JSONForms is a javascript library for submitting form data as JSON. With this plugin you can convert any form into a structured JSON object.
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Thursday, January 14, 2016
It’s Time to Rethink Vendor Prefixes in CSS
The -webkit- prefix is now so dominant across CSS on the web that some websites fail to work properly without it. While this is clearly a sign of less than ideal practices by developers over the past few years, it has led to quite an unfortunate but almost necessary move by Mozilla. By either Firefox 46 or 47 (released either in April or May 2016), Mozilla plan to implement support for a series of non-standard -webkit- prefixes to improve Firefox's compatibility with a -webkit prefixed (and often mobile) web.
This is not a new idea, Microsoft Edge supports a series of -webkit- prefixes too to ensure compatibility. Opera already began implementing -webkit- prefixes in 2012 and have since moved to the WebKit based Blink engine.
The W3C and browser vendors did not intend for vendor prefixes to be used on production websites:
"Official W3C policy states that you shouldn't really use experimental properties in production code, but people do, as they want to make sites look cool and keep on the cutting edge." - W3C page on optimizing content for different browsers
However, developers everywhere wanted to use them to access the latest features as soon as they could. While prefixes have caused a bit of a mess with WebKit's dominance, I think they succeeded in helping the web move forward quite rapidly.
The approach by Mozilla and Microsoft is likely to be harmless to most websites. Most websites online will have already included -moz- prefixes or will find that the updates by Mozilla improve their website compatibility with no action required. As professional web developers though, we do need to be thorough and understand that there are outlier results that may occur on some designs. You may already know which of your creations could break with this update.
Developers, it is clearly time to rethink your approach to prefixes and test those websites.
The Prefixes Involved
There are a range of -webkit- prefixes Mozilla might look to include. From what I've gathered, Mozilla aren't looking to match Edge's list of supported -webkit- prefixes, as not all of these are likely to be necessary to ensure Mozilla's Gecko layout engine compatibility with the broader web.
The prefixes Mozilla is likely to approach according to their wiki page on Compatibility/Mobile/Non Standard Compatibility includes the following:
-webkit-flexbox-webkit-prefixed gradients-webkit-transforms-webkit-transitions-webkit-appearance-webkit-background-clip-webkit-device-pixel-ratio-webkit-animation-webkit-border*
Some other features may be impacted too such as @-webkit-keyframes.
Cross Browser Testing Will Be Crucial
If you are a web developer out there who left out -moz- prefixes to avoid the need to test newer CSS features on Firefox — let's assume you were on a tight deadline and the client forced your hand — you are going to need to retest that site in Firefox 46 or 47. These versions of Firefox will be out in either in April or May, so you have a bit of time to plan ahead.
Continue reading %It’s Time to Rethink Vendor Prefixes in CSS%
by Patrick Catanzariti via SitePoint
Cybeer Bar
Oh man, just when you thought you'd seen it all. Digital agency Leavingstone have created this fun interactive One Pager that digitally pours a beer - using your phone. Yup, you have to see it to believe it. If you're reading this on your mobile, here is a video demo. Looking forward to the fun future when we'll be interacting more with websites like this.
by Rob Hope via One Page Love
Everything You Need to Know About Setting Your Prices
In everyday life, you probably don’t spend a ton of time questioning why items cost what they do—you simply choose whether or not to buy them depending on your needs, desires, and budget.
But it turns out, a huge amount of thought goes into each and every price tag you see. And if you’re not making incredibly strategic decisions about your own product’s price, well, you’re sabotaging your business.
Here’s what you should consider before putting a dollar value on your goods or services.
The Three Basic Pricing Models
There are three foundational approaches to calculating prices: cost-based, competition-based, and value-based.
Cost-Based Pricing
This method is the simplest. Start with how much you want to make on each product, then add how much it takes to make and distribute that product. The sum is your price.
Although cost-based pricing will give you the margins you’re looking for, most people agree it’s not effective because it’s not tied to customer demand, market conditions, or the product’s true value.
Competition-Based Pricing
Using this approach, you analyze how much other companies are charging for similar products and choose competitive prices. If you use this model, your product needs differentiating features to give customers a reason to buy it.
If you’re in a well-established industry where consumers are familiar with how much the traditional product costs, competition-based pricing may be the way to go.
Many apps rely on competition-based pricing. For example, productivity apps Fantastical 2 and Clear are both priced at $4.99.
Value-Based Pricing
Value-based pricing is the most popular and effective. Of course, it’s also the hardest to nail down. To determine your value-based price, you figure out how much money or value your product generates for the user in the long run, then take a fraction of that.
For a simplified example, let’s say that you’re selling an email replacement tool that helps companies recover $7,000 in productive hours each month. Ten percent is a reasonable cut, so you set your monthly price at $700.
Obviously, if you’re selling something that’s not directly functional, value-based pricing becomes even more nebulous.
Get around this by gathering a sample of potential customers (i.e., people in your target demographic) and asking them if they’d buy your product at X price, at Y price, at Z price, etc. You’ll be able to generate a rough bell curve of the percentage of consumers who will buy at each price point. In general, the “value” of your product is at the peak of the curve. (That doesn’t mean that’s what your price should be, however—more on that in a bit!)
Pricing Goals
Even after you’ve found the most suitable pricing model for your product, you need to factor in your company’s business plan.
Make Money Fast
There are a couple situations that may demand bringing in as much profit as you can as quickly as you can. First, if you’re bootstrapping it (which means running your company with no outside money), you’ll need to generate profit right away. Second, if you’re looking to attract funding, showing profitability is a great way to convince VCs or angels that your startup will be a good investment. (Note: You don’t always need to be in the black to get investors excited—Snapchat and Facebook were worth billions of dollars before they ever turned a profit!)
Drive Your Revenue Up
Another goal is to generate huge revenues—but not necessarily huge profits. In other words, you’ll be making and spending lots of money. This strategy can help you establish dominance in the market. It can also enable economy of scale, which will help you lower your costs down the line.
Online marketplace jet.com is using this strategy. Jet has earned a $600 million to $3 billion (depending on whom you ask) valuation by offering lower prices than Amazon. Despite the valuation, it’s not making any money yet—the Wall Street Journal picked out 12 items on Jet (selling for a total of $275.55), researched how much it cost Jet to buy and sell those items, and found that Jet was actually losing $242.91.
Get Customers
Acquiring as many customers as possible is yet another goal. Uber is the poster company for this technique; it frequently gave away rides (thus operating at a loss) because it knew that once people rode in an Uber, they were very likely to become repeat customers.
If, like Uber, your product is “sticky,” or if it’s available as freemium, than getting customers should be your primary objective.
Develop a Reputation
If you’re positioning your product as affordable and attainable, your prices should be on the lower side. Alternatively, if your product is a luxury good, price it high. Many people confer high prices with better quality, even if there’s no real evidence that’s the case.
Continue reading %Everything You Need to Know About Setting Your Prices%
by Aja Frost via SitePoint
Are You a Talented Designer? Sourcehunt Needs You!
In October 2015, SitePoint's very own Bruno Skvorc launched Sourcehunt PHP, a valuable initiative aiming to help (mostly niche) open source projects grow by attracting more contributors. In true open source fashion, it greatly reflects our love for open source here at SitePoint.
With the PHP channel being the first channel to get the Sourcehunt treatment, the Design channel was eager to catch up too. While you may not often hear "Design" and "Open Source" in the same sentence, I have seen too many great open source projects fail due to a lack of good design. Often it's very simple fixes to UX, UI or even branding that make the difference.
However, contributing to an open source project, can be greatly rewarding. Sure, you might not get paid directly, to do get: -designer street cred ("oh yeah.. I worked on that..") -the experience of working with others talented people in a decentralized way -and, of course, it looks very impressive on your resume
And that's not to mention the simple joy of just making cool stuff - a concept I probably don't need to convince you of, since you are likely already a designer and are reading this post.
For Sourcehunt Design, the Open Source Design group has been a great help with promoting open design principles and open source projects in need of a sprinkling of good design. Thanks to them, I was able to compile this small collection of projects to contribute to, with more to come in the coming months.
So, to recap:
We will be going through some open source projects which are in need of a helping design hand. However contributing as a designer is sometimes not as straightforward as with code, so I will try to explain how you can contribute on a case by case basis.
In case GitHub scares you a little (it's ok, we've all been there), relax! We will be solely focusing on GitHub Issues, which is the ticketing system GitHub offers. Check out the GitHub guides in case you are stuck.
Let's get started!
PhotoFlow
PhotoFlow aims to provide a fully non-destructive photo retouching experience with a complete workflow including RAW image development. It has an ambitious feature list which it wishes to fulfill once version 1.0 is shipped. Concretely:
- Fully non-destructive, layer-based photo editing workflow with real-time preview of the final image
- Support for 8-bits and 16-bits integer as well as 32-bits and 64-bits floating point precision, selectable at runtime and on a per-image basis
- Allows to load and edit images of arbitrary size, thanks to the underlying rendering engine based on the VIPS library
- Fully color managed workflow: user-defined input, work, and output profiles, soft-proofing and similar
- Support for layer grouping and layer masks
- Support for common photo editing tools: levels, curves, brightness-contrast control, blurring, sharpening, cropping, resizing, colorspace conversions, etc. implemented in the form of image layers
The project is currently looking for a UX/UI Designer to improve upon its graphical interface and help with the general look and feel of the program. It's a pretty straightforward task, so check out the listing on Open Source Design and start an issue in the GitHub repo.
OpenFarm
OpenFarm is a free and open database for farming and gardening knowledge. It aims to provide a platform for expert and beginner farmers and gardeners to share their knowledge in the form of Growing Guides that describe how to grow a crop based on specific environmental conditions and growing practices. Compatibility scoring between Users and Guides allows high quality and relevant information to be discovered quickly.
This is not one of the run-of-the-mill open source projects you stumble upon, which makes it all the more interesting. It's also worth noting that all data stored in OpenFarm's database is Public Domain, which is a great contribution to the commons.
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Currently, the guys at OpenFarm are looking for an illustrator to create their personalized mascot. Head over to the issue on GitHub if you want to give it a try.
If icon design is more 'your thing', OpenFarm also need some help with the development of their drag and drop farm designer/manager tool - specifically a selection of plant icons. You can find the related issue on GitHub in case you can take it on.
These are only 2 specific jobs currently most prioritized, but feel free to browse around and contribute to the project with other changes and additions. The OpenFarmers will surely appreciate it!
Thunderbird Conversations
Thunderbird Conversations is a Thunderbird extension which, as the name implies, enables a conversation view in the Thunderbird email client by Mozilla. Notable features include:
- a regular conversation view that fetches messages from all folders, and behaves similarly to Gmail's
- a quick reply feature, with autocomplete, that allows you to reply to a thread in a snap,
- quoted parts are collapsed,
- keyboard shortcuts,
- and a few other bonus features.
Conversations is actually one of the most downloaded Thunderbird add-ons with more than 60,000 daily users. As the major open source client out there, Thunderbird enjoys great popularity also.
Continue reading %Are You a Talented Designer? Sourcehunt Needs You!%
by Elio Qoshi via SitePoint
Fredrick
One Pager with a subtle parallax as you scroll for 'Fredrick' - a funny iPhone app that acts as "an honest menstrual cycle navigator for men". Cheers for the build notes Grant!
by Rob Hope via One Page Love
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