You want to make your website faster, but maybe you’re not sure where to start. I get it, web performance optimization contains a lot of “stuff.” It can be overwhelming if you don’t know where to focus first. Don’t worry, I got you! To understand what’s going to drive the…

Every time you load a web app, your browser performs a set of actions. By understanding what each action is and why it’s needed, you can fine-tune the performance. This article is an excerpt from my book The Web Performance Handbook. In it, you will learn the core concepts of…

Have you ever licked up bird shit? Eaten cat food? Bobbed for apples out of the toilet? There are two Canadian documentarian-turned-comedians who have. The “best friends” form a natural comedic duo, as Spencer Rice likes to point out during interviews. Spencer is the anxiety-riddled “straight” man who’s frowning mug…

Consensus Algorithms — Proof of Work, Proof of Stake, Proof of Importance Bitcoin uses a shit load of energy. Bitcoin’s energy footprint has surged along with it’s dramatic rise in popularity. With “mining” hubs popping up locations all over the world, the power needed to execute the complex algorithms within Bitcoin’s Proof of…

Why you should care, how it works, and why it’s not Bitcoin. — You’ve probably heard a lot about blockchain lately. With Bitcoin’s recent surge in popularity, this new field of distributed cryptographic technology has exploded with companies and blockchains all competing for a piece of the pie. Bitcoin uses blockchain technology to track transaction of digital currency in a distributed way. Ethereum…

These are the questions and considerations I use to pick a tech stack for that fits my client and my project. — I’m a developer. I have frameworks I like to use and opinions about ones I don’t. I struggled to break away from this myopic view of technology for a long time, but as I’ve been slowly introduced to working on larger project, with bigger teams and enormous companies, simply recommending…

What work? — It’s not unusual to write a small “status update” email to a client or superior throughout the lifespan of a project. Usually once a day, or maybe 3x a week, I’ll drop my boss a line, just to convey progress, concerns, or blockers. Then I stumbled on something. Occasionally, I’d…

How browsers render & style a page — I spent a handful of year building websites without knowing how exactly one is rendered. I’d hear things about “painting” and “layout,” but I never really felt like I needed to dive into it in order to do my job. I was wrong (kind of). Sure, you can get by…

Blockchain and Bitcoin explained in a way your mom would understand —