Notes

Learning CSS by Reading Specs

permalink

As I am touring with Hui Jing next week at Mozilla’s Developer Roadshow, I thought this post of her fits quite well.

She has written a lovely blog post about why reading CSS specifications is immensely helpful to build a strong understanding of CSS.

Anyone of you attending one of the stops at next week’s Mozilla Developer Roadshow in Fürth/Nuremberg, Munich, Linz or Vienna is able to chat with her about this (and not just this obviously) and ask question.

Read the blog post here

Spotify Family Account Nightmare

A long time ago I set up our Spotify family account. I don’t remember, if it was difficult or what I really had to do, but I thought it was an easy to be done job. I though …

Today a friend was calling me and asked, if I could help him set up the account for his family. 4 people in the house and he thought, it makes sense to finally get an account where they would be able to download and listen to songs offline. Fair enough. I thought, I could help, as I did not remember any difficulties setting up mine. But I was proven wrong.

I was not able to simply set up the users by adding them to my main (admin?) account. I had to send them all an email invite! And then it was not too easy as they all already had free accounts. I might have been too stupid, but I haven’t found anything within their accounts, where I could enter the invite code for example. The invitation link also did not work easily and especially not on their phones.

But before I go into details, I was wondering about one two things:

  1. Why would someone make it so super complicated (and in the end not possible without connecting your account to Facebook or deleting your account to create a new one) to change your user’s name? This is nuts. Really! When they created their accounts, they did not give themselves good names and were given a cryptic one by Spotify. Now there is not bloody chance to change this!?
  2. The concept of the family account is, that all of the 6 possible people using the family account have to live under one address aka one house or apartment. Why the hell do I have to invite everybody via email then? Why can’t I simply add 5 more people to my family account with their names and – sure – their email address, but would have to get an invite code via email etc. This is totally stupid and makes no sense, when they have to be in the same household anyways?!

I really like using Spotify for many reasons, but these two things drove me crazy tonight.

Smashing Print #1: Ethics & Privacy

Image is a collage of 6 photos showing the new Smashing Print magazine in several angles

After a long time talking about the Smashing Print magazine, it is finally released. #1 circles all around ethics and privacy and you can read articles by Trine Falbe, Vitaly Friedman, Heather Burns, Morten Rand-Hendriksen, Laura Kalbag, Stuart Langridge and Cennydd Bowles.

The introductory price is $17.95 instead of usually $24.95, but if you are a Smashing Member, you get a discount if you are Supporter ($3/month) or Member ($5/month) and a completely free printed magazine if you are a Smasher ($9/month). Worth thinking about it really. Especially if you see all the other benefits you have got, like huge discounts, if you want to attend the events, free ebooks and webinars and so forth.

The cover of the magazine was designed by the wonderful Veerle and she has written a little bit about the process of creating the cover design in her latest newsletter, which is worth the read (worth subscribing to the newsletter anyways!).

Well, that’s it, but I would sum it up with a few useful links related to the printed magazine #1:

Is There Anything Like a Sidebar Sync For MacOS Mojave?

Is there anything for MacOS (Mojave), which syncs the layout of my Finder sidebar (the favorites)? Thanks for help!

All Stranger Things Movie References Explained

If you like Stranger Things, you might like this YouTube video by Wired, where the Duffer brothers explain all the movie references included in the three existing seasons. (Spoilers possible)

Campu Santu

Four photos showing Campu Santu in Bonifacio on Corsica, which is a graveyard above the sea

Impressions from Campu Santu, a beautiful cemetery in Bonifacio on Corsica. Located on the Bosco plateau facing the sea.

A Beautiful Sunset in Bonifacio, Corsica

A photo showing a sunset from Bonifacio on Corsica

A beautiful sunset in Bonifacio, Corsica

Photos from Smashing Conference Toronto 2019

Last week I arrived back from Toronto, were we ran the second edition of Smashing Conference after starting in 2018. I brought a set of photos which hopefully transport the lovely vibe it had.

A collage showing a few speakers on stage at SmashingConf Toronto and people at sponsor booths
Smashing Conference Toronto 2019

This year’s Toronto edition had a really calm and nice atmosphere. When asking someone onsite, everybody was very positive and liked what was going on. There is a mixed feeling about presentations without slides, but I guess it is with all the other things in the world: taste is different and level of execution as well. I myself like the setup running a presentation without a complete slide deck most of the times. The Smashing team in Toronto did a very great job, which you recognise, when you don’t see or feel anyone during the show. It was very well produced and ran smooth and slick.

I once more uploaded the set to Flickr, as there is not finished solution to host them here, on my own site, right now. I already cancelled my Flickr subscription and will soon host all my albums on my own site.

See the whole set of photos from SmashingConf Toronto 2019

Adobe XD Workshops in Düsseldorf

My friends at Adobe, also long-time partners of beyond tellerrand, are organising half-day workshops with independent designers in a couple of cities in Germany. Next week Tuesday – July 9th – they are stopping by in Düsseldorf.

Topics are circling around prototyping for voice interfaces, animation and design systems with XD. Clive K. Lavery and Claire Lise Bengue are leading through those two workshops.

Good news is, that I still have the option for you to get the tickets for 50% off instead of the full price. Use this opportunity to attend the workshop, but also to meet like minded people, interested in topics mentioned above and more.

Mozilla Roadshow – Spread The Word

An illustration showing a women with a VR headset in front of a screen and a sentence left to it stating Developer Roadshow 2019
The Mozilla Developer Roadshow Europe in August

Earlier this year I met with Mozilla in San Francisco. They are wonderful supporters of my beyond tellerrand events and when we discussed the idea of co-operating for a series of free events for the web dev community in Germany and Austria, I was directly in.

So we came up with four stops for this:

Registration for all cities are great, but of course I want it to be absolutely jam packed. Not because we want to make any money (it is a free event by Mozilla), but because we want to meet the community – YOU!

Details about content, idea and the four stops can be read in a blog post on my btconf blog or at the roadshow website, but I am writing this blog post here to ask for your support: if you’d spread the word, so we all can meet and listen to a view interesting and inspiring talks together, that would be fantastic.

And if you have questions after reading the details about the roadshow, don’t hesitate to send me an email. Happy to chat to you and answer your questions.

See you in one or many of the stops in August! Oh … and thank you for spreading the word ;)