted to ensure everything worked. In this article Ben will teach you his methodology for testing responsively, not just on a case by case, page-from-PSD comp. He developed a certain system to make sure that nothing’s broken at launch on different devices. It’s not enough to look for blatant bugs. You have to be thorough: in execution, in accountability, and in direction.
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Using the data from over 22 billion email subscribers, we determined what designers should prioritize when creating an email newsletter, both this year and beyond. Which email clients and platforms should we be supporting now? Should we learn all of the email workarounds or just use existing builders and frameworks? In this article, Ros Hodgekiss will interpret the numbers from her “Email Marketing Trends” report to help designers like you make informed decisions about what works and what doesn’t in email newsletters.
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Z-index is an inherently tricky thing, and maintaining z-index order in a complex layout is notoriously difficult. With different stacking orders and contexts, keeping track of them as their numbers increase can be hard — and once they start to spread across CSS files, forget about it! Because z-index can make or break a UI element’s visibility and usability, keeping your website’s UI in working order can be a delicate balance.
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In this third part of the series, Joseph Zimmerman will be taking a gander at how Marionette helps make views better in Backbone. Marionette extends the base View class from Backbone to give us more built-in functionality, and to convert all of the common code down to configuration. Some things may be mentioned in this article that refer to the previous articles, and this is part of a series about Marionette, so if you wish to learn about Marionette, you should read the whole series.
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The way we access the Web has changed a lot in the last couple of years. We no longer rely solely on our desktop computers to navigate the Web. Rather, we use a wide and quickly growing array of devices to get our daily dose of information. With the device landscape going all fuzzy, the time of building fixed width desktop sites has definitely come to an end. ConditionerJS will help you combine all of this contextual information to pinpoint the right moment to load the functionality you need. It tells your JavaScript when to act up and when to tune down a bit, and it will help you combine all of this contextual information to pinpoint the right moment to load the functionality you need.
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In this article, Joseph McDermott will walk you through the creation of a new “brand” entity in Magento that can be managed through the admin panel. Once you are finished, you will be able to create, update and delete brands that can be viewed in the front-end independently. The process itself is quite lengthy because he will explain each step in detail, but it really is easy once you know how, and it’s a great example of how powerful the Magento platform can be with minimal effort.
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