Testing design system component libraries is critically important, but has historically been a pain in the butt to implement. That’s why I’m thrilled my brilliant colleague wrote Testing Components in Storybook in 2023, which details how to lean into Storybook’s testing features … | Continue reading

If you want a colored, shaped favicon, you need a color that works on dark and light equally well. Like orange! You kinda want an orange favicon. – Chris Coyier Can’t say I disagree with this one! | Continue reading

You can’t learn the whole stack. Nobody can. Maybe it was possible in 1990, the day after the web was invented, but I’m not even sure about that. The stack grows and shifts and evolves every day. Very much agree with everything here: You Will Never Be A Full Stack Developer  and … | Continue reading

Here’s a fantastic article that digs into whether or not digital products need dark mode or not. In my design system consulting work, it’s a topic that comes up a lot, and I always find myself asking follow-up questions to client teams and workshop attendees that ask about it. Ha … | Continue reading

I had a great time on the Skip To Content podcast chatting about how design systems are great vehicles for delivering more accessible experiences to users. Check it out: | Continue reading

Building conscious design systems by Amy Hupe is a very, very good read. You should read it all. | Continue reading

I was talking to my friend Cameron Moll, and he discussed a series of articles about mental health that he, his wife, and a mental health nurse practitioner wrote. There’s some really fantastic information and advice in there, and I highly recommend giving it a read. | Continue reading

This Design System ROI Calculator by Knapsack is fun. It’s often tough to quantify the benefits a design system provides, so things like this are helpful even as a conversation starter. | Continue reading

Atomic design and the future of design systems with Brad Frost - PodRocket | Continue reading

Now here’s an interesting article: Why We’re Breaking Up with CSS-in-JS.  I took to Twitter to spew out some thoughts, so I thought I’d capture them here. I’m fortunate in that I get to duck my head into a lot of companies, and get to witness all manner of cultures and technical … | Continue reading

The Arrogance of the Anthropocene really paints the picture of how insignificant human existence is on a geological scale. Despite the author painting a pretty wild picture of how much of a blip we all are, he makes it clear that we absolutely still need strong and swift action t … | Continue reading

For the first time in my career, I took a relatively extended break from work. I’m just now returning after 6 weeks of being away, so I wanted to share some reflections from my time off. Here’s what I said I wanted to accomplish during my break: I’m not setting any goals for m … | Continue reading

In September of last year, I dragged my cursor across all of August 2022 in Google Calendar. I gave the calendar entry the title of “Time off?” A year later, I’m actually taking that time off! Which means that for the first time in my working life, I’m taking a break from work th … | Continue reading

Very rarely is exactly one design system created to serve exactly one product that expresses exactly one design language. Nearly all the design systems we’ve worked on require a high degree of flexibility in order to properly serve our clients’ needs. Some of this flexibility is … | Continue reading

Here's a nice article by the folks at Storybook that deconstructs my interview with Michael Chan.  The gist of the article is: 🙅‍♂️ Not all engineers are made for design system work 🛠 Design system developers need custom tools 🐌 Design systems go stale … | Continue reading

This is the third time in the last four years that I’ve been forcibly yanked away from my normal life —both personal and professional — for extended periods of time. My nervous system is threadbare. My bones are exhausted. My face, neck, and back muscles are on fire. My wife is … | Continue reading

This post really resonated with me, and hits at my feeling of needing an extended break to just kinda collect myself and get my feet back under me. My family has been through multiple rounds of crazy shit and it’s definitely had an impact on all aspects of my life, including work … | Continue reading

These are fantastic, and strangely reflective of my life right now. Source: Cars vs Giant Bulge and Other Outlandish Vehicular Simulations | Continue reading

In my opinion, I Think You Should Leave is one of the funniest things created in the last number of decades. As a fan of absurd and goofball comedy, it’s right up my alley. Here’s a website that links directly to every ITYSL sketch, and here’s a dedicated ITYSL meme website. | Continue reading

Love me a good pros/cons article. This post does a great job talking about React-based headless UI frameworks that provide functionality and accessibility controls, but don't provide any default styling (a la Material Design or Bootstrap). We've used a few libraries (like Downshi … | Continue reading

I've always hated writing lyrics, and felt everything I came up with was shallow, contrived, and s.In three and a half minutes, Jacob Collier provides a treasure trove of techniques for writing interesting lyrics. Watch it here. | Continue reading

This is a pretty great guide to naming design tokens and follows pretty closely how we structure our tokens. | Continue reading

Pinball Map is a perfect example of the best qualities of the web. Crowd-sourced info on where to play pinball across the world. | Continue reading

Here's a fun Twitter thread about how cheese, snails, Christianity, underwear, and eyeglasses all contributed to the rise of the modern book. | Continue reading