Hey,
Let’s talk about Microsoft, Apple and Kodak a bit this week. First, Apple announced the availability of iOS11 this week, introducing new security features, a new Safari version with important changes for the viewports due to the launch of the iPhone X. Microsoft in parallel announced the new version of their Edge-browser, bringing long-wanted features to users, making our lives easier. But at the same time while they release cool new stuff and their stocks are going up and up, it’s this behavior and the strive for more profit that is at the cost of how they treat employees—effectively pushing towards increasing inequality between people. Neil Irwin compares how companies like Apple (but they’re only one example) treat their normal employees (note that we’re not talking about developers here) in comparison to one top company called Kodak in the 1980s. An important thing we should reflect on and try to at least make things better on our own, in our agencies, at home.
News
- On this year’s developer event, Microsoft announced the new features of what’s coming in Edge 16: Updated CSS Grid Layout,
object-fitandobject-position, support for the Payment Request API, Service Workers, and WebVR. Quite an announcement!
Security
- Oleg Afonin on the new security measures in iOS11: From now on, trusting a Computer with your iOS device requires the passcode instead of the TouchID. The change is important from a legal standpoint: While in some cases the user may be compelled to unlock their device using their fingerprint, obtaining the passcode may be challenging or not legally possible. But Apple also improved 2-factor authentification, doesn’t store notifications in backups anymore, and has secured down the SOS mode.
Privacy
- Privacy International shares new insights into how we’re being manipulated invisibly with our own data, like banks deciding on creditworthiness by using data of our transaction content, connected cars being hacked while the owner doesn’t know which data is recorded, evaluated or sent to whom—concatenated into one big article with links to the deeper stories if you’re interested.
Accessibility
- Russ Weakley shares in his slideshow how to build an accessible auto-complete field.
CSS
- Adam Wathan wrote up his story how his writing of CSS transformed from a very semantic approach to what is called functional CSS. In the article he explains the semantic approach, how it works, why it’s useful and what the challenges are and then compares the code example with functional approaches.
- Darryl Pogue gives you insights how we can fix website issues with the new kind of viewport introduced by the iPhone X, announced this week by Apple. With CSS options like setting main
background-colorto the body, usingviewport-fit=coveror thesafe-area-inset-*prop
Go beyond…
- Neil Irwin analyzed the janitors’ job conditions at two top companies, back in in the 80s and now—namely Kodak and Apple. The article tries to help you understand the rising inequality and how our system and company-culture helps growing the inequality. A sad story of how so called “successful” companies achieve their success, taken at one (probably even better) example.
Anselm