15 year full stack developer here with at least 8 of those years doing GUI stuff. Over the years, the two biggest things that helped boost my skills were: 1) W

15 year full stack developer here with at least 8 of those years doing GUI stuff. Over the years, the two biggest things that helped boost my skills were: 1) Write a game. It may sound cheesy, but it gives you a frame of reference to work from. Most people have played enough games to know when the interaction feels right or wrong. If, like me, you decide to write a game in the browser, it will also teach you many, many things about working with the DOM, optimizing for performance, managing memory, etc... Plus, it looks freaking fantastic on the resume. I recommend a 2D side scroller (I did Mario in JS) or top down (zelda would be cool). Be careful of anything with large numbers of moving things on the stage at once (contra, for example). Optimization can kill you with those. 2) Write in a framework. For instance, if you write a iPhone app, the obj-c based framework tends to guide you towards a usable, responsive app. Same thing with Rails and QT. You can also find scaffolding for all of the above that will lay down the groundwork for you to expand on.