Welcome to Web Witch Weekly

Hello friends and welcome to volume 1 of my newsletter! This is meant to replace my "Web Witch's Grimoire" posts on my blog that were focused on updates about life, career, the book, and interesting things I've listened to or have read as well as things found on the web. I will cover product management, web development, web design and the usual book and music recommendations. So thank you for subscribing!

I've spent the last week off work for the Thanksgiving Holiday in the U.S. and it has been a much-needed break after a very packed 7 months of work and work travel. I flew down to Arizona with my dog to stay with my parents and bike in the desert. I checked Slack a few too many times though so here's to hoping the Christmas holidays are a bit more disconnected.

But even as the year is winding down, there's a lot on my mind and personal projects brewing for next year. 

Career Things 

Update 1: At RapidAPI, I own the API Clients across the web (RapidAPI Studio), Mac, and VS Code, as well as our design system. My focus since August has largely been the Mac application, Paw, and driving the rebrand of it so that it falls under the Rapid brand.  It's now RapidAPI for Mac. We made the application free to download, rolled out new features, and obviously the new brand (but allowed devs to keep the fox icon if they wanted). This project has reminded me of how passionate I am about developer experience and doing the right thing by devs. When you've taken over an application as beloved as Paw is, it can be hard to convince devs you have their best interest in mind when rolling out an update. I'm excited for what's to come with the Mac app. We have a group of great engineers of working on it too! 

Update 2: On November 29th my book, Design for Developers, will be the Deal of the Day, starting at midnight ET. You can save 45% along with the other Deal of the Day  books.

On the Web

• I've started writing about browser DevTools tips. This one is about syncing CSS edits in the DevTools to VS Code.

• During a 1:1 with my design system engineer lead, he mentioned this Advent of Code challenge that launches on December 1. Excited to give this a go.

• Dave Rupert posted about all the latest news with Web Components. It's a good roundup with lots of resources.

• This post from Rachel Andrew called Stop treating all of your content as if it were news

• How to take a vacation without leaving your own home - important advice. Sometimes a vacation at home instead of somewhere else in the best type of vacation.

Books of Note & The Weekly Music Find

These are affiliate links and I will receive a small commission at no cost to you

My goal for this year was to read 12 books, which isn't a lot. I wasn't prioritizing time to read and in the second half of the year started to prioritize it more. I just hit my 12 books though, and have a few more I'll finish by the end of the year. 

Finished reading: 

• How Iceland Changed the World: The Big History of a Small Island

• Dopamine Detox

• Bad Days in History: A Gleefully Grim Chronicle of Misfortune, Mayhem and Misery for Every Day of the Year

• Notes On a Nervous Planet

• Women & Power: A Manifesto

Currently Reading: 

• Lean Customer Development

• Just Keep Buying: Proven ways to save money and build wealth (I'm finding this to be really helpful and easy to follow)

• The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive Book 1) (Excited to venture down a new fantasy series. I finished the second book of The Kingkiller Chronicle and am incredibly sad book 3 doesn't seem to be in sight)

Weekly Music Find:

Dark and surfy synth pop from Graveyard Club in their song, Witchcraft (Spotify link)

Codepen of the Week

I quite like this animated tab bar by @abxlfazl. The animation is smooth and the color change is a nice effect. 

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a wonderful week! Don't forget to log off and take time for yourself. 

Cheers,The Web Witch (Stephanie)