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An Event Apart was started by the A List Apart people. ALA was/is a website that was very important for front-end development during the 2000s and early 2010s.
by dimmke 4y ago
An Event Apart was started by the A List Apart people. ALA was/is a website that was very important for front-end development during the 2000s and early 2010s. Famously, the article that outlined the technique and name for"responsive web design" for the first time was published there in 2010: https://alistapart.com/article/responsive-web-design/ https://alistapart.com/article/responsive-web-design/
It wasn't UX focused, it was specifically front-end focused. And it was a hugely important part of the evolution of that domain.
- threepio 4y agoThe article that first described what came to be known as responsive design was published on ALA by Marc van den Dobbelsteen in 2006: https://alistapart.com/article/switchymclayout/ https://alistapart.com/article/switchymclayout/
- dimmke 4y agoCool find! I had not seen that before. But I still think the one I linked to is the canonical origin since it actually named it and described the method we ended up using (media queries) but this article definitely seems like an important precursor as well - and it strengthens my point of how important ALA was that this post was also posted to ALA.
- nomdep 4y agoI think they also were the first to describe the idea of “Mobile First”, the very next year: https://abookapart.com/products/mobile-first https://abookapart.com/products/mobile-first
- dimmke 4y agoPlus foundational work on concepts like Progressive Enhancement: https://alistapart.com/article/understandingprogressiveenhancement/ https://alistapart.com/article/understandingprogressiveenhan... I think if you were not in the front-end scene during the 2000s, you don't understand how miserable it was. For most of that decade, we had to make sure our sites were compatible with IE6. Flash was vying to take over. Without the work that publications like A List Apart did (along with Mozilla) the web might look much different (worse) today. They were thought leaders. They shaped what was actually happening in the industry in a time when front-end development was changing dramatically year over year. It makes me sad that they seem to be slipping from our collective memory a bit.
- Dachande663 4y agoEven before then they were teaching front-end techniques like Sliding Doors[1] that now seem so elementary as to be expected knowledge. [1] https://alistapart.com/article/slidingdoors/ https://alistapart.com/article/slidingdoors/
- pc86 4y agoI remember implementing this exact article in high school and being absolutely blown away at actually creating something "on my own."
- satisfice 4y agoThat is interesting. Thank you for the capsule description.
- Klonoar 4y agoI read ALA religiously when starting out, and attended one of the earlier AEAs that happened in SF. Crazy to see it ending but it had a great run.