services
Designer & Developer Support
When other web suppliers tap us it’s usually for our ExpressionEngine chops.
Recently
products
External SAEF (Free)
Insert a row into any MySQL database table using a form on an ExpressionEngine page.
Tied Entries (Free)
An ExpressionEngine plugin to access content entries further than a single relationship away.
Elsewhere
I keep referring back to this article by Kyle Chayka — beautifully and ironically illustrated by Daniel Hertzberg — and in a nice homologue I keep forgetting the term it coins, "airspace":https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-global-minimalism-startup-gentrification: bq. It’s the realm of coffee shops, bars, startup offices, and co-live / work spaces that share the same hallmarks everywhere you go: a profusion of symbols of comfort and quality, at least to a certain connoisseurial mindset. Minimalist furniture. Craft beer and avocado toast. Reclaimed wood. Industrial lighting. Cortados. Fast internet. The homogeneity of these spaces means that traveling between them is frictionless, a value that Silicon Valley prizes. The title says it's sterile but is it? The word never appears within the article. Isn't airspace more a vocabulary? Here in Brighton there are nasty pastiches of it (Tortilla: Real Californian Burritos and Tacos), lovely expressions (Gails Bakery) and sophisticated extensions (Smallbatch Coffee).
"Ben Thompson concisely contrasts Amazon and Apple":https://stratechery.com/2018/divine-discontent-disruptions-antidote/. "I’m not sure that Amazon will beat Apple to $1 trillion, but they surely have the best shot at two."
"Jon [Favreau] said, ‘Look into his eyes. If you look into his eyes you will know. Is he being asked a question or is he asking the question?’" On the making of "Iron Man's HUD":https://vfxblog.com/ironman/.
"Jaron Lanier on social media":http://nymag.com/selectall/2018/04/jaron-lanier-interview-on-what-went-wrong-with-the-internet.html: "We got into this by trying to be socialist and libertarian at the same time, and getting the worst of both worlds ... we have to choose."
We have entered an uncanny valley of "algorithmic culture":https://www.racked.com/2018/4/17/17219166/fashion-style-algorithm-amazon-echo-look. I believe it's still easy to step out of, but even easier not to. And maybe it's merely a speeding up of how things have always worked.
Facebook-owned "WhatsApp's security claims are dubious":http://www.atimes.com/article/whats-up-with-whatsapp/.
Brian X. Chen, technology writer at ??The New York Times??, checks "what data Facebook and Google have":https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/11/technology/personaltech/i-downloaded-the-information-that-facebook-has-on-me-yikes.html on him and provides links to do your own. "Be warned," he concludes. "Once you see the vast amount of data that has been collected about you, you won’t be able to unsee it." Google for instance, keeps a record of every time you open an app on an Android phone, Facebook of whom you unfriended when.
Slack: "“meeting-izing” the entire workday":https://ux.useronboard.com/slack-i-m-breaking-up-with-you-54600ace03ea. Me, I've tried to dip in but like with Twitter I just can't take the multitudinous inputs.
Since I'm returning to it for some refreshment, time to add the link: "“How to Use Clashing Fonts”":https://www.typography.com/blog/fonts-that-clash by Jonathan Hoefler. "It’s often the dialogue _between_ typefaces that most effectively communicates how information is meant to be understood."
Processes
Architecture
Before building your site or system, plans are required for both the back and front ends.
Design
It’s the competing considerations themselves that coalesce to form the design.
Installation & configuration
As well as smarts, what really makes a successful implementation likely is experience.
N
ow that the site’s wireframes have been generated during the architecture process, we turn them into mock-ups using visual elements such as a logo and an icon set; visual conventions such as a color scheme and a typeface collection; and visual rules such as a grid layout. Design appears in Jesse James Garrett’s useful Elements of User Experience diagram as the top level, labelled Visual Design.
As well as these elements, conventions and rules, the design must take into account a number of considerations that may initially appear to conflict until, with work, the tensions among them coalesce to actually form the design.
Dieter Rams, renowned industrial designer, has 10 Principles of Good Design.
Good design:
- is innovative
- makes a product useful
- is aesthetic
- helps us to understand a product
- is unobtrusive
- is honest
- is long-lasting
- is consequent to the last detail
- is concerned with the environment
- is as little design as possible.
The entire process, with dependencies
