The total number of Covid-19 cases in the national capital climbed to 6,542 after 224 more people were infected by the coronavirus, the Delhi government said on Saturday. The fresh cases were reported between 4pm to midnight of May 8.

Yesterday was my last day at Happy Cog. Today, I’ve started my own practice again.

...so, yeah. That paragraph doesn’t do much for, you know, context, does it? Consider that the TL;DR version, and let’s try again:

If you ever talk to me on the phone, you should probably know that I’m a bit of a pacer. I guess I should blame it on the nanosecond-long attention span, but I can’t really sit at my computer when talking to someone at length. More often than not, I’ll simply pace back and forth in the kitchen. Our pearlish-gray kitchen tiles form some rather, well, comforting diagonals, and I’ll just walk along them from one corner of the room to the next. Still not sure why I do it, to be honest. I suppose tracing those pixellated little laps frees my mind a bit, a mundane, repetitive little charm that helps me better focus on the discussion at hand.

Having that routine provides not a little symmetry when a major life change happens. I was walking those elliptical loops when I agreed to join Airbag Industries. And I was making my kitchen laps yesterday when Greg and I had my last phone call as an employee of Happy Cog.

I could say that the decision to leave has been difficult, sure—but that’s one of the most understate-y understatements ever if not, perhaps, the understatiest. I joined a little studio called Airbag Industries over three years ago, and it’s been a wonderful, insane, fantastic ride. After a few years of running a mini-studio of my own, I leapt at the chance to work with Greg and Ryan, two of my favorite (if personal space-challenged) people. From there, we took on incredible projects, watched the team more than triple in size, and eventually officially joined forces with Happy Cog, a studio I’ve admired since first picking up my now dog-eared copy of the orange book.

Throughout my tenure, I’ve been fortunate to work with people who are consistently at the top of their game. And I can’t stress that enough: everyone at Happy Cog is eminently professional, impossibly fun to hang out with, and just stupidly talented. It’s one of the first times that I’ve worked alongside so many craftsmen, if you’ll pardon the lack of an appropriately gender neutral term. Each project was an opportunity to ask ourselves how we could work a little bit better than last time, how to learn from emerging technologies and ideas, and build something truly great. Plus, you know, there was the occasional karaoke bout thrown in for good measure.

Re-reading that last paragraph just underscored how hard it is to leave. But in the past year or so, I’ve been feeling more and more excited about some of the opportunities that have been coming my way. I’ll be rounding out this year’s simply fantastic An Event Apart roadshow with appearances in DC and San Diego, and speaking at Future of Web Design NYC in November. And I’m unbelievably excited to be writing for A Book Apart on responsive web design, working with Jeffrey, Jason, and Mandy to produce a great little book.

So that’s why I’ve decided to leave Happy Cog, and go independent again. As hard as it is to move on, I’m positively exhilarated by the prospect of focusing on writing, speaking, and creating, hopefully with the occasional awesome client project thrown in. If that sounds interesting to you, or even if you’d like to chat a bit about how much Photoshop crashes or your favorite animated GIF, I hope you’ll get in touch.

Over the past few weeks, as my last day at Happy Cog loomed closer, I’ve been thinking about how most of our language around transitions has gotten wrapped up in books. You know: “turning a page,” “the next chapter,” and so forth. And there’s something comfortingly sequential about those phrases: we turn one page, and the next one gains focus. Thing is, the transition isn’t quite as forward-looking as the rhetoric implies: the previous experience shapes us, educates us. We’re always flipping back to a lesson we’ve learned before.

So that’s where I am now. I’ve just turned a page over, and it’s one I’ll sorely miss—but I know I’ll be referring back to it, and often. And in the months ahead, I’m excited to draw from those experiences as I do some writing of my own.

If you haven’t, you should immediately read Jeremy’s post titled A responsive mind. Not because he says some incredibly kind things about yours truly, but, well, of bits like this:

That’s the thing about responsive web design: you can’t just think of it as a sprinkle of pixie dust that can be applied to any site. It requires the right mindset. It requires that sites be built on solid foundations of best practice. If those foundations are in place—a flexible layout, flexible images, optimised performance—then responsive web design can work its magic.

There are so many wonderful, quotable points that I’m doing Jeremy a disservice by even excerpting that one. If you’d like to understand why a responsive approach would be right for your project (or, perhaps as importantly, why it might not), I urge you to read the whole thing.

Since striking out on my own, much of my time’s been dedicated to, well, the book. But I’ve also been fortunate enough to collaborate a bit with Filament Group on one of their projects: namely, a large-scale engagement that requires a responsive approach.

Needless to say, I am having the time of my life.

We’re also learning a lot, too. A lot of discussions about approach and execution have come up, largely because processes for a lot of this stuff don’t exist yet. That will, with a bit of hard work and community discussion, change over time. Still, there has been a lot of brilliant stuff created so far.

Here’s just one example:

The goal of this technique is to deliver optimized, contextual image sizes for responsive layouts that utilize dramatically different image sizes at different resolutions. Ideally, this approach will allow developers to start with mobile-optimized images in their HTML and specify a larger size to be used for users with larger screen resolutions — without requesting both image sizes, and without UA sniffing.

Check out the script, download it, and kick the tires a bit—feedback and tweaks are most welcome.

I realize that there are always going to be philosophical differences around responsive web design. But for me, the solutions-driven discussions are always going to be infinitely more interesting to me than the alternative.

I won’t lie to you: I might’ve pounded the table emphatically a few times while reading Mark Boulton’s latest entry:

We can now design effective adaptive layouts that respond to their environment. If these layouts are based on a system that defines its ratios from the content, then there is connectedness on two levels: connectedness to the device, and connectedness to the content.

Mark’s thinking about flexible, content-driven grids has me damned excited about his upcoming talk at AEA Boston, and you know I’ll be flinging fistfuls of lucre at my laptop screen whenever his new book’s available to preorder.

The web really feels fun again.

So that Trent Walton went and redesigned his blog. And it is responsive. And on top of all that? It is sexy.

I’ve been admiring the Paravel team’s work for some time, and especially their dabblings in responsive design; if you haven’t seen the Do Lectures site, give it a whirl. It’s visually and technically impressive, and is a joy to browse at any resolution.

But that’s not all: given Trent’s penchant for full-width, type-heavy headings, he and the team at Paravel decided to knock out FitText, a jQuery plugin to create full-width, scaleable headlines from, well, your headlines. I can’t wait to give this a whirl.

Of course, in the middle of this cornucopia of goddamned fantastic things, Trent has to go and drop beats like this:

My love for responsive centers around the idea that my website will meet you wherever you are—from mobile to full-blown desktop and anywhere in between.

Emphasis mine. That sentence—that sentiment—is so good, I want it tattooed on my knuckles.

(Hrm. Wonder if there’s a jQuery plugin for that.)

I’m doing a disservice to this lovely interview with Shaun Inman—one of my favorite designers and people—by quoting it, but, well:

How do you stay focused?

I’m not sure that I do. I’m kind of all over the place, with my attention split between web apps, iOS games and apps, and Safari extensions…. If I feel my focus waning, I let it wane. Curiosity or that unpleasant feeling of leaving something unfinished usually draws me back to a problem or task before too long.

“5 Minutes on The Verge: Shaun Inman”

This. Oh, so very this.

A confession: I love working in Keynote. Love it.

(I’m speaking, of course, of Keynote ’09. Not the feature-stripped version that was released last month. Still, I’m hopeful it’ll improve over time, since it is so very pretty.)

It’s not perfect, mind you—after four or five years of use, the program’s got some not-insignificant stability issues, crashing way more often than I’d like. But after all that time it’s still one of my favorite visual editors: it’s great for quickly prototyping UI components, sketching out ideas for animation timing, and, yes, making slides.

Anyway: over the years, folks have said some very kind things about the visual design of my presentations. I don’t have any special knowledge about Keynote, mind, but thought I’d share a couple things I use in my presentations, in case anyone else finds them helpful.

First up: Magic Move.

Basically, Magic Move is a transition you can apply between two slides. If the second slide shares any objects—images, text boxes, or what-have-you—with the first slide, those objects will be, well, magically moved from one position to the next.

Here’s a very, very simple example:

As you can see, there’s just one object on both slides: a picture of my good friend Dwayne. The image is the same on both slides—you can duplicate the slide, or copy/paste the object to the second slide—but since its position changed, Magic Move kinda tweens the photo to its new position.

Now, I don’t use Magic Move a lot, usually preferring to just lean on simple dissolves between slides. But it’s great for managing more complex animations, like this one:

This animation requires a bit more setup, but the principle is basically the same:

1. In the first slide, the “screenshots” you see are basically a lot of tiny little screencaps, each containing just one element of the interface. (So there’s an image for the toolbar in Editorially’s editor, another for the discussion panel, another for the account menu avatar, and so on.)
   1. When I’m arranging complex flyouts like this, I’ll usually have a reference screenshot on the canvas as a base layer, and place the smaller screencaps atop it. Just to make sure everything’s aligned, that is.
2. Then, in the second slide, I move all those small images where I’d like them to end up.
3. Turn on Magic Move, and you’re left with a neat little flyout cross-section of an interface.

As with most things Keynote-related, Magic Move is pretty reliable…but the more you use it, you’ll probably run up against a couple idiosyncrasies. You can’t magicmove (oh god i’m so sorry) an object if it has any builds or actions on it; animated objects (YES MOM, I’M TALKING ABOUT GIFs) will just blink to their new position; and some objects might move completely counter to what you’d expect.

And as with anything animation-driven, it’s very, very easy to overuse and abuse: try to consider marrying the animation with what you’re actually saying, and ensure the visuals don’t outwhelm your words as you’re presenting. That said, Magic Move is a fantastic tool to keep near at hand—when used just right I think it can be, well, kinda magical.

With economic activities coming to a halt for several weeks due to the nationwide lockdown, there is a thought within the govt to zero in on areas with Covid-19 cases for restrictions rather than putting a blanket ban across a district, sources said. TOI has learnt that discussions are on to push economic activities in a big way outside containment zones.

With economic activities coming to a halt for several weeks due to the nationwide lockdown, there is a thought within the govt to zero in on areas with Covid-19 cases for restrictions rather than putting a blanket ban across a district, sources said. TOI has learnt that discussions are on to push economic activities in a big way outside containment zones.

Around 3,500 Indians stranded abroad had been flown into India until the wee hours on Sunday as India’s Vande Bharat Mission motored ahead under what official sources described as regular high-level oversight. While eight flights landed across India on Saturday — Day 3 — an equal number was expected on Sunday. Around 2K will be arriving from the Maldives.

A possible maximum of 3 million people will be infected by Oct if the ongoing third phase of lockdown till May 17 is "implemented with full vigour" but the absence of the two lockdowns may have seen a projected maximum that would be as high as a staggering 171 million cases, a study of the Mumbai-based International Institute for Population Sciences said.

Fifteen districts are contributing 64% of the Covid-19 cases in the country and out of these five account for 50% of the cases, according to Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant. These five districts include Delhi, Pune, Mumbai, Ahmedabad and Chennai. All of Delhi and all of Mumbai have been considered as a district each for the purpose of the study.

In the wake of the gas leak at a factory in Visakhapatnam, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has issued detailed guidelines for restarting industries after the lockdown and the precautions to be taken for the safety of the plants as well as the workers.

The number of total confirmed cases in the country rose to 62,939, including 19,358 patients who have been cured and discharged or migrated, according to the Ministry.

The first batch of 698 expatriates evacuated from the Maldives arrived at Cochin Port on Sunday morning. INS Jalaswa of Indian Navy, which brought these passengers was the first ship to reach India with passengers under Operation Samudra Setu. Majority of passengers are from Kerala and Tamil Nadu there are repatriates of 18 other states and UTs also in the ship.

As per experts, Nepal and China had signed a border dispute resolution agreement in 1960 according to which it was decided that Mount Everest will be divided, and southern part of it will belong to Nepal and Northern part to Tibet Autonomous Region which China claims as its own.

Ricardo Allen didn't budge when Georgia was one of the first states to open businesses during the coronavirus pandemic. The Atlanta Falcons safety believes it is smart to stay home. The NFL has set protocols for reopening team facilities and has made a 2020 season seem more real by releasing schedules this week.

Over the past couple of weeks, the PFTPM podcast has generated extended interviews with various team decision-makers in the wake of the 2020 draft. If you've missed them, here's your chance to catch up. Just click the link and click the accompanying videos to see (via Zoom) and hear from the likes of: Cowboys COO [more]

No team has had two consecutive AP NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year winners. Could the 49ers become the first?

When Jaguars head coach Doug Marrone said the team was considering adding a veteran quarterback last week, many people thought names like Andy Dalton and Cam Newton might be in the mix. Dalton came off the market quickly and signed with the Cowboys and the Jaguars signed Mike Glennon on Friday with Newton still available. [more]

Drew Lock was a Jeezy-rapping savior for the Broncos during the final five games of the 2019 season. What should we expect from the QB next season? (AP)

The 2020 NFL schedule will feature football on two Saturdays in December, but we don't know specifically which games will be played. The league announced that there will be Saturday games in Weeks 15 and 16, but we don't know how many games, only that there can be "up to three" on each Saturday. The [more]

This isn't quite the way Anthony McFarland expected his NFL career to begin. Pittsburgh's fourth-round draft pick is doing what he can to keep up during the first - and the NFL hopes only - ''virtual'' offseason amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Sure, he'd rather be at the Steelers' practice facility with the rest of the newcomers.