Category Archives: Design

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December 21, 2022

An Insight into Daikin HERO Cloud

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In a world of smartphones connected to smart lights, garage doors, alarm systems, and doorbells, it feels as if we can bring smart connectivity to practically anything. Yet it isn’t as simple as having the idea for new technology. 

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September 12, 2022

Analyzing Two Frontend Technologies: Vue vs. React

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Two of the most popular front-end technologies today are React and Vue.js. Current usage statistics reveal that React has been the most-used front-end technology for quite some time, with none of the other options really challenging its position. However, Vue.js, a new, progressive JavaScript framework, is gaining popularity and boasting satisfaction ratings comparable to React’s. 

This post provides my opinions on the strengths, weaknesses, and overall usability of these two frameworks. Though I’ve only spent about one year working with each, I’ve had the opportunity to explore many of the features they have to offer and see firsthand how each has been designed to respond to developer needs. 

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October 29, 2020

Modeling User Interfaces with Statecharts

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As developers and designers, we are creating new things every day. I like to say that we are really good at making the impossible possible. In fact, some of us are so good at it, that we actually do it unintentionally. These unintentional outcomes that occur when we are creating code are called “impossible states.” 

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April 20, 2020

Helping Real People in Real Time: COVID Staffing Project Redesign

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The global COVID-19 pandemic has plunged the world into an unprecedented time of turmoil, in which finding efficient solutions to never-before-seen problems can save lives. Grio has been able to work with collaborators to increase global efficiencies for front line responders. In this blog , I will talk about my recent work with the COVID Staffing Project,  redesigning a website that provides resources for emergency personnel.

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April 9, 2019

Fear and Empathy in Design

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Last Christmas, I had a minor family tech crisis (we’ve all had those, right)? I was visiting my parents, and my mom asked me to AirDrop some photos from my iPhone to hers. I’ve AirDropped photos probably a hundred times, but this time, for some reason, it didn’t work. My phone showed the photos as “sent”, but they weren’t appearing on my mom’s phone.

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March 25, 2019

Atomic design: When a Button is a Molecule

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If you’ve worked on a web design or development project, you can probably appreciate the benefits of reusing design elements across multiple website pages or app screens. Whether it’s a big, obvious chunk — a head or footer, say — or something much smaller, like an image or an icon, a design approach that allows for mixing and matching building blocks can save you a ton of time over one that’s constantly reinventing the wheel.

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August 23, 2018

Motion & UX Design

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In recent years I have noticed mobile and web apps starting to include motion design in their user experiences. One example of this is Facebook reactions. Instead of the reactions instantly appearing on hover, they gradually appear to the user’s eye and animate to help the user further understand and choose their reaction. If the user hovers over a certain reaction it becomes larger to help signify to the user that that reaction will be the one they choose if the click or tap on it. The motion being used here keeps the user engaged in the app and is included in a meaningful and playful way.

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April 23, 2018

Cybernetics: A cyborg-free introduction

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It has been observed that the acceleration of Moore’s Law has left tech culture with a tendency to discount the past, which leads to issues when building for the long-term. If everything we do is going to be circular filed in a few years anyhow, why bother? I think we’re starting to see some of the limits of ahistorical strategies, especially because building for internet scale means that systems can affect higher-order aspects of society and culture in unexpected ways. This is why I want to talk a little bit about cybernetics.

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April 6, 2018

ForwardJS SF 2018 Recap

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ForwardJS was the first developer conference that I ever attended, and it was a pleasure to be able to attend again this year. Forward has been releasing batches of the recorded talks on YouTube, so I thought that I would share a few of my favorite talks from this year’s conference, along with the video and slides when available.

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