Jeffrey Zeldman's Blog, page 37
May 10, 2014
I Cry Inside
MY DAUGHTER cries and begs me not to leave on my business trip. I hold her and tell her I will return soon.
My grandfather died in a plane crash between New York and California. My mother, who was eleven, had begged him not to leave. He lied and told her he would cancel the trip. I never lie to my daughter.
I always thought my grandfather died on a business trip. Two years ago I finally learned he was actually flying to California to divorce my grandmother. My mother never told me.
My grandmother never told her children their father was dead. They figured it out gradually.
When my mother was a young adult, her fiancée died in a plane crash.
My mother was never able to be happy, to feel safe, to trust the world.
One of my jobs is to help my daughter learn to be happy, to feel safe, to trust the world.
It is hard for any parent. Harder when you are divorced. My daughter is sensitive, creative, and has a learning disability. She feels different from other kids. Family is everything to her.
My daughter is everything to me. To support her, I do several jobs. Jobs I love, working with people I love and trust. One of my jobs requires me to travel frequently, staying away for up to a week at a time.
My father worked twelve hours a day to support his family. We grew up in his absence and long shadow.
I am grateful for my daughter’s life and my ability to spend so much time with her. She knows her parents love her and will always be there for her.
But when I leave, she cries, and I cry inside.
April 24, 2014
Video: It’s a Great Time To Be A UX Designer by Jared Spool
IN THIS 60-minute video caught live at An Event Apart Austin 2013, Jared M. Spool explains why “It’s a Great Time To Be A UX Designer.”
Big Web Show № 117: The Real Macaw – Stop Writing Code, Start Drawing It
IN BIG WEB SHOW Episode № 117, Tom Giannattasio, Founder/CEO of Macaw, “the superhot web design tool of the future,” joins me to discuss a paradigm shift: can we really draw semantic HTML and succinct CSS? How it works. Pixels, percentages, ems, or rems? Designing a design tool. How to quit your job. From Kickstarter to startup. Team building. Responsive design, responsive community.
April 18, 2014
Hot Links!
AS AN EVENT APART Seattle closes, and we prepare for a sold-out Boston show, we want to share some of the helpful reviews, summaries, notes, and web links that An Event Apart Seattle inspired. Please enjoy: Hot Links From An Event Apart Seattle.
The Practice
Typekit Practice is a fine new typography resource. Congrats & thanks @nicewebtype @typekit !
http://t.co/LncTpApUku pic.twitter.com/AVntKX6Ntn
— Jeffrey Zeldman (@zeldman) April 18, 2014
April 8, 2014
A List Apart № 393: Inventing & Documenting Design Patterns
A LIST APART Issue № 393 is about documenting design patterns with a style guide and creating new ones with the z-axis.
Creating Style Guides
by SUSAN ROBERTSON
A style guide, also referred to as a pattern library, is a living document that details the front-end code for all the elements and modules of a website or application. It also documents the site’s visual language, from header styles to color palettes. In short, a proper style guide is a one-stop guide that the entire team can reference when considering site changes and iterations. Susan Robertson shows us how to build and maintain a style guide that helps everyone from product owners and producers to designers and developers keep an ever-changing site on brand and on target.
The Z-Axis: Designing for the Future
by WREN LANIER
For years we’ve seen the web as a two-dimensional space filled with pages that sit side by side on a flat, infinite plane. But as the devices we design for take on an increasingly diverse array of shapes and sizes, we must embrace new ways of designing up and down. Designing on the z-axis means incorporating three-dimensional physics into our interface designs. Wren Lanier explains how, by using the z-axis to place interface elements above or below one another, we can create better design systems that are more flexible and intuitive to use—and create new patterns that point the way to future interactions.
March 27, 2014
Big Web Show № 116: The Difference Between Ideas and Products
IN BIG WEB SHOW № 116 (“Everything Web That Matters”), I chat with Phillip Reyland and Roland Dubois, cofounders of Byte Dept., a NYC agency that designs and builds digital products for brands and agencies, and that created the popular Bike Department app for iOS.
We discuss…
Creating products for clients instead of yourself. Four strategies to apply to every product: experience strategy, platform strategy, mobile strategy, and integration strategy. Rethinking the mobile bike app: using data to predict whether a bike will be there when you get to it. The experience layer versus the visual layer. Finding the right partner. Working with ad agencies. The difference between ideas and products, and how to explain it to your client. The wild world of wearables. And more.
LISTEN to Big Web Show № 116 on Mule Radio.
URLS Mentioned
Mobile and Web Development Agency in NYC – Byte Dept.
Bike Department iOS app
@bytedept on Twitter
@reyland on Twitter
@rolanddubois on Twitter
Roland Dubois on LinkedIn
Frontback
Sponsored by Typekit
The Gory Details
SO MY DAD had another seizure—it’s been about six months since the last one; nobody knows what causes them or how to prevent them. It was 4:00 AM Monday morning. He fell heavily, like a sack of bricks, and cracked open his skull above his right eye. There was blood everywhere on the tiled floor of his bathroom, his wife Catherine says.
Catherine called 911. She couldn’t do it from the phone in the bedroom; she went running through the house looking for a working portable phone. The ambulance came fast and he was rushed to Presbyterian Hospital in Pittsburgh, where he stayed overnight.
The hospital wanted to keep him an extra day for fear that the blood floating around inside his skull could clot and kill him or damage his brain. But he demanded to be released. Got so caught up arguing with his nurse that he forgot he and I were on the telephone.
He may have feared that he would never leave that hospital if he didn’t exit immediately. I get that.
The hospital relented, and he and Catherine drove home, where he called me via FaceTime. His face is horribly bruised and cracked—he resembles the De Niro version of Frankenstein’s monster. But he seems to be all right. His mind and character are what they always were.
March 24, 2014
A Temporary Reprieve
MY PHONE SHOWED three consecutive voicemails from my dad’s wife. I told myself, this can only mean one thing. Fortunately, it meant something else. You know your father is getting on in years when a fall and bleeding and a hospital stay are good news.
March 21, 2014
Achieving Empathy for Institutions with Anil Dash
IN BIG WEB SHOW № 115 on Mule Radio, I talk with Anil Dash, a hugely influential entrepreneur, blogger, and web geek living in NYC.
Things we discuss include:
How government, media, and tech shape the world, and how we can influence them in turn. Our first meeting at SXSW in 2002. How selling CMS systems teaches you the dysfunction at media companies and organizations. Working for the music industry at the dawn of Napster. RFP-EZ. The early days of blogging.
Designing websites for the government—the procurement problem. If we’re pouring all this time into social media, what do we want to get out of it? How big institutions work and how to have an impact on them. Living in “Joe’s Apartment.”
Why, until recently, federal agencies that wanted a blog couldn’t use WordPress or Tumblr and how the State Dept got on Tumblr. Achieving empathy for institutions. Being more thoughtful about what I share and who I amplify on social media. The launch of Thinkup, and a special offer exclusively for Big Web Show listeners.
Sponsored by An Event Apart, the design conference for people who make websites. Save $100 off any 2- or 3-day AEA event with discount code AEABWS.
