Our Blog
We’re passionate about every aspect of the Internet: from beautiful typography to explosive social media, enabling technologies to emerging business models. We created this space so that we could collect, share and discuss our thoughts with you.
- Continuing our regular book review series, Box UK User Experience (UX) consultant Chris Bangs looks at ‘The Optimism Bias’
- As a designer dealing with criticism is an almost daily experience; how can we turn this into a catalyst for creativity?
- JAN26
Posted by Matthew Parsons on 26th Jan 2012
Following on from Rhodri Pugh's "Towards Faster Releases" blog post Box UK's Release Manager Matthew Parsons provides a different perspective. - A recent project gave Box UK the perfect opportunity to trial the Developer In Test role. Gavin Davies explores what the role is and how the project benefited.
- 2011 was an exciting time to be a software developer - and it looks like 2012 will be just as thrilling. Senior Developer Craig Marvelley gives his top 5 picks for the year ahead.
- Carey Hiles offers a judge's-eye view of the first ever Box UK hack day, held on November 20th, 2011 at Cardiff University Students' Union.
- At Box UK we are subject to pressures which affect our demands for stability and flexibility in our codebases. When planning our processes we need to support these, and any other demands, as best we can.
- Box UK developer Gavin Davies looks into the rapidly changing world of JavaScript.
- Box UK's User Experience Consultant Chris Bangs explains the process and benefits of a one-day UX workshop.
- Looking for tools to streamline the process of making CSS changes? WebPutty can help...
- Developer Luke Quinnell looks at Vogue, a time-saving tool when making CSS changes.
- OCT19
Posted by Gavin Davies on 19th Oct 2011
When a Microsoft Kinect arrived in the Box UK office, Gavin Davies immediately wanted to explore the possibilities of the Kinect SDK and motion control… - Rhodri Pugh, Senior Developer at Box UK, takes a look at going one step further with the dependency injection pattern.
- Following the launch of the Opa web development platform, Rhodri Pugh took a look to see if it lived up to the hype.
- Can you learn to love a new (or old!) text editor in the space of a week? Senior Developer Rhodri Pugh got the chance to find out when he decided to get acquainted with Vim.
- As part of developing web applications you may come into contact with the PEAR distribution format. Rhodri Pugh explores the benefits of Continuous PEAR.
- Craig Marvelley, Senior Developer at Box UK announces the launch of a brand new PEAR Channel for Box UK open source libraries.
- Box UK's Production Manager, Stuart Arthur, looks at the common challenges faced when trying to decide on a project management approach.
- Adobe have just released the beta version of their animation tool, Adobe Edge. Gavin Davies takes an early look.
- Tech meetings were an initiative that came out of developer knowledge sharing. We've now adopted the format throughout the business and are seeing huge benefits. Gavin Davies outlines the concept and shows how you can implement it in your workplace.
- As automated testing becomes an increasingly central part of the Quality Assurance process, Box UK's Head of QA Sean Robbins explores Watir-Webdriver, a browser automation tool.
- Gavin Davies gets to grips with CSS bundler service Boxcss in the latest post in our Unboxing blog series.
- The promise of online banking was an always open, instantly accessible and, perhaps most importantly, easy-to-use platform for money management. So what went wrong – who broke online banking?
- Box UK developer James Cryer takes a look at Hardboiled Web Design in our latest book review.
- Continuing our regular book review series, Box UK Product Manager Carey Hiles looks at Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams.
- JUN28
Posted by Emma Willis on 28th Jun 2011
As businesses continue to feel the impact of the recession, Box UK's Marketing Assistant Emma Willis explores where you should be investing your budgets for maximum results. - In our latest Unboxing post, Gavin Davies explores Sencha Animator, a brand new app for creating CSS3 and HTML5 animations.
- Box UK developer Ben Tidy looks at HTML5 and Web Storage as part of our Unboxing blog series.
- Gavin Davies takes a look at this classic book to see if it remains relevant in today's world.
- Coding standards are guidelines for not only the syntactic structure and formatting of our code (no tabs, braces on new lines), but can also help shape the actual code we write (for example, rules like “don’t use global variables”, or “no singleton access”). In this post we explore how coding standards help us at Box UK, and how you can deploy them for your own projects.
- As we launch our new series of Box UK Book Reviews, Gavin Davies explains why he feels there's still value in the printed page.
- As part of our regular blog series, Box UK developer Craig Marvelley takes a look at the new experimental Terminal platform, TermKit.
- JUN06
Posted by Emma Willis on 6th Jun 2011
Writing an effective award entry can seem like a daunting task. Emma Willis, Marketing Assistant at Box UK looks at some simple guidelines to increase your chance of success. - In the first of our new blog series Box UK developer Gavin Davies explores the Silex Micro-Framework and Twig template engine
- MAY18
Posted by Gavin Davies on 18th May 2011
User Story-centric workflow with Scrum, Redmine and RedmineBacklogs - DEC17
Posted by Gavin Davies on 17th Dec 2010
Can Flash survive with the increasing popularity of HTML5? Gavin Davies looks at the evidence. - Box UK developer Gavin Davies recently moved to the Ubuntu operating system - read about his experience.
- AUG24
Posted by James Downes on 24th Aug 2010
James Downes, Box UK's Head of User Experience talks about how we use a collaborative sketching technique to design user interfaces quickly and effectively. - Ever have days where you can't concentrate? Where you feel sluggish, lethargic, disinterested? This could be a result of poor nutrition.
- APR08
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 8th Apr 2010
People evaluate the overall quality of items by their minutiae. The discernible quality of something affects our trust in it, its perceived value and our willingness to pay for it. So why not test the documents we create? - APR01
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 1st Apr 2010
Two short related essays on sincerity and reputation on the web, and why both matter. - What's the best platform for customer service? Does Twitter provide any benefits that email, telephone, chat and posted mail don't?
- How we can address the trust issues relevant to an E-commerce environment, which can also be applied to other different types of website environment.
- A simple software idea, that uses the integrated video camera or an external webcam to help improve posture.
- The web offers so much choice that it is vital to gain the user's trust if you stand any chance of seeing them through the intended user journey.
- In software development, we are often faced with things that can seem intimidating. How can we, as software developers, overcome the instinct to cower when projects seem daunting?
- JAN05
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 5th Jan 2010
To help your web app business model, this article discusses the main needs that consumers are willing to pay for, together with a guide for how much you can charge for each. - A high-level look at PHP's role in the development of Enterprise Web Applications.
- A developer not utilising the best tools for their task, or who does not take time to learn to use those tools properly, is not likely to be a great developer.
- We often hear the term "Enterprise" thrown around, and as web developers many of the applications we build are considered enterprise applications, but what does the term really mean?
- SEP16
Posted by Gavin Davies on 16th Sep 2009
As software becomes more sophisticated it is increasingly critical that it is well structured and sensibly managed. Let's find out how not to do exactly that using antipatterns. - Museums are popular in the physical world, but not as much online. As all sectors undergo the change initiated by the Internet, how do museums adapt to stay relevant in a digital age?
- SEP08
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 8th Sep 2009
A social experiment suggests that Twitter users of both sex are more likely to follow white women, and least likely to follow black women. - During July and August 2009, we gathered data for a random selection of 83,628 twitter users. The following is an analysis of the data.
- SEP04
Posted by Gavin Davies on 4th Sep 2009
In this blog post, four criteria of a good progress bar are defined, the difficulties in implementing progress bars are examined, and we take a look at when they should and should not be used. - The Magic Whiteboard can be used on more than just walls.
- We have created incredible platforms for interaction. Now, let's build the tools that help us communicate.
- A suggested checklist for web design, to ensure that common mistakes are avoided.
- Box UK was recently involved in a project that highlighted for us a need to capture mobile device capabilities. Detecting the device is not sufficient due to the high number of disparate devices in common use. WURFL can be used to serve device-appropriate content.
- JUN11
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 11th Jun 2009
Design is subjective, and design is an art, but can we automatically calculate any metrics for a webpage that could indicate how 'good' the design is? - One of the hardest things to do in software development is to keep technical staff happy and motivated. Day to-day-work can feel like a grind if innovation and growth are stifled. One way to counteract this is to encourage developer-led initiatives.
- APR27
Posted by Dan Zambonini on 27th Apr 2009
In your quest to build a successful web application, your exciting new ideas are almost certainly nothing but a distraction. Instead, concentrate on the boring same-old stuff, but do it brilliantly. - What is reputation, why does it matter, and how can we measure it online? Includes a comparison for major UK newspapers.
- Are museums capable of making a significant impact on the web? It is a difficult question, with a potentially difficult-to-swallow answer.
- Building or thinking about building a Twitter app? Check out some of the most useful APIs around right now.
- I have spent the last week experimenting with the Twitter API, creating various prototype feeds. In this blog entry, I discuss how the API was used, including code samples.
- Built or building a web site/application? Check out the choices below on how to generate money from your hard work.
- About to launch a new website? Make sure all your bases are covered with a comprehensive launch checklist.
- Iteratively improve your website user experience using the oldest scientific process in nature.
Box UK Twitter Feed
- Matthew Parsons provides a Release Manager’s perspective into how we manage the process at Box UK http://t.co/gCHIlVAXPosted at 11:56 am by Box UK