The Vegas MC apparently likes to smoke. Wright spends most of his time on the album getting stoned with his guests including members from Bone Thugs-n-Harmony and Mod Sun. But when the smoke is clear, Wright is at his best like venting out his frustration on “Can I Feel This Way” (“Nowadays kids not even living they life, they just staring in they iPhone screens”) or dropping some thought-provocative rhymes on “Training Your Mind” (I wouldn’t be surprised if my future killer’s a black man / Wake up, walk out, another man chalked out”). His emotional comes through on “Daddy Daughter Relationship” (“If this world ever breaks you down / Baby girl stay strong, remember that I got your back”). In his mid 20s, Wright is still in his growing process and he probably won’t be matured until he let go of the weed.

Despite the lack of sell on Professional Web Typography this week, I added a new chapter on animating type. I write about my lost love for Flash and how you can use CSS animations to bring your typography to life. It’s a beautiful Friday so take your iPad to the nearest bar for happy hour, order a drink or two, and enjoy reading.

The new Facebook’s Instant Articles has shaken up the web community on performance. Broadband are getting better and yet sites are getting slower. Sites are slow to the point that Facebook could even use performance as its marketing strategy. While the tools can cause websites to load slowly, we, as web designers, are responsible for implementing those tools; therefore, to increase performance we have to start with education.

I had an opportunity to teach web design and usability to advanced undergraduate and graduate students in the Fall of 2014. For the final project, in which the students had to design and code their own portfolio, I kept reminding them the concept of progressive enhancement because they were so early to create slick-looking websites. Out of 19 students, I had three that didn’t take my advice. One student who had some front-end skills decided to create a one-page portfolio with all the bells and whistles. She ended up using multiple CSS files and JavaScript libraries. When I tested her page on the iPhone, it could barely scroll. Another student had to start over from scratch because he couldn’t get jQuery to behave the way he wanted it to. On the last night before the due date, another student asked me why his site was not working properly. I looked at his code, which has jQuery and a handful of JavaScripts, and didn’t know how or where to begin. I told him to just do the best he could.

I was not at all against using JavaScript. In fact, I encouraged students to explore it, but they had to build the solid foundation first before they could layer all the cool interactions on top. That has always been my approach as well in my own work. For example, when I created the website for Professional Web Typography, I set out my priority. I could tuck all items in the table contents under the hamburger, but readers have to click on the icon every time they want to access the TOC. Furthermore, adding a hamburger requires JavaScript. So I decided to have the TOC always accessible at the bottom of every page so that readers can get to it at whatever page they are on. With the fancy drop cap, I could have used Adobe’s dropcap.js for consistency across the browsers, but then I could do it with just a few lines of CSS. Even though the drop cap would be a little bit off in various browsers, but I can live with that. It’s just an enhancement future.

I urge you to think the same when you approach a project to make the web a faster experience for everyone.

Starting next week, I will be teaching Introduction to Web Design. With only eight students signed up, I thought the class would get cancel, but I got the green light on Tuesday that the show will go on. As I was scrambling to prepare the lesson plan and the syllabus, I realized that the schedule, which will begin on June 2nd and end on July 23rd; is quite condensed. I have less than two months and I my goal is to teach the students the foundations of HTML & CSS. I ended up turning it into a hands-on training bootcamp. Everyday I will teach them how to code and give them assignments. They will have one project to do so that they’ll learn everything from creating a site map to wireframe to complete website.

One of the challenges of teaching an intro course is selecting the textbook. I had three choices: Shay Howe’s Learn to Code HTML and CSS: Develop and Style Websites, Thomas Michaud’s Foundations of Web Design: HTML & CSS, and Jon Duckett’s HTML & CSS: Design and Build Websites. I chose Duckett’s. Beside its beautiful design, the content seems to be easy for beginners to understand.

I built my lesson plan around the book and will cover only parts that the students will work with most of the time. My goal is to get them to get comfortable with HTML & CSS. They can learn more design in their upper classes. When I taught Web Design and Usability, which is an advanced class, last year, most students were struggling with basic coding. I want to change in the intro level. I truly believe that you can’t be a web designer, especially today, unless you can code the basics. They will have some work cut out for them.

Arman Emami’s book is a concise, comprehensive, and utilitarian primer to industrial design. Beautiful illustrations and clear writing make it a breezy read on useful topics including functionality, usability, form, colors, and materials.

The new version of Visual Gui goes black. For this redesign I am experimenting with dark background and legibility. I wanted to see how well a serif typeface reads on a dark background. Readability has always been my concern; therefore, I hardly take this approach. Then again, I don’t see any reason not to give it a shot since this is a personal site after all. If it doesn’t work out, I can always redesign it again.

Making the switch from white to dark background is the boldest move in this new version, but another change that I have wanted to push is getting rid of the standard navigation. Although this is not something new, I wanted to have one sentence that describes me: “Donny Truong is a Visual Gui who loves to learn, read, write, and omit needless design.” The second sentence, “He recently published a book on web type,” will change to promote my latest project or highly something special. If users want the standard navigation, they can always find it at the footer of the site.

For the work section, omit needless design, I took out all of the screenshots and provided a short blurb for each project. The learn section has been simplified to highlight only a handful of projects I have created in my graduate program. I also included a teaching section on the same page. The library section, which showcases the books I proudly own, is also reduced to one column.

As for the typefaces, I am combining Minion Pro Condensed, designed by Robert Slimbach, with Myriad Pro, designed by Robert Slimbach and Carol Twombly with Fred Brady and Christopher Slye. Because of the dark background, I wanted to have the most neutral typefaces so that they don’t distract the readers. I also needed the typefaces that support Vietnamese language. These two workhorse types do the job.

I hope you enjoy the dark version of the site.

I just published a new chapter on Professional Web Typography called “Using SVG as Type.” Enjoy reading and have a great Memorial weekend.

Fresh Air has become my daily listen for years. Because Terry Gross covers such a wide range of topics and she always asks the appropriate questions to get her guests to talk, I have always learn something new from the program. Her voice is fantastic too. Despite listening to her everyday, I hardly get to know her personal life; therefore, I am so glad that Marc Maron gets to interview her. He is such a great host himself. Take a listen.

Unlike most young jazz prodigies who have impressive acrobatic technicality, 11-year-old, Bali-born Joey Alexander is gifted with not only natural talent, but also sophisticated musical knowledge. With his debut, My Favorite Things, Joey shows that he is serious about his craft. His solo rendition of Thelonious Monk’s “‘Round Midnight” is refined and thoughtful. He played the tune with clarity and delicacy beyond his age. Together with the drummer Sammy Miller and the bassist Russell Hall, Joey swings like it don’t mean a thing on “It Might As Well Be Spring.” His ostinato is sensational when he comps for Miller to do his solo. He also displays his harmonic complexities on John Coltrane’s “Giant Steps” and “My Favorite Things.” This is just the beginning of a young kid with a remarkable talent.

I read the first edition of Adrian Frutiger Typefaces borrowed from the library and wanted my own copy, but the cost of $153.95 is too much for my budget. Fortunately, the second edition came out last year with a much more affordable price tag. I preordered and copped my copy for about $65 bucks. The cover doesn’t have the bounded cloth like the first edition, but it is definitely worth the bargain if you’re a type nerd.

For the reread, I focused mostly on his words. I find his honesty and modesty are as fascinating as his thinking process and design decision. For example, here is what he has to say about one of his “unsuccessful” typefaces:

Serifa is one of my worst attempts at a typeface, I think it’s fair to say. Not because of the characters that were unusual for me, but because my idea of a constructivist slab serif face was wrong for the eye. I always wanted to make readable typefaces. And Serifa just isn’t comfortable to read, it doesn’t flow well enough because of its wide fit. One could use it for posters. Serifa is pretty meaningless and yet it endures. That’s the tragic thing about typefaces, they stick around and always will. Once you design one you have to be able to stand by it.

Thanks to Heidrun Osterer and Philipp Stamm for putting together such a priceless treasure for the type community.