firs

Apple set for first MacBook Pro revamp in five years on October 18

The new MacBook Pros are likely to use a higher-end version of the M1 chip, with increased performance



  • Computers & Laptops

firs

Asus launches India’s first ProArt series laptops for creators

Also launches Vivobooks starting ₹75,000 and will be sold across online channels beginning December 14.



  • Computers & Laptops

firs

The first East Indians to Trinidad : Captain Cubitt Sparkhall Rundle and the Fatel Rozack / Dennison Moore, Ph. D.

[United States] : Kindle Direct Publishing, 2020.




firs

The first modern economy : success, failure, and perseverance of the Dutch economy, 1500-1815 / Jan De Vries, Ad van der Woude.

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1997.




firs

Chinese folklore. Pekinese rhymes / first collected and edited with notes and translation, Guido Vitale.

Hong Kong : Vetch and Lee, 1972.




firs

Malta, a case study in international cross-currents : proceedings of the First International Colloquium on the history of the Central Mediterranean, held at the University of Malta, 13-17 December, 1989 / edited by Stanley Fiorini, Victor Mallia-Milanes.

[Msida] : Malta Historical Society, Foundation for International Studies, University of Malta, 1991.




firs

In search of Norfolk's first stone churches : the use of ferruginous gravels and sands and the reuse of Roman building materials in early churches / Peter Wade-Martins.

Oxford : BAR Publishing, 2024.




firs

16 First Responders Explain COVID-19 Cases In Their Cities

We talked to 16 people on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic, all experiencing different points of the infection rate curve. We asked them a series of questions regarding their specific situations. Here are there answers. Check your risk for COVID-19 here: https://c19check.com/start




firs

WIRED25 2020: Avi Schiffmann, the 17-Year-Old Who Built the First Coronavirus Tracker

Avi Schiffmann built the first coronavirus tracker in January 2020, before global organizations were aggregating cases. His dashboard proved essential. At WIRED25, he spoke with Megan Molteni about his plans to visualize candidates' positions for the 2020 election.




firs

Metformin: The First Anti-Ageing Drug? | The Future of Ageing | WIRED

"Average life expectancy is now in the 80's in most developed countries, so we are losing out on 15-20 years of life for most people". In episode two of Wired UK's four-part documentary series, we head to New York City to talk to Dr. Nir Barzilai and Dr. Ana Maria Cuervo, directors at the Institute for Ageing Research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, about their extensive and detailed work on the biological, physiological and functional processes of ageing. We also discuss the institute's exploration into what genes are resilient to the negative aspects of ageing, as well as what impact the so-called 'miracle drug' Metformin could potentially have. Subscribe to WIRED UK ► https://www.youtube.com/wireduk?sub_confirmation=1 Visit the WIRED website ► https://www.wired.co.uk Subscribe to WIRED Magazine ► https://www.wired.co.uk/subscribe Sign up for one or more of our WIRED newsletters: https://www.wired.co.uk/newsletters CONNECT WITH WIRED Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wireduk Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wireduk Twitter: https://twitter.com/wireduk LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wired-uk ABOUT WIRED WIRED brings you the future as it happens - the people, the trends, the big ideas that will change our lives. An award-winning printed monthly and online publication. WIRED is an agenda-setting magazine offering brain food on a wide range of topics, from science, technology and business to pop-culture and politics.




firs

First Look: Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2022

Samsung has debuted three new smartphones—the Galaxy S22 Ultra, S22+, S22—and three Android tablets in various sizes at Samsung Unpacked 2022. WIRED's Julian Chokkattu takes a look at the newest features.




firs

First Look: Apple iPhone SE 2022

The iPhone SE has been updated for 2022! It boasts the A15 Bionic chip for fast processing, a 4.7-inch screen, and camera upgrades. Reviews editor Julian Chokkattu gives us a first-hand look at what the SE is all about.




firs

BJP releases first list of 99 candidates for Maharashtra Assembly elections

The list includes 71 sitting MLAs and several prominent party leaders




firs

India’s first ‘Make in India’ C-295 transport aircraft to roll out in September 2026

Inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Spain’s PM Pedro Sanchez, this factory will produce over 85 per cent of the aircraft’s components domestically, reflecting a strong India-Spain defence collaboration. 




firs

First phase of Maharashtra’s new emergency ambulance project to be operationalised by Sept 2025

Plans afoot to bid for TN and UP, next year




firs

Australian-German research finds world-first cure for deadly skin disease




firs

First demonstration of in situ Lu–Hf dating using LA-ICP-MS/MS applied to monazite

J. Anal. At. Spectrom., 2024, 39,2703-2715
DOI: 10.1039/D4JA00258J, Technical Note
Shitou Wu, Junlong Niu, Yueheng Yang, Hao Wang, Jinhui Yang, Fuyuan Wu
Monazite is a LREE-rich accessory mineral in various igneous and metamorphic rocks; therefore, monazite geochronology has the potential to answer a range of important geological questions.
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry




firs

World’s first dengue vaccine likely by 2015: Sanofi

The company said the vaccine gives a 95.5% protection against severe dengue and an 80.3% reduction in the risk of hospitalisation.




firs

Ebola vaccine seems safe in first-stage testing




firs

First trial to use umbilical cord stem cells to cure HIV




firs

First Due: Why Should You Use Social Media?

When I teach social media, I commonly am told that not all people are on social media, particularly the older population. What I want you to consider is that many members of the families of those older residents are on social media, and they can share a departments information with their older relatives. Yes, local newspapers, radio stations and local cable access channels love to share fire department information, and that information is being read, heard and watched by more of that audience that is not on social media. However, social media is another vehicle that transports a department’s information to many other forms of communication.




firs

Structural and thermodynamic properties of the Li6PS5Cl solid electrolyte using first-principles calculations

J. Mater. Chem. A, 2024, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/D4TA05159A, Paper
Tarek Ayadi, Maylise Nastar, Fabien Bruneval
We perform static and dynamic ab initio simulations to investigate the structural and the thermodynamic properties of Li6PS5Cl, a solid electrolyte actively considered for solid-state batteries. Our simulations account for...
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry




firs

Purdy amazed by Pearsall's NFL journey before first 49ers TD

Brock Purdy still is amazed at rookie wide receiver Ricky Pearsall's first touchdown for the San Francisco 49ers.




firs

Pokies Parlour Review – Get up to AU$7,777 for the First 7 Deposits

Contents Pokies Parlour Remarkable Bonus Strategy What should you know about Pokies Parlour Casino? Tell me the importance of Pokies Parlour security? Top AU$20 deposit casino Pokies Parlour Casino offers its customers a fantastic welcome package that can give up to AU$7,777 for the first seven deposits. This is an excellent offer for slots and […]




firs

Indian box office sees muted first half, collections down 30-35 per cent

Industry hopeful of a better second half starting with release of Kalki 2898 AD this week




firs

How India’s first woman mining engineer cut a rocky path for herself

From braving ‘roof collapses’ to the lack of basic amenities in coal mines designed for men, engineer Akanksha Kumari scripts an inspiring tale of passion and grit




firs

Green Humour by Rohan Chakravarty on the first great Indian bustard born through IVF 




firs

TASL’s first ‘sub-metre optical’ satellite launched

The SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket catapulted the TASL’s satellite from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center on April 7, says TASL




firs

Timeline: Boeing’s Starliner launches first crewed flight after multiple delays

This historic mission aims to certify Starliner for routine travel to the International Space Station.




firs

AWS announces first space tech accelerator program in India with 24 shortlisted startups

The program is a result of the MoU agreement AWS signed with the Indian Space Research Organization and the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre in 2023




firs

First test flight of Gaganyaan is expected in December 2024: ISRO Chairman

‘All the systems for the Gaganyaan rocket - codenamed G1 - will reach SDSC in November this year and the target for the rocket flight is December’




firs

SpaceX delays launch of first-ever private spacewalk mission

The signature moment of the mission was to be a spacewalk by billionaire Jared Isaacman and SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis




firs

Elon Musk: SpaceX to launch first Starships to Mars in two years

After separating from the spacecraft, the Super Heavy booster for the first time executed a landing burn and had a soft splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico after eight eight minutes of the launch




firs

ICMR inks industry collaborations for first in-human trials

Collaborations on four molecules, a fillip for research in the country




firs

IndusInd, Bandhan, RBL, IDFC First, Kotak, Ujjivan et al. - Dissecting the MFI worry 

Many private banks have been hit by the turbulent MFI segment. Read on to know what has caused this distress and how investors should play this space safely




firs

Nirdiganta: A first-of-its-kind incubation centre for theatre 

Actor Prakash Raj’s innovative incubator for theatre and arts offers a comprehensive production process, stipends for actors/techs, lodging, kitchen and tech support. It also plans to promote fine arts and film in the future.




firs

India’s first fuel outlet operated by woman convicts inaugurated in Chennai

About 30 woman prisoners will be employed in this petrol outlet in day shift and about 17 men prisoners on the night shift with a salary of ₹6,000 a month




firs

Watch | Inside Hyderabad’s first train-themed restaurant

A video on Pariwar Foodexpress, the first train-themed restaurant at any railway station in Telangana 




firs

First International Calligraphy Festival of Kerala under way in Kochi is a hit with enthusiasts and fine arts students

Exhibition serves as an introduction to the potential of the art form which is gaining popularity among young artists in State




firs

India’s first Voco Hotel in Jim Corbett offers many surprises beyond the tiger trail

The romance of the mountain rains, fragrance of the forest and petrichor, a symphony by sung by the birds and a taste of Kumaoni cuisine and cocktail, that’s how India’s first Voco Hotel in Jim Corbett invites you to live in the moment




firs

Mizoram reports first case of swine flu




firs

First case of pregnant woman diagnosed with Zika in Singapore




firs

Designers, (Re)define Success First

About two and a half years ago, I introduced the idea of daily ethical design. It was born out of my frustration with the many obstacles to achieving design that’s usable and equitable; protects people’s privacy, agency, and focus; benefits society; and restores nature. I argued that we need to overcome the inconveniences that prevent us from acting ethically and that we need to elevate design ethics to a more practical level by structurally integrating it into our daily work, processes, and tools.

Unfortunately, we’re still very far from this ideal. 

At the time, I didn’t know yet how to structurally integrate ethics. Yes, I had found some tools that had worked for me in previous projects, such as using checklists, assumption tracking, and “dark reality” sessions, but I didn’t manage to apply those in every project. I was still struggling for time and support, and at best I had only partially achieved a higher (moral) quality of design—which is far from my definition of structurally integrated.

I decided to dig deeper for the root causes in business that prevent us from practicing daily ethical design. Now, after much research and experimentation, I believe that I’ve found the key that will let us structurally integrate ethics. And it’s surprisingly simple! But first we need to zoom out to get a better understanding of what we’re up against.

Influence the system

Sadly, we’re trapped in a capitalistic system that reinforces consumerism and inequality, and it’s obsessed with the fantasy of endless growth. Sea levels, temperatures, and our demand for energy continue to rise unchallenged, while the gap between rich and poor continues to widen. Shareholders expect ever-higher returns on their investments, and companies feel forced to set short-term objectives that reflect this. Over the last decades, those objectives have twisted our well-intended human-centered mindset into a powerful machine that promotes ever-higher levels of consumption. When we’re working for an organization that pursues “double-digit growth” or “aggressive sales targets” (which is 99 percent of us), that’s very hard to resist while remaining human friendly. Even with our best intentions, and even though we like to say that we create solutions for people, we’re a part of the problem.

What can we do to change this?

We can start by acting on the right level of the system. Donella H. Meadows, a system thinker, once listed ways to influence a system in order of effectiveness. When you apply these to design, you get:

  • At the lowest level of effectiveness, you can affect numbers such as usability scores or the number of design critiques. But none of that will change the direction of a company.
  • Similarly, affecting buffers (such as team budgets), stocks (such as the number of designers), flows (such as the number of new hires), and delays (such as the time that it takes to hear about the effect of design) won’t significantly affect a company.
  • Focusing instead on feedback loops such as management control, employee recognition, or design-system investments can help a company become better at achieving its objectives. But that doesn’t change the objectives themselves, which means that the organization will still work against your ethical-design ideals.
  • The next level, information flows, is what most ethical-design initiatives focus on now: the exchange of ethical methods, toolkits, articles, conferences, workshops, and so on. This is also where ethical design has remained mostly theoretical. We’ve been focusing on the wrong level of the system all this time.
  • Take rules, for example—they beat knowledge every time. There can be widely accepted rules, such as how finance works, or a scrum team’s definition of done. But ethical design can also be smothered by unofficial rules meant to maintain profits, often revealed through comments such as “the client didn’t ask for it” or “don’t make it too big.”
  • Changing the rules without holding official power is very hard. That’s why the next level is so influential: self-organization. Experimentation, bottom-up initiatives, passion projects, self-steering teams—all of these are examples of self-organization that improve the resilience and creativity of a company. It’s exactly this diversity of viewpoints that’s needed to structurally tackle big systemic issues like consumerism, wealth inequality, and climate change.
  • Yet even stronger than self-organization are objectives and metrics. Our companies want to make more money, which means that everything and everyone in the company does their best to… make the company more money. And once I realized that profit is nothing more than a measurement, I understood how crucial a very specific, defined metric can be toward pushing a company in a certain direction.

The takeaway? If we truly want to incorporate ethics into our daily design practice, we must first change the measurable objectives of the company we work for, from the bottom up.

Redefine success

Traditionally, we consider a product or service successful if it’s desirable to humans, technologically feasible, and financially viable. You tend to see these represented as equals; if you type the three words in a search engine, you’ll find diagrams of three equally sized, evenly arranged circles.

But in our hearts, we all know that the three dimensions aren’t equally weighted: it’s viability that ultimately controls whether a product will go live. So a more realistic representation might look like this:

Desirability and feasibility are the means; viability is the goal. Companies—outside of nonprofits and charities—exist to make money.

A genuinely purpose-driven company would try to reverse this dynamic: it would recognize finance for what it was intended for: a means. So both feasibility and viability are means to achieve what the company set out to achieve. It makes intuitive sense: to achieve most anything, you need resources, people, and money. (Fun fact: the Italian language knows no difference between feasibility and viability; both are simply fattibilità.)

But simply swapping viable for desirable isn’t enough to achieve an ethical outcome. Desirability is still linked to consumerism because the associated activities aim to identify what people want—whether it’s good for them or not. Desirability objectives, such as user satisfaction or conversion, don’t consider whether a product is healthy for people. They don’t prevent us from creating products that distract or manipulate people or stop us from contributing to society’s wealth inequality. They’re unsuitable for establishing a healthy balance with nature.

There’s a fourth dimension of success that’s missing: our designs also need to be ethical in the effect that they have on the world.

This is hardly a new idea. Many similar models exist, some calling the fourth dimension accountability, integrity, or responsibility. What I’ve never seen before, however, is the necessary step that comes after: to influence the system as designers and to make ethical design more practical, we must create objectives for ethical design that are achievable and inspirational. There’s no one way to do this because it highly depends on your culture, values, and industry. But I’ll give you the version that I developed with a group of colleagues at a design agency. Consider it a template to get started.

Pursue well-being, equity, and sustainability

We created objectives that address design’s effect on three levels: individual, societal, and global.

An objective on the individual level tells us what success is beyond the typical focus of usability and satisfaction—instead considering matters such as how much time and attention is required from users. We pursued well-being:

We create products and services that allow for people’s health and happiness. Our solutions are calm, transparent, nonaddictive, and nonmisleading. We respect our users’ time, attention, and privacy, and help them make healthy and respectful choices.

An objective on the societal level forces us to consider our impact beyond just the user, widening our attention to the economy, communities, and other indirect stakeholders. We called this objective equity:

We create products and services that have a positive social impact. We consider economic equality, racial justice, and the inclusivity and diversity of people as teams, users, and customer segments. We listen to local culture, communities, and those we affect.

Finally, the objective on the global level aims to ensure that we remain in balance with the only home we have as humanity. Referring to it simply as sustainability, our definition was:

We create products and services that reward sufficiency and reusability. Our solutions support the circular economy: we create value from waste, repurpose products, and prioritize sustainable choices. We deliver functionality instead of ownership, and we limit energy use.

In short, ethical design (to us) meant achieving wellbeing for each user and an equitable value distribution within society through a design that can be sustained by our living planet. When we introduced these objectives in the company, for many colleagues, design ethics and responsible design suddenly became tangible and achievable through practical—and even familiar—actions.

Measure impact 

But defining these objectives still isn’t enough. What truly caught the attention of senior management was the fact that we created a way to measure every design project’s well-being, equity, and sustainability.

This overview lists example metrics that you can use as you pursue well-being, equity, and sustainability:

There’s a lot of power in measurement. As the saying goes, what gets measured gets done. Donella Meadows once shared this example:

“If the desired system state is national security, and that is defined as the amount of money spent on the military, the system will produce military spending. It may or may not produce national security.”

This phenomenon explains why desirability is a poor indicator of success: it’s typically defined as the increase in customer satisfaction, session length, frequency of use, conversion rate, churn rate, download rate, and so on. But none of these metrics increase the health of people, communities, or ecosystems. What if instead we measured success through metrics for (digital) well-being, such as (reduced) screen time or software energy consumption?

There’s another important message here. Even if we set an objective to build a calm interface, if we were to choose the wrong metric for calmness—say, the number of interface elements—we could still end up with a screen that induces anxiety. Choosing the wrong metric can completely undo good intentions. 

Additionally, choosing the right metric is enormously helpful in focusing the design team. Once you go through the exercise of choosing metrics for our objectives, you’re forced to consider what success looks like concretely and how you can prove that you’ve reached your ethical objectives. It also forces you to consider what we as designers have control over: what can I include in my design or change in my process that will lead to the right type of success? The answer to this question brings a lot of clarity and focus.

And finally, it’s good to remember that traditional businesses run on measurements, and managers love to spend much time discussing charts (ideally hockey-stick shaped)—especially if they concern profit, the one-above-all of metrics. For good or ill, to improve the system, to have a serious discussion about ethical design with managers, we’ll need to speak that business language.

Practice daily ethical design

Once you’ve defined your objectives and you have a reasonable idea of the potential metrics for your design project, only then do you have a chance to structurally practice ethical design. It “simply” becomes a matter of using your creativity and choosing from all the knowledge and toolkits already available to you.

I think this is quite exciting! It opens a whole new set of challenges and considerations for the design process. Should you go with that energy-consuming video or would a simple illustration be enough? Which typeface is the most calm and inclusive? Which new tools and methods do you use? When is the website’s end of life? How can you provide the same service while requiring less attention from users? How do you make sure that those who are affected by decisions are there when those decisions are made? How can you measure our effects?

The redefinition of success will completely change what it means to do good design.

There is, however, a final piece of the puzzle that’s missing: convincing your client, product owner, or manager to be mindful of well-being, equity, and sustainability. For this, it’s essential to engage stakeholders in a dedicated kickoff session.

Kick it off or fall back to status quo

The kickoff is the most important meeting that can be so easy to forget to include. It consists of two major phases: 1) the alignment of expectations, and 2) the definition of success.

In the first phase, the entire (design) team goes over the project brief and meets with all the relevant stakeholders. Everyone gets to know one another and express their expectations on the outcome and their contributions to achieving it. Assumptions are raised and discussed. The aim is to get on the same level of understanding and to in turn avoid preventable miscommunications and surprises later in the project.

For example, for a recent freelance project that aimed to design a digital platform that facilitates US student advisors’ documentation and communication, we conducted an online kickoff with the client, a subject-matter expert, and two other designers. We used a combination of canvases on Miro: one with questions from “Manual of Me” (to get to know each other), a Team Canvas (to express expectations), and a version of the Project Canvas to align on scope, timeline, and other practical matters.

The above is the traditional purpose of a kickoff. But just as important as expressing expectations is agreeing on what success means for the project—in terms of desirability, viability, feasibility, and ethics. What are the objectives in each dimension?

Agreement on what success means at such an early stage is crucial because you can rely on it for the remainder of the project. If, for example, the design team wants to build an inclusive app for a diverse user group, they can raise diversity as a specific success criterion during the kickoff. If the client agrees, the team can refer back to that promise throughout the project. “As we agreed in our first meeting, having a diverse user group that includes A and B is necessary to build a successful product. So we do activity X and follow research process Y.” Compare those odds to a situation in which the team didn’t agree to that beforehand and had to ask for permission halfway through the project. The client might argue that that came on top of the agreed scope—and she’d be right.

In the case of this freelance project, to define success I prepared a round canvas that I call the Wheel of Success. It consists of an inner ring, meant to capture ideas for objectives, and a set of outer rings, meant to capture ideas on how to measure those objectives. The rings are divided into five dimensions of successful design: healthy, equitable, sustainable, desirable, feasible, and viable.

We went through each dimension, writing down ideas on digital sticky notes. Then we discussed our ideas and verbally agreed on the most important ones. For example, our client agreed that sustainability and progressive enhancement are important success criteria for the platform. And the subject-matter expert emphasized the importance of including students from low-income and disadvantaged groups in the design process.

After the kickoff, we summarized our ideas and shared understanding in a project brief that captured these aspects:

  • the project’s origin and purpose: why are we doing this project?
  • the problem definition: what do we want to solve?
  • the concrete goals and metrics for each success dimension: what do we want to achieve?
  • the scope, process, and role descriptions: how will we achieve it?

With such a brief in place, you can use the agreed-upon objectives and concrete metrics as a checklist of success, and your design team will be ready to pursue the right objective—using the tools, methods, and metrics at their disposal to achieve ethical outcomes.

Conclusion

Over the past year, quite a few colleagues have asked me, “Where do I start with ethical design?” My answer has always been the same: organize a session with your stakeholders to (re)define success. Even though you might not always be 100 percent successful in agreeing on goals that cover all responsibility objectives, that beats the alternative (the status quo) every time. If you want to be an ethical, responsible designer, there’s no skipping this step.

To be even more specific: if you consider yourself a strategic designer, your challenge is to define ethical objectives, set the right metrics, and conduct those kick-off sessions. If you consider yourself a system designer, your starting point is to understand how your industry contributes to consumerism and inequality, understand how finance drives business, and brainstorm which levers are available to influence the system on the highest level. Then redefine success to create the space to exercise those levers.

And for those who consider themselves service designers or UX designers or UI designers: if you truly want to have a positive, meaningful impact, stay away from the toolkits and meetups and conferences for a while. Instead, gather your colleagues and define goals for well-being, equity, and sustainability through design. Engage your stakeholders in a workshop and challenge them to think of ways to achieve and measure those ethical goals. Take their input, make it concrete and visible, ask for their agreement, and hold them to it.

Otherwise, I’m genuinely sorry to say, you’re wasting your precious time and creative energy.

Of course, engaging your stakeholders in this way can be uncomfortable. Many of my colleagues expressed doubts such as “What will the client think of this?,” “Will they take me seriously?,” and “Can’t we just do it within the design team instead?” In fact, a product manager once asked me why ethics couldn’t just be a structured part of the design process—to just do it without spending the effort to define ethical objectives. It’s a tempting idea, right? We wouldn’t have to have difficult discussions with stakeholders about what values or which key-performance indicators to pursue. It would let us focus on what we like and do best: designing.

But as systems theory tells us, that’s not enough. For those of us who aren’t from marginalized groups and have the privilege to be able to speak up and be heard, that uncomfortable space is exactly where we need to be if we truly want to make a difference. We can’t remain within the design-for-designers bubble, enjoying our privileged working-from-home situation, disconnected from the real world out there. For those of us who have the possibility to speak up and be heard: if we solely keep talking about ethical design and it remains at the level of articles and toolkits—we’re not designing ethically. It’s just theory. We need to actively engage our colleagues and clients by challenging them to redefine success in business.

With a bit of courage, determination, and focus, we can break out of this cage that finance and business-as-usual have built around us and become facilitators of a new type of business that can see beyond financial value. We just need to agree on the right objectives at the start of each design project, find the right metrics, and realize that we already have everything that we need to get started. That’s what it means to do daily ethical design.

For their inspiration and support over the years, I would like to thank Emanuela Cozzi Schettini, José Gallegos, Annegret Bönemann, Ian Dorr, Vera Rademaker, Virginia Rispoli, Cecilia Scolaro, Rouzbeh Amini, and many others.




firs

Mobile-First CSS: Is It Time for a Rethink?

The mobile-first design methodology is great—it focuses on what really matters to the user, it’s well-practiced, and it’s been a common design pattern for years. So developing your CSS mobile-first should also be great, too…right? 

Well, not necessarily. Classic mobile-first CSS development is based on the principle of overwriting style declarations: you begin your CSS with default style declarations, and overwrite and/or add new styles as you add breakpoints with min-width media queries for larger viewports (for a good overview see “What is Mobile First CSS and Why Does It Rock?”). But all those exceptions create complexity and inefficiency, which in turn can lead to an increased testing effort and a code base that’s harder to maintain. Admit it—how many of us willingly want that?

On your own projects, mobile-first CSS may yet be the best tool for the job, but first you need to evaluate just how appropriate it is in light of the visual design and user interactions you’re working on. To help you get started, here’s how I go about tackling the factors you need to watch for, and I’ll discuss some alternate solutions if mobile-first doesn’t seem to suit your project.

Advantages of mobile-first

Some of the things to like with mobile-first CSS development—and why it’s been the de facto development methodology for so long—make a lot of sense:

Development hierarchy. One thing you undoubtedly get from mobile-first is a nice development hierarchy—you just focus on the mobile view and get developing. 

Tried and tested. It’s a tried and tested methodology that’s worked for years for a reason: it solves a problem really well.

Prioritizes the mobile view. The mobile view is the simplest and arguably the most important, as it encompasses all the key user journeys, and often accounts for a higher proportion of user visits (depending on the project). 

Prevents desktop-centric development. As development is done using desktop computers, it can be tempting to initially focus on the desktop view. But thinking about mobile from the start prevents us from getting stuck later on; no one wants to spend their time retrofitting a desktop-centric site to work on mobile devices!

Disadvantages of mobile-first

Setting style declarations and then overwriting them at higher breakpoints can lead to undesirable ramifications:

More complexity. The farther up the breakpoint hierarchy you go, the more unnecessary code you inherit from lower breakpoints. 

Higher CSS specificity. Styles that have been reverted to their browser default value in a class name declaration now have a higher specificity. This can be a headache on large projects when you want to keep the CSS selectors as simple as possible.

Requires more regression testing. Changes to the CSS at a lower view (like adding a new style) requires all higher breakpoints to be regression tested.

The browser can’t prioritize CSS downloads. At wider breakpoints, classic mobile-first min-width media queries don’t leverage the browser’s capability to download CSS files in priority order.

The problem of property value overrides

There is nothing inherently wrong with overwriting values; CSS was designed to do just that. Still, inheriting incorrect values is unhelpful and can be burdensome and inefficient. It can also lead to increased style specificity when you have to overwrite styles to reset them back to their defaults, something that may cause issues later on, especially if you are using a combination of bespoke CSS and utility classes. We won’t be able to use a utility class for a style that has been reset with a higher specificity.

With this in mind, I’m developing CSS with a focus on the default values much more these days. Since there’s no specific order, and no chains of specific values to keep track of, this frees me to develop breakpoints simultaneously. I concentrate on finding common styles and isolating the specific exceptions in closed media query ranges (that is, any range with a max-width set). 

This approach opens up some opportunities, as you can look at each breakpoint as a clean slate. If a component’s layout looks like it should be based on Flexbox at all breakpoints, it’s fine and can be coded in the default style sheet. But if it looks like Grid would be much better for large screens and Flexbox for mobile, these can both be done entirely independently when the CSS is put into closed media query ranges. Also, developing simultaneously requires you to have a good understanding of any given component in all breakpoints up front. This can help surface issues in the design earlier in the development process. We don’t want to get stuck down a rabbit hole building a complex component for mobile, and then get the designs for desktop and find they are equally complex and incompatible with the HTML we created for the mobile view! 

Though this approach isn’t going to suit everyone, I encourage you to give it a try. There are plenty of tools out there to help with concurrent development, such as Responsively App, Blisk, and many others. 

Having said that, I don’t feel the order itself is particularly relevant. If you are comfortable with focusing on the mobile view, have a good understanding of the requirements for other breakpoints, and prefer to work on one device at a time, then by all means stick with the classic development order. The important thing is to identify common styles and exceptions so you can put them in the relevant stylesheet—a sort of manual tree-shaking process! Personally, I find this a little easier when working on a component across breakpoints, but that’s by no means a requirement.

Closed media query ranges in practice 

In classic mobile-first CSS we overwrite the styles, but we can avoid this by using media query ranges. To illustrate the difference (I’m using SCSS for brevity), let’s assume there are three visual designs: 

  • smaller than 768
  • from 768 to below 1024
  • 1024 and anything larger 

Take a simple example where a block-level element has a default padding of “20px,” which is overwritten at tablet to be “40px” and set back to “20px” on desktop.

Classic min-width mobile-first

.my-block {
  padding: 20px;
  @media (min-width: 768px) {
    padding: 40px;
  }
  @media (min-width: 1024px) {
    padding: 20px;
  }
}

Closed media query range

.my-block {
  padding: 20px;
  @media (min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1023.98px) {
    padding: 40px;
  }
}

The subtle difference is that the mobile-first example sets the default padding to “20px” and then overwrites it at each breakpoint, setting it three times in total. In contrast, the second example sets the default padding to “20px” and only overrides it at the relevant breakpoint where it isn’t the default value (in this instance, tablet is the exception).

The goal is to: 

  • Only set styles when needed. 
  • Not set them with the expectation of overwriting them later on, again and again. 

To this end, closed media query ranges are our best friend. If we need to make a change to any given view, we make it in the CSS media query range that applies to the specific breakpoint. We’ll be much less likely to introduce unwanted alterations, and our regression testing only needs to focus on the breakpoint we have actually edited. 

Taking the above example, if we find that .my-block spacing on desktop is already accounted for by the margin at that breakpoint, and since we want to remove the padding altogether, we could do this by setting the mobile padding in a closed media query range.

.my-block {
  @media (max-width: 767.98px) {
    padding: 20px;
  }
  @media (min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1023.98px) {
    padding: 40px;
  }
}

The browser default padding for our block is “0,” so instead of adding a desktop media query and using unset or “0” for the padding value (which we would need with mobile-first), we can wrap the mobile padding in a closed media query (since it is now also an exception) so it won’t get picked up at wider breakpoints. At the desktop breakpoint, we won’t need to set any padding style, as we want the browser default value.

Bundling versus separating the CSS

Back in the day, keeping the number of requests to a minimum was very important due to the browser’s limit of concurrent requests (typically around six). As a consequence, the use of image sprites and CSS bundling was the norm, with all the CSS being downloaded in one go, as one stylesheet with highest priority. 

With HTTP/2 and HTTP/3 now on the scene, the number of requests is no longer the big deal it used to be. This allows us to separate the CSS into multiple files by media query. The clear benefit of this is the browser can now request the CSS it currently needs with a higher priority than the CSS it doesn’t. This is more performant and can reduce the overall time page rendering is blocked.

Which HTTP version are you using?

To determine which version of HTTP you’re using, go to your website and open your browser’s dev tools. Next, select the Network tab and make sure the Protocol column is visible. If “h2” is listed under Protocol, it means HTTP/2 is being used. 

Note: to view the Protocol in your browser’s dev tools, go to the Network tab, reload your page, right-click any column header (e.g., Name), and check the Protocol column.

Note: for a summarized comparison, see ImageKit’s “HTTP/2 vs. HTTP/1.”

Also, if your site is still using HTTP/1...WHY?!! What are you waiting for? There is excellent user support for HTTP/2.

Splitting the CSS

Separating the CSS into individual files is a worthwhile task. Linking the separate CSS files using the relevant media attribute allows the browser to identify which files are needed immediately (because they’re render-blocking) and which can be deferred. Based on this, it allocates each file an appropriate priority.

In the following example of a website visited on a mobile breakpoint, we can see the mobile and default CSS are loaded with “Highest” priority, as they are currently needed to render the page. The remaining CSS files (print, tablet, and desktop) are still downloaded in case they’ll be needed later, but with “Lowest” priority. 

With bundled CSS, the browser will have to download the CSS file and parse it before rendering can start.

While, as noted, with the CSS separated into different files linked and marked up with the relevant media attribute, the browser can prioritize the files it currently needs. Using closed media query ranges allows the browser to do this at all widths, as opposed to classic mobile-first min-width queries, where the desktop browser would have to download all the CSS with Highest priority. We can’t assume that desktop users always have a fast connection. For instance, in many rural areas, internet connection speeds are still slow. 

The media queries and number of separate CSS files will vary from project to project based on project requirements, but might look similar to the example below.

Bundled CSS

<link href="site.css" rel="stylesheet">

This single file contains all the CSS, including all media queries, and it will be downloaded with Highest priority.

Separated CSS

<link href="default.css" rel="stylesheet"><link href="mobile.css" media="screen and (max-width: 767.98px)" rel="stylesheet"><link href="tablet.css" media="screen and (min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1083.98px)" rel="stylesheet"><link href="desktop.css" media="screen and (min-width: 1084px)" rel="stylesheet"><link href="print.css" media="print" rel="stylesheet">

Separating the CSS and specifying a media attribute value on each link tag allows the browser to prioritize what it currently needs. Out of the five files listed above, two will be downloaded with Highest priority: the default file, and the file that matches the current media query. The others will be downloaded with Lowest priority.

Depending on the project’s deployment strategy, a change to one file (mobile.css, for example) would only require the QA team to regression test on devices in that specific media query range. Compare that to the prospect of deploying the single bundled site.css file, an approach that would normally trigger a full regression test.

Moving on

The uptake of mobile-first CSS was a really important milestone in web development; it has helped front-end developers focus on mobile web applications, rather than developing sites on desktop and then attempting to retrofit them to work on other devices.

I don’t think anyone wants to return to that development model again, but it’s important we don’t lose sight of the issue it highlighted: that things can easily get convoluted and less efficient if we prioritize one particular device—any device—over others. For this reason, focusing on the CSS in its own right, always mindful of what is the default setting and what’s an exception, seems like the natural next step. I’ve started noticing small simplifications in my own CSS, as well as other developers’, and that testing and maintenance work is also a bit more simplified and productive. 

In general, simplifying CSS rule creation whenever we can is ultimately a cleaner approach than going around in circles of overrides. But whichever methodology you choose, it needs to suit the project. Mobile-first may—or may not—turn out to be the best choice for what’s involved, but first you need to solidly understand the trade-offs you’re stepping into.




firs

The last of us. The complete first season (2023) / created by Craig Mazin, Neil Druckmann [DVD].

[U.K.] : HBO Entertainment ; Warner Bros., [2023]




firs

Karen Pirie. The complete first season (2022) / directed by Gareth Bryn [DVD].

[U.K.] : World Productions, [2021]




firs

Captain America : the first Avenger (2011) / directed by Joe Johnston [DVD].

[U.K.] : Marvel Studios, [2013]




firs

First report on the assessment of maximum acceptable daily intake (MADI) of pesticides for humans using intelligent consensus predictions

Environ. Sci.: Processes Impacts, 2024, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/D4EM00059E, Paper
Ankur Kumar, Probir Kumar Ojha, Kunal Roy
Direct or indirect consumption of pesticides and their related products by humans and other living organisms without safe dosing may pose a health risk. The risk may arise after a...
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry




firs

Osaka registers her first top-10 win in four years

Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz survive US Open first round wobbles as Naomi Osaka makes emotional return




firs

U.S. Open: Taylor Fritz gets past Alexander Zverev to reach his first Grand Slam semifinal

Now he is headed to the final four at the U.S. Open, where he will meet either No. 9 Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria or No. 20 Frances Tiafoe of the United States