Speaking
I'm very happy to announce that I will be speaking at OSCON 2015 with my good friend Robin Osborne. We will be presenting a tutorial entitled "Automating web performance" which will run through a step-by-step guide to web performance and show you how to
JavaScript
As web developers, we often need the ability to retrieve data from the server in order to update our applications asynchronously. Traditionally this data is retrieved using JavaScript and the XMLHttpRequest object. A simple example of this might look something like the code below. In the code above, there are
Service Workers
A while ago I built a fun side project on Github to keep a collection of typography links and tools that caught my eye. There are a number of people that follow the project on Github, but every time I make a change or add a new link, I normally
Web Performance
Earlier this year I was lucky enough to get the chance to present at UpFront Conference in Manchester. This was the inaugural year for the conference, and it was great to be apart of this event. A few people have asked about the slide deck and wanted to know more.
Web Performance
If you browse the web today, there are many articles that explain what browser pre-loading is and how to use it, but very little explain how to actually use this feature in the real world. The ability to prefetch resources is powerful, but if used incorrectly it can turn
Web Performance
Using web fonts can be a great way to improve the look and feel of your website. I love tinkering with different font combinations on websites and seeing the changes they make. Unfortunately, adding web fonts to your site adds extra overhead to your site and can often slow your
Web Performance
Compressing files can be a very effective way of reducing their size as they are transferred between the server and a user's browser. Most modern browsers work effectively with compressed files and use lossless compression formats such as Gzip, Deflate or Zlib. In order to compress a file,
Google Chrome
Did you know that Chrome has a list of internal pages that allows you to see advanced flags and settings? There are some hidden gems inside the Google Chrome internal pages that give a useful insight into the hard work that the browser is doing behind the scenes. If you
Technical Leadership
During my daily commute into the office, I like to alternate between reading the newspaper and a good book. Lately I’ve been reading a book entitled “The Hard Thing about Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz. It’s a great insight into the trials and tribulations of running your own
Speaking
I am very proud to announce that as of today, I am a Google Developer Expert. If you haven't heard of Google Developer Experts before, they are a global network of experienced product strategists, designers, developers and marketing professionals that actively support developers and startups. While this doesn&
Speaking
I’m proud to say that I will be speaking at UpFront Conference in Manchester, UK on the 19th of May. UpFront Conference is in it’s first year and is billed as “a front-end conference for anyone who makes for the web”. The speaker line-up is packed
Programming
If you visit some of the most popular websites on the net today and view the source of their HTML, you might be surprised with what you find. There are often hidden gems and messages in the form of ASCII art embedded in their HTML comments. Troy Hunt recently wrote