April
Sunny Spring days, decorating the flat, appreciating simple genius of my Ikea Poang armchair, with its flexible bentwood struts, and sitting on the beach tempting myself to go for a dip in the frigid post-winter sea. What have I been up to outside of my day job and personal movements?
- I've decided to get full Web Accessibility specialist certification, which entails taking an exam in August/June. Dxw have agreed to cover my costs for the preparatory course. I've already spent a day studying.
- Getting to grips with Typescript while converting my Satoshi Power web app codebase into full typescript coverage.
- I decided to turn the currency converter feature into its standalone Android app, built in React Native and Expo. For this I familiarised myself with React Native.
Reflections
I'm new to building anything on native apps. Quite soon I realised that it's not as close to developing for the web as I had assumed. The view layer uses a different infrastructure to the HTML DOM, and as such the UI libraries I reach for don't serve React Native.
There's something quite satisfying about applying the colour theory I think about in web design, to home decorations. Primary colours, secondary and accents, as well as other design elements like balance, density and focal points.
To finish on a bit of a black pill, but reflective of the development community — AI is scaling incredibly fast. A lot of the Youtubers who I've followed for a long time, for tutorials on design and various web technologies are now lamenting the reality of AI, and wrestling with the question of whether or not they are being replaced. This led to my decision to focus on web accessibility. I think designers and developers now have to have that extra tool in their toolkit that can't be disrupted by AI in the medium term at least. For me, I think positioning myself as a Design Engineer who focusses on web accessibility and User (human) centred design where I want to be. Still letting me explore creativity, problem solve and work with people is how I'll dodge the robots who are lined up to replace me.