Lara L. Schenck

Computing researcher, maker of monsters

Author: Lara

  • The Time A Bird Shat on My Laptop [Pastry Box Project]

    This post was originally published on The Pastry Box Project on August 27, 2015. Before I get into the bird poop story, let’s talk about guilt. Guilt is my method of self-discipline. When in moderation, guilt keeps me on track; it keeps me working on what I should, and it keeps me from ordering Indian food when I really shouldn’t. But…

  • Pricing and Economic Relativity

    I’m usually not one for non-fiction, but the times have changed. I’m currently reading Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape Our Decisions by a cool dude named Dan Ariely. In short, we humans are constantly influenced by “hidden forces” that cause us to make decisions that don’t always make logical sense. Can’t say I’m…

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  • It’s identity crisis, not impostor syndrome

    I think we’ve gotten to a point where non-impostors, myself included, are using impostor syndrome as a way to describe ever-human insecurity. The web is in its awkward twenties, and so are many, many of the people working on it. Fortunately or unfortunately, with your twenties comes the inevitable, quarter-life identity crisis.

  • WP Super Cache and Browser Caching

    I’ve been jamming on WP Super Cache these days. As great as Super Cache is (and it is great), however, you will consistently be failing in YSlow’s “Expires Headers”, Web Page Test’s “Cache Static Content”, and Google Page Speed Insights’ “Leverage Browser Caching”. Shouldn’t a plugin with name “Super Cache” take care of all things…

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  • Sassy WordPress and some updates

    A recap of my talk “Sassy WordPress” along with some updates I’ll add should I give the talk again.

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  • Cocktails on the Pastry Box

    For those unfamiliar, the Pastry Box Project is a curated collection of thoughts and articles from anyone who works with the web. I wrote an article about cocktails and websites, i.e. my two favorite things, and it was published! You can read it here.

  • Let’s try “Full-Stack Designer” instead of unicorn

    At An Event Apart last week, one speaker asked, “How many of you refer to yourselves as designers? … Developers? … Or maybe you design and develop…so…unicorn?”. The latter had the most hands, along with a few modest chuckles. Let’s take a step back here.

  • I wrote a post for CSS-Tricks and people read it

    This week, I had a guest post published on CSS-Tricks. You should read it. It kinda blew up. Well, definitely blew up. What started as legitimate comment thread on the post turned quite sour when the article was shared on r/programming: Not a nice way to rephrase my post title. Yes, that would be me. I…

  • A favorite tweet

    I mention this tweet at least three times a week (both while teaching CSS and in general conversation). Now you will too!

  • Iterate over Keys and Values in Twig with Timber

    I found the Twig documentation for using key value pairs from PHP arrays a little sparse, so thought I’d elaborate.

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  • MTNmeister.com:
    Timber + ACF for the Win

    I’m excited to officially announce the launch of MTNmeister.com. It was really fun to build, thanks to my new favorite pair of things in the world: Timber with Advanced Custom Fields. I’d like to share some highlights of my process, and maybe even convince you to try out Timber on your next project.

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  • I designed some skis

    I’m into skiing, and it’s time for a gear upgrade. Courtesy my brother at MTNmeister, I’m getting custom skis from Parlor Skis in Boston, and got to design the graphics myself – how cute are these? And here they are in Alta (took a very nice, unplugged vacation for myself):

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  • What I’m Up To

    I’ve been working my tail off: Simple Sassy Starter MTNmeister WP site (created with Timber) DiJiFi site redesign (also with Timber) Angular Wireframing Kit Many a blog posts about these in the icebox – coming soon-ish!

  • Walking and Talking: A technique for writing blog posts

    The words were all there when you talked about the topic in conversation yesterday, but when it comes to actually writing the post…impossible. But wait, that’s just it! Record yourself talking about it. I spend roughly 23% of my life walking (that’s an exaggeration, but I do walk a lot). Why not write a blog…

  • On Progressive Enhancement

    In a nutshell, progressive enhancement is building “content out”, separating the structure of a website (HTML) from its presentation and behavior (CSS and JS). Content should be available regardless of the capabilities of the device, and should not rely on styling or scripting to function at a base level. There are some strong opionions for…

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