14 hours agoMember-onlyThis Moment in Tech“What the hell is going on?” When I talk with engineers these days, I frequently hear a sense of whiplash — what happened? How could such a tight market turn into such a bad one so fast? Industry old timers draw comparisons with the dot-com bust, and opportunistic executives and…Tech13 min readTech13 min read
Published in JavaScript in Plain English·Mar 3Member-onlyThe React.ReactNode type is a black holeAs developers, we use TypeScript for a few different reasons. The self-documentation aspects are huge — being able to step into an unfamiliar function and know the shape of the objects it’s expecting is a massive boon when working on a large project. The added tooling features, with IntelliSense and…React8 min readReact8 min read
Published in codeburst·Nov 5, 2019Member-onlyNavigating Software Engineering Career PathsShould you dive deep into one front-end framework or try to learn all of them? How do you know if you’re ready for a senior engineering position? What should you even be working on learning? These questions are extremely common in a field as rapidly changing as software engineering, and…Tech12 min readTech12 min read
Published in codeburst·Oct 31, 2019Member-only8 Key Communication Skills for CodersJerod, Feross, Divya and I recently had a conversation about communication skills for software developers on JSParty #93. This is a topic that has come up a lot on JSParty, so it was great to do a whole episode focused on tips and best practices, and the results were too…Programming8 min readProgramming8 min read
Oct 4, 2019Member-onlyPerspective is PricelessHave you ever tried to convince someone of something and they looked at you like you were crazy? Or had someone try to explain something to you that was so full of buzz words that you couldn’t understand a word they were saying? The problem is one of perspective. Everyone has their own perspective Whenever…Communication Skills2 min readCommunication Skills2 min read
Published in Friday Frontend·Oct 4, 2019Member-onlyFriday Frontend: Vanilla is Powerful EditionHappy Friday! I hope you had a great week, filled with fun and learnings, and are going into the weekend ready to relax and enjoy. This week what really struck me is we have a ton of articles (and some new videos from Mozilla) that highlight how incredibly powerful vanilla…Web Development4 min readWeb Development4 min read
Oct 3, 2019Member-onlyThe Halo EffectThe halo effect is a universal human bias that is important to understand to master communication. The effect is simple: If I feel positively about you in one dimension, I will feel positively about you in others. If I think you’re attractive, I’m more likely to think you are smart…Speaking1 min readSpeaking1 min read
Oct 2, 2019Member-onlySeven, plus or minus twoOne of the keys to becoming an effective communicator is to understand the limitations of the person you are speaking or writing to. And one of the limitations that impacts ALL of us is the limit to our short term memory. One of the most highly cited papers in Psychology…Learning2 min readLearning2 min read
Published in Friday Frontend·Sep 27, 2019Member-onlyFriday Frontend: Small Things at Scale Edition[Ed note: I got behind on republishing to Medium, so this is coming out here a week late. Sorry!] Happy Friday! I’m traveling again, enjoying some fun monsoon weather in Phoenix, Arizona. Hope you’re having a great end of summer/early fall wherever you’re at. The articles that stood out to…CSS4 min readCSS4 min read
Published in Friday Frontend·Sep 20, 2019Member-onlyFriday Frontend: Optional Chaining Edition[Ed note: I got behind on republishing to Medium, so this is coming out here a couple weeks late. Sorry!] Hope you’ve had a great week! …CSS3 min readCSS3 min read
