Think about all the possibilities of being able to combine any kind of mobile device, independent of its operating system.

Let's start off with typography, a fundamental basis for design. The first step is to define typography constants. And unlike Sass or Less, constants for Aphrodite can go in a JavaScript or JSON file. Define typography constants When creating constants, use semantic names for your variables.

Apple has created many near-magical devices that enrich our lives. Their products exude ultra premium design, with a multitude of useful features, and constructed of refined materials. They get thinner. They get lighter. (But those prices never get smaller.) And we love them for it.

I've had a love-hate relationship with JavaScript for years. I got to know the language by way of the design and development community's favorite whipping boy, jQuery. You see, at the time I began learning JavaScript, as a "Designer who codes," working with jQuery was a magical experience.

Last week, one of my readers sent in a question: How do I become a better visual designer? As I was thinking about how to answer this question, my mind wandered to my experience with learning Mandarin Chinese. Recently, I decided to teach myself Mandarin.

This is a continuation of my series on ' UX on a Budget'. If you haven't read part one, I'd strongly recommend giving it a read before getting into this article. You can find it here. In part one, I discussed the first stage of IDEO's circular design methodology, ' Understand'.

In my last post I described the concept of navigation trails as an evolution of the standard tabbed browsing model. As a part of the Browser.html project, I'm working on a spatial model through various user interactions and animations. This should help users better understand what's going on and how to navigate the web most effectively.

Four months ago, I left my cushy San Francisco gig at LinkedIn to learn to code. As an aspiring designer, I didn't have a clue about how web products were built. Coding was the next logical step to pursuing this goal.

It's no secret that Twitter has been struggling to grow its user base. To fix this, they've laid out a long-term strategy to turn around its business by focusing on five areas: Its core service Live-streaming video The site's "creators and influencers" Safety Developers Two things that stuck out to me in that statement are 1) focus on its core service (tweeting) and 2) live-streaming video (Periscope).

I remember sitting down for my first interview at Facebook. Back then, the feeling I had deep in my stomach was mostly excitement but also a bubbling fear. Fear I was somehow being pranked. Fear they had the wrong guy. Fear I would walk in, embarrass myself, and return home defeated.

Airbnb recently came out with Experiences, which are activities designed and led by hosts. I encountered some problems when using the newly redesigned app, so I conducted a usability test to: See if other users were experiencing similar issues Identify user pain points / priorities and Make the user experience more frictionless and intuitive.

Here's a problem I've encountered over and over again during my 5 years as a UX designer at Melbourne agencies: no budget. "We would love to do user testing, but we can't afford it." It can be hard to sell user experience design.

As designers, we can apply our skills to shape public opinion, and ultimately affect political change. This article will explore some of the ways designers have made an impact in the past through branding, product design, and graphic design. Branding is a powerful tool. Branding is a promise of shared values.

Just under a year ago, I embarked on a quest to better understand my seasonal allergies. In support of this quest, I spent a few weekends writing an iOS and Android app called Hayfever. With the app, I could log my symptoms and it would collect data about the allergens in the area.

The challenge: to take an application I love and use everyday, then see how far I could push myself creatively as a designer, by rebuilding it from the ground up. I chose Instagram because I've been a dedicated user since 2011  - a year after it was launched.

There's no single universal formula for designing a great user interface (if you discover one, please let me know). But I do know some major mistakes to avoid if you want to deliver a great app. I've seen every one of these mistakes made by designers of all levels of experience.

I used to work as a system administrator. I spent my days repairing PCs, doing backups, and restoring deleted emails that had suddenly become very important. But sometimes I got really weird requests. Like fixing a microwave. Or changing a light bulb in the women's bathroom.

In March 2016, Google updated Material Design to add bottom navigation bars to its UI library. This new bar is positioned at the bottom of an app, and contains 3 to 5 icons that allow users to navigate between top-level views in an app. Sound familiar?

Flexbox promises to save us from the evils of plain CSS (like vertical alignment). Well, Flexbox's deliver on that goal. But mastering its new mental model can be challenging. So let's take an animated look at how Flexbox works, so we can use it to build better layouts.

It was 2 AM on a Saturday night, and I was up late working on a new project. As a beatmaker, you would think that my screen would look something like this: Rather than programming kicks and snares, I was trying to build out a sticky navigation bar on my website.