Web Development Reading List #186: Tor 7, Designing Depth, And Mac Ransomware

Design is one of the most controversial things in our industry. There are barely any redesigns that aren’t discussed heavily in the community. Changing a well-working design is even harder as people tend to dislike anything new, but if we give them a bit of time, they might start to see things from a different perspective.

Instead of following what everyone else is doing, we shouldn’t hesitate to leave the beaten tracks when designing — by creating a contrast-rich, deep design without using drop shadows, for example. Whatever you do, be sure to explore new options whenever you can.

Further Reading on SmashingMag: Link

• The Good, The Bad And The Great Examples Of Web Typography¹
• How To Use Shadows And Blur Effects In Modern UI Design²
• Define Your Process To Master Time, Gain Clarity, And Take Control³
• How To Maximize Your Creative Energy⁴

News Link

• Chrome 60 beta is available⁵ and brings us the Paint Timing API, CSS’ font-display property, the Web Budget API, and Credential Management API improvements.
• Firefox 54 is out⁶ — and, thanks to a new multi-process architecture, with huge performance improvements. The update also brings⁷ us the new Web Extension APIs as well as CSS clip-path improvements with basic shapes.
• A new version of Tor Browser was released, too: Tor Browser 7.0⁸. The new version is based on Firefox 52 ESR and, thus, has multi-process mode and sandboxing on Linux and macOS (Windows coming soon) enabled.

Concept & Design Link

• Matej Latin created an online course to teach you better web typography in ten free lessons¹².
• Scott Jensen shows how you can create great designs with depth without using drop shadows¹³. A great primer on modern design techniques.

¹⁴

Security Link

• Patrick Wardle found evidence that there’s a macOS ransomware spreading and wrote up the key facts about it¹⁷. This shows that the Mac platform is growing and attackers start targeting users as well. Better be safe and have a valid, usable backup.

Work & Life Link

• Last but not least, an article that makes us rethink how we deal with our workloads: Madeleine Dore’s “Why you should manage your energy, not your time¹⁸.”

—Anselm

Footnotes Link

1. 1 https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/12/the-good-the-bad-and-the-great-examples-of-web-typography/
2. 2 https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2017/02/shadows-blur-effects-user-interface-design/
3. 3 https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2016/11/define-your-process-master-time-gain-clarity-take-control/
4. 4 https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/10/maximize-your-creative-energy/
5. 5 https://blog.chromium.org/2017/06/chrome-60-beta-paint-timing-api-css.html
6. 6 https://hacks.mozilla.org/2017/06/firefox-54-e10s-webextension-apis-css-clip-path/
7. 7 https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Firefox/Releases/54
8. 8 https://blog.torproject.org/blog/tor-browser-70-released
9. 9 https://hacks.mozilla.org/2017/06/firefox-54-e10s-webextension-apis-css-clip-path/
10. 10 https://hacks.mozilla.org/2017/06/firefox-54-e10s-webextension-apis-css-clip-path/
11. 11 https://hacks.mozilla.org/2017/06/firefox-54-e10s-webextension-apis-css-clip-path/
12. 12 https://betterwebtype.com/
13. 13 http://scottjensen.design/2017/05/out-of-the-dropshadows/
14. 14 http://scottjensen.design/2017/05/out-of-the-dropshadows/
15. 15 http://scottjensen.design/2017/05/out-of-the-dropshadows/
16. 16 http://scottjensen.design/2017/05/out-of-the-dropshadows/
17. 17 https://objective-see.com/blog/blog_0x1E.html
18. 18 http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170612-why-you-should-manage-your-energy-not-your-time

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