Dear Diary

The Great Pretender General web Gitlet [github/maryrosecook] is git, implemented in JavaScript. Soooo… yeah. terminal.js [github/gottox] is a terminal emulator for browsers and Node. What is it with things pretending to be other things today?! Gotalk [github/rsms] is a Go/JavaScript tool to enable communication between web apps, servers, and programs. riot [github/muut] is a React-like UI library. Gauguin [github/lunarlogic] is a Ruby gem for extracting the main colors out of an image. Related to the post we linked to yesterday about preparing a site to handle hosting photos of Kim K [medium/message], here’s a post about what happens when a chunk of the population of China visits your site [furbo]. Space Cadet Design Here’s how to center and crop images with one line of CSS [medium/chrisnager]. Spacebase [spacebase] is a great-looking Sass-powered responsive CSS framework Campfires [campfires] is a nice little collection of interviews with designers, sharing tips, tricks and war stories. Here’s a fascinating look into the process of making the GT Sectra font [ilovetypography]. And here’s how to give non-sucky feedback [benedikt-lehnert]. Personal Development SitePoint First up on SitePoint today, an interesting forum discussion on the topic: Should the W3C and WHATWG die? Sure, why not? We’re pretty into people learning web development here at SitePoint, so here’s a five-point guide to getting it done. Note: if you already know web dev, these tips can be applied to learning literally anything else. Once you’ve got skills, you’re gonna want to monetize them. Here are some unexpected ways to do that. And here’s how to build the ultimate “long shadow” Sass mixin. Dear Diary News/business The trial of the alleged Silk Road kingpin is going really badly for the accused. On Wednesday prosecutors read out extracts of the journal he kept on the same computer he ran the online black market [forbes]. Sometimes the legal system is like a snooping parent. Macstories has a great list of indie developers you can follow [macstories]. Meanwhile, it looks like Apple is looking at about 19 hours worth of battery life for that watch you probably won’t buy [9to5mac]. Here’s a really interesting interview with Bill Gates [medium/backchannel] that covers a bunch of topics touched on in the Gates Foundation’s annual letter, including AI, connectivity in the developing world, and more. Blackberry’s CEO is worried about threats to net neutrality, and one of the best examples is how competing companies not developing apps for its platform [blogs.blackberry]. Language learning app Duolingo does a really good job of onboarding new users [useronboard]. Drop Vox Off-topic Drops [planblabs] is a new language app that only asks for 5 minutes out of your day. You can spare 5 mins, can’t you? MacID [macid] uses your iPhone’s TouchID sensor to unlock your laptop. Finally, here’s a vintage Facebook ad [youtube/brentweinbach]. It’s hard to believe The Facebook has been around since 1995, but there you go. That's it for us for the week, thanks for joining us. We'll be back on Tuesday next week, because it's 'Straya Day on Monday so we all have to spend it throwing boomerangs, drinking enormous beers and throwing shrimp on the barbie. You know, Australia stuff. See you again on Tuesday!