Frontend

Using PostCSS with Sass

Using PostCSS with Sass

In this article we’ll be looking to a basic overview of PostCSS from the perspective of a developer whose current CSS development process includes use of CSS preprocessor, or in particular, Sass. If you’re a Sass user, there are a couple of approaches when starting out with PostCSS. You could make a complete switch and recreate your basic preprocessing environment with PostCSS, or you could start using it as a supplement.

Many of you will say that you still only rely on your favorite preprocessor, but then, it’s possible that you’re also using Autoprefixer for vendor prefixing, and guess what? In this case, you have already included PostCSS into your workflow.

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Minify your CSS and JavaScript code!

Minify your CSS and JavaScript code!

If you are reading this article, you are probably somehow involved with web development. It is also most likely that you already know how search engines use page speed as one of the parameters for evaluating your site. We have couple of options on our disposal when it comes to increasing site speed. Today we will cover one of them.

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Getting started with CSS Flexbox

Getting started with CSS Flexbox

The CSS3 Flexible Box Layout, or as a shorter and more widely recognised term – Flexbox, is a CSS box model optimised for designing user interface layout.

It is the addition to the four basic layout modes, previously defined in CSS: block layout, inline layout, table layout, and positioned layout. But, in contrast to these earlier ones, this is the first CSS module designed for laying out complex pages.

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Improve default Magento reviews

Improve default Magento reviews

If you’ve ever worked on Magento framework you’re familiar with the fact that Magento provides bunch of useful features. In this article we will cover one of them – Customer Product Reviews. Maybe some will say that we don’t need to change anything regarding this feature, but when we are in custom development a lot of things can’t just work “out of box”. Especially if you willing to provide fully polished retina responsive theme, default isn’t the way we roll.

So let us improve the default Magento product reviews feature.

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A simple frontend workflow for Gulp

A simple frontend workflow for Gulp

What is Gulp?

Gulp is a task/build runner which uses Node.js for web development. In this tutorial, I will not explain how to create your Gulp plugin but I will show you how you can create a simple, basic, customized build process for your frontend workflow to ease your job.

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Snowflakes Magento Extension

Snowflakes Magento Extension

Back by popular demand – it’s Inchoo Snowflakes Magento extension! Revamped to behave nicely with responsive layouts, this extension will give your store a real holiday cheer, and bring smiles to your customers’ faces. Step by step installation and customization guide included.

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Adding static blocks to specific CMS pages with Magento layouts

Adding static blocks to specific CMS pages with Magento layouts

While working on a project, I had to add a unique static block between header and main content of the CMS page on each CMS page. Element had to be fully customizable via Magento admin panel and it had to be easy to create on new CMS pages, easily modifiable and removable. Since that element needed to be placed outside of the main content, it couldn’t have been added using CMS in Magento admin. It had to be added using Magento layouts. Here’s how I achieved that.

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Creating a Magento theme from scratch

Creating a Magento theme from scratch

Powerful fallback system, organized folder structure and tons of functionality is what makes Magento one of the most flexible and powerful eCommerce platforms out there. By default, Magento offers a lot, but as eCommerce evolved during the years, there is always additional work required to fit client needs.

Probably the first thing you will do when starting a new Magento project will be to create a Magento theme that will have custom styling and functionality. Although creating a Magento theme is a pretty simple thing to do (just ask any certified frontend developer), by not following Magento recommendations and rules you can easily make your life a bit complicated.

So, how to do it properly? Read on…

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Frontend performance: why should you care?

Frontend performance: why should you care?

Speed is the most important feature of any online store. If it is too slow, people will just not use it. It may have great products, low prices, the most beautiful interface, but if it takes forever to load, people will just go away.

In the offline world, we often have to wait. Line in the bank, security control at the airport, checkout line at the grocery store… pick your favorite. “I had such a great time waiting in the line for 3 hours” – said no one, ever…  People hate waiting.

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Book Review – Mastering Magento Theme Design by Andrea Sacca

Book Review – Mastering Magento Theme Design by Andrea Sacca

It is widely assumed that knowledge is power and that it has to be built upon every day. It takes a lot of time to put a person’s knowledge into a book. For the past few months I was looking for a new book in order to expand on my frontend knowledge.

Due to lack of free time I usually read only particular sections of some book or I surf the Internet if I need a specific piece of information.

Long story short, just at that time Andrea Sacca published his new book which covers one of my favorite topics – Creating responsive Magento theme. As one of the frontend developers at Inchoo, I had the opportunity to receive one of first copies of that book (and a copy for entire Inchoo). To return the favor to the author, we were asked to write a review of the book.

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Out of the box Form Validation in Magento

Form Validation in Magento

Magento uses Prototype library to manage form validation. This comes in handy, because all you need to do when writing custom form is to assign a valid class names to your input fields, and pass the form id to VarienForm object.

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Reusing Magento poll on any page or any block

Reusing Magento poll on any page or any block

On very rare occasions we get to work with polls. Most of our Magento projects end up with polls removed from the layout for one reason or the other – mostly because we rely on social networks instead for adding ‘social’ aspect to stores.

Nonetheless, sometimes client wants to have polls on his site. Magento has default poll system, which does it’s job. To an extent. What do we do if we want to add multiple polls to the site or choose which poll we want to display?

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Custom category menu navigation in Magento

Custom category menu navigation in Magento

Magento has its top menu reserved for category navigation. It’s pretty solid for displaying categories, even when there is a large number of them.

What some of the clients want is a vertical (sidebar) category menu, so they can display sibling categories of a category their customers are exploring.

In this article we’ll cover the creation of a full vertical menu. We’ll go 3 levels deep: category, subcategory, and sub-subcategory. You can always expand on this, but I believe 3 levels are more than enough for most stores.

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