Our Latest Insights
Thoughts from our team on current events, new techniques and tools, trends we're seeing, and our culture.
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Introducing Renature: Experimenting with Physics for UI Animation
December 18, 2019For this first fellowship, Parker Ziegler, in collaboration with others at Formidable, is working on a new physics-based animation library for React focused on modeling natural-world forces like gravity, friction, air resistance, and fluid dynamics. The project is called renature, harkening to the inspiration it takes from the physics of our universe. It's targeted at UI developers, digital artists, and physics nerds alike. In this post, we'll introduce the motivations behind writing renature, highlight some of the technology we're using to build it, and show off the progress we've made in these first two weeks!
Parker ZieglerThe UX Deck: Card-Based Testing for Better Design
December 12, 2019Formidable design team has developed a card-based user testing model to meet the needs of client projects that require early-stage research and concept validation. As part of our commitment to open source, we are sharing our learnings and best practices related to this methodology. Here's what it is, how to use it, and where to get your own copy.
Eliot AdamsRunpkg v1.0 - The node packages explorer
December 4, 2019Earlier in the year we released Runpkg, an online tool to help developers explore npm packages and their dependencies. We were pleased with the results, but, as with any prototype, there was room for improvement. Over the past few weeks, we were able to iterate on our prototype to improve the package viewing experience, the performance and speed of the site, and the overall design and user experience. Today we are delighted to announce the release of Runpkg v1.Meet Emma Brillhart
November 14, 2019We'd like to introduce you to Emma Brillhart. Emma is a senior developer, engineering manager, experienced speaker, co-lead of our newest office in Phoenix, Arizona, and now leads our DevRel program at Formidable.
Emma Brillharturql DevTools: Introducing Explorer View
October 17, 2019In its current state, the urql DevTools make it easy to understand how these responses come in, but you’re still not able to observe your GraphQL data as a whole. We wanted a simpler way for users to see what data their app is currently consuming with a clear overview of which exact query produced which response, without the need to check the network tab manually. We also wanted to see that data update in real time and include any metadata such as cache outcomes as part of the view.Living on the Edge: Lazy Static Sites with Modern CDNs and Lambda
October 15, 2019Websites like the New York Times can't wait for a twenty-minute build to deliver breaking stories. A CDN-based service like unpkg can't build a static filesystem for every possible npm package without exorbitant storage and compute costs. Yet these services stay fast in spite of the pitfalls of dynamic sites. How?
Tyler ThompsonResponsive Images: Improving performance by letting the browser do the work
October 8, 2019We want to serve appropriate images to all of our users, like small images on slower connections and small screens, and large, high-quality images on fast connections and high-resolution screens. Luckily, all modern browsers support a few nifty HTML features to help us optimize our images for whatever device your users are visiting your site on.
Cody CrozierBuilding a more accessible web with semantic HTML
October 2, 2019I want to make a case for semantic HTML as a way to unlock the door to building accessible apps from the ground up. Accessibility is something that we must get better at slowly, not overnight, and if we do, we will end up saving time and become stronger developers.
Brittany FeenstraSay Hello to Kate Schaefer
September 12, 2019Our Formidable Denver office is growing! Please meet Kate Schaefer, a software engineer from Colorado.
Kate SchaeferProgress Towards OSS Sustainability
August 28, 2019Open source sustainability has been an increasingly visible problem in recent years. The problem is too big for any one person, or any one company to solve, but at Formidable, we're hoping to make a very small, local dent by making open source work more sustainable for our business and for our engineers.
Lauren EastridgeInput Smoothing: An Intro To Reactive Animations
August 16, 2019A tutorial on how to make an input smoothing object from scratch and leverage it in a React component to smoothly animate a cursor.
Max YingerGlicky: A Graphical User Interface for JavaScript Development Workflows
June 18, 2019Modern web development is hard. Long gone are the days of opening up your text editor, writing some HTML, CSS and JavaScript, saving it to an index.html file, and loading it in your browser. For many of us, fiddling with package.json and interacting with the terminal seems easy, because we've done it for a long time. But do you remember how you felt the first time you were faced with a terminal?
Alex SaundersMeet Jon Reynolds
June 18, 2019We're launching a new blog series to showcase our talented team of Formidables across the globe. We're delighted to introduce you to Jon Reynolds from the Formidable Denver office.
Jon ReynoldsHow To Create an Ideal Design to Dev Workflow
June 13, 2019Products that require both design and engineering find an inflection point in their lifecycle that can cause confusion, delay production, and add multiple headaches further down the road. Specifically stated, that point is when the thing that is designed must now be made. How can we, as both designers and developers, mitigate these risks and foster a more inclusive workflow that ensures the final designs are not only beautiful, but functional and developmentally sound?
