Look mum, no breakpoints!
An excellent overview of how to approach fluid design on the web. Lots of excellent references and techniques, particularly those around using Flex layout with flex-basis to control widths, or […]
Archives
What is utility-first CSS?
As acerbic and cutting a critique of utility-first CSS (and that particular framework) as you would expect from Heydon, but hidden amongst the humour are some (also equally expected) jewels […]
The time to unmaintainable is very low
A critique of npm (and other package managers), the move-fast hype cycle of tech products, and the tech debt it […]
Follow any web feed from Mastodon
Just mention @birb in a post to Mastodon with a link, and RSS Parrot will search the site for any kind of feed, convert that feed to an RSS output, and then launch a Mastodon account that […]
A GitHub content editor
Prose is a service that connects with any GitHub repo you want, and then lets you edit Markdown and plain text files directly from a dedicated text editor. Particularly useful for people using GitHub […]
Core web vitals reporting
A semi-official reporting tool to interrogate trends in web technologies versus Core Web Vitals (including the upcoming INP metric). Things look particularly bad for React-based frameworks, but […]
Open source web analytics
An alternative, open-source analytics package which should be lighter weight than Google and claims to be more privacy conscious than even […]
Dark hotels
A simple mapping project that overlays light pollution data with available accommodation pulled from AirBnB and Booking.com, allowing you to find places to stay that will also be great for star […]
Time to rethink mobile-first CSS?
An interesting look at whether the current mobile-first paradigm is problematic. Ultimately, the title feels a little like click-bait; to me the solution proposed remains mobile-first, but suggests […]
Resurrecting web marginalia
A few careful thoughts about the utility of "web marginalia", in this case for discovery; things like blogrolls, feed lists, and webrings. John wonders if their demise is in part due to the loss of […]
There's a web component for that
The Component Kitchen is a sort of app store for web components; a digital directory of useful packages, recipes, and one-shots that can be imported into your […]
Indieweb icons and logos
I'm a big fan of these proposed IndieWeb icons/logos, particularly the Protocols set. The repeated node motif is just a really solid piece of logo design – and the Salmention salmon is just […]
A static-site CMS that runs in VS Code
A clever, open-source CMS designed for static site generators like Eleventy, Astro, and Hugo which use Markdown files and frontmatter metadata. The CMS itself runs directly in your IDE, giving you a […]
Accessible chart & data library
Easily the most comprehensive and impressive charting and data visualisation library I've come across. Graphs and charts are keyboard accessible, well-labelled, meaningfully marked up, with colour […]
The curious disappearance of the Carolina parakeet
A look into the life – and death – of one of the more infamous recent extinctions: the Carolina parakeet (which, turns out, is not a parakeet at all, but a small parrot). I hadn't realised how […]
Convert Markdown to RTF online
A brilliant tool: paste in some Markdown and it will display the converted Rich Text in the preview window. You can then copy this and paste into any RTF editor and hey presto, no more annoying […]
Performative performance
A thoughtful look at the idea of sustainability in web development and design, particularly in terms of whether worrying about an individual design choice's carbon footprint is meaningful or simply […]
Making sense of React Server Components
A superb breakdown of the changes being made in React 18+ around the new React Server Components paradigm. Josh has a knack for explaining complex problems in simpler ways, and this is no exception; […]