149 Carrie Forde from WebDevStudios

We talk with front end architect/designer Carrie Forde about atomic design and front-end development for WordPress. Carrie's Forde day job is as a front-end developer at the highly-respected WebDevStudios.

Carrie Forde on Twitter: https://twitter.com/carrieforde

Carrie's site: https://carrieforde.com/

 

Table of Contents for Episode 149

0:00 Podcast intros.

1:22 Carrie's origin story.

3:44 What Carrie's work typical work day looks like right now.

4:56 How difficult is it to break into front-end development in today's environment?

7:20 Carrie tells us about her Alcatraz framework for WordPress that she developed.

9:05 What are style tiles? And what is Carrie's style tiles plugin for WordPress?

12:27 Carries teaches us about atomic design and the benefits of using it in UI design.

17:10 More resources for learning about Atomic Design.

19:38 What the WordPress community can do to make themes more accessible?

21:43 A habit to develop when creating WordPress themes to make them translatable.

22:48 What inspired Carrie to build the Alcatraz framework and what ideas in Genesis she wanted to improve on.

25:06 Carries philosophy on creating themes and making them developer friendly.

27:23 What goes into a CSS refactoring project.

28:56 Where does a CSS refactoring project make sense?

30:33 What is Carrie's preferred naming or organizational convention for writing CSS?

31:48 What are some great resources for learning JavaScript?

34:31 Are there any trends in CSS and front development that Carrie sees becoming prominent in 2017?

36:10 Any resources that Carries recommends for learning front-end development?

 

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Links mentioned during the show:

WebDev Studios

https://webdevstudios.com/

Mighty Minnow

https://www.mightyminnow.com/

Alcatraz - A framework for creating awesome, flexible WordPress themes

http://alcatraztheme.com/

https://github.com/carrieforde/Alcatraz

Style Tiles (Samantha Warren)

http://styletil.es/

Style Tiles and How They Work (A List Apart)

http://alistapart.com/article/style-tiles-and-how-they-work

Faster Design Decisions with Style Tiles (An Event Apart)

https://vimeo.com/115992327

WordPress Style Tiles (Carrie Forde plugin)

https://github.com/carrieforde/WordPress-Style-Tiles

Creating Themes with Atomic Design (WC Sac 2016)

https://speakerdeck.com/carrieforde/creating-themes-with-atomic-design

Atomic Design Methodology

http://atomicdesign.bradfrost.com/chapter-2/

Atomic Design: The Book

http://bradfrost.com/blog/post/atomic-design-book/

PatternLab.io

http://patternlab.io/

Strengths Finder 2.0

https://www.amazon.com/StrengthsFinder-2-0-Tom-Rath/dp/159562015X

BEM - Block Element Modifier

http://getbem.com/introduction/

ITCSS - Scalable, Maintainable CSS Architecture

https://www.xfive.co/blog/itcss-scalable-maintainable-css-architecture/

SMACSS - Scalable and Modular Architecture for CSS

https://smacss.com/

JavaScript Is Sexy

http://javascriptissexy.com/how-to-learn-javascript-properly/

JavaScript for WP

https://javascriptforwp.com/

Treehouse

https://teamtreehouse.com/

CSS Grid (MDN)

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/CSS_Grid_Layout

ES6 for Everyone (Wes Bos course)

https://es6.io/

 

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Find bonus content for this episode on the WP-Tonic website:

https://www.wp-tonic.com/podcast/149-carrie-forde-front-end-architect/

 

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Subscribe to WP-Tonic on iTunes

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/wp-tonic-wordpress-podcast/id893083124?mt=2

 

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WP-Tonic is both a WordPress maintenance and support service, and also publishers of a twice weekly business-focused WordPress podcast where we talk with some of the brightest minds in WordPress development and online marketing.