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Spotify Vs. Apple Music: Whose UI is Best?

by Sara Hamidi
The rivalry between Apple Music and Spotify is a battle that music-lovers fight about everyday, but what exactly makes these two music streaming platforms so powerful, yet so different?  One of the key differences between these two platforms is the music player interface itself. While Spotify utilizes a dark background, Apple music goes with an...
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Designing for Accessibility

by Sandhya Iyer
The Interaction Design Foundation succinctly summarizes the importance of accessible design: “A design is only useful if it’s accessible to the user: any user, anywhere, anytime.” People often think the need for accessibility is only targeted at people with disabilities, but really, it’s just about making sure that anyone can understand, interact with and contribute...
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5 Tips to Stand Out in the Competitive Online Shopping Sphere

by Sandhya Iyer
Due to lockdown restrictions, many people have shopped online more in the last few months than they have their whole lives. But even during non-pandemic times, the ease and convenience of online shopping is often just too good to give up — does anyone really like to scavenge through clothing racks or wait in line...
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The Complement of Repeat Business

by Khaiersta English
If you’re working as a designer, chances are you’re working for clients. Your clients may be in-house departments or different companies. Either way, the dynamics are largely the same. If you do a good job listening, creating, and delivering solutions for clients, they will pay you back with repeat business, testimonials, and referrals. If your...
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Five UX Design Books to Add to Your Reading List

by Khaiersta English
In the world of user experience design, there are many approaches to solving design problems. Depending on how you gained your education and experience in the field, you may prefer one approach or another. I find it is helpful to read about other people’s experiences and approaches to solving design problems. Often, opportunities present themselves...
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Designing Better Forms, A Top 10 Guide

by Khaiersta English
In digital product design, forms are a necessary evil. Whether you’re designing a registration flow, checkout experience or settings page, forms allow you to collect data from the end-user. There are fundamental best-practices you can use when putting forms together, which will help users process requests more quickly, increase data entry accuracy and increase your...
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SVGs: Vectors for the Web

by Khaiersta English
When working on visual design for the web, choosing the correct image format is essential.  The rise of responsive design, mobile devices, and high-pixel-density displays have made this process trickier than ever. When working with photography, and 3D imagery, JPGs and PNGs are still the best formats to use. Saving images up for 2x to...
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How to Quickly Evaluate Browser Compatibility for New Web Technologies

by Khaiersta English
When designing for the web, designers and developers are often tempted by new technologies. Recent advancements such as embedded fonts, parallax scrolling, JS animation, SVGs etc. have had varying levels of cross-platform support. Depending on the requirements of your website or application, browser support limitations may become a deal-breaker to including modern UI/UX advancements. Can...
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Issue Tracking and Team Workflow with BitBucket

by Khaiersta English
With multiple projects and competing demands, issue trackers can be a lifesaver. Our team at Flower Press Creative Studio relies pretty heavily on BitBucket, which is compatible with our GitHub repositories. Designers and developers work together to tackle new functional requirements, design deliverables and bug tracking. There are plenty of competitors on the market with...
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How to Export SVGs for the Web from Illustrator

by Khaiersta English
Adobe Illustrator is by far the most established, and popular Illustration tool in the design community. But until recently, it had a major shortcoming when exporting SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphics) cleanly for the web. Now, Adobe has upped its game by adding a clean, export function targeted at the web. Please note: there are actually...
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SVGs, CSS and Javascript: Where Images and Code Cross

by Khaiersta English
SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphics) is well-accepted as an ideal format for two-dimensional graphics on the web. Logos, icons, backgrounds, buttons and animated graphics can scale for high-definition displays while maintaining low file-size. There are several ways to implement SVGs within web code. The chosen method depends heavily on what you’re trying to achieve. SVG Embed...
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HTTPS, A Necessary Investment

by Khaiersta English
This video from DigiCert does a good job of spelling out recent updates to HTTPS on the Internet. As of July 2018, Google Chrome released changes to its handling of HTTP sites. In the address bar, these sites are now labeled Not Secure. On all HTTP pages, Chrome 68 displays a warning reading “Not Secure”...