Eric Howey • May 21, 2020 • 1 Min
Using Theme-UI with RedwoodJS
RedwoodJS is a new javascript framework bringing the frontend and the backend together in one incredible fullstack package. They have a great tutorial that gives you a good feel for what is possible with Redwood. While I was completing the tutorial I got curious about using Theme-UI with…
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Eric Howey • April 27, 2020 • 1 Min
Decoupling data and presentation components in Gatsby themes
When building a Gatsby theme it is best practice to separate data queries from presentation components. This separation of concerns enables a happy path for component shadowing in the finished production site. Keep in mind that to do this you also need to control the page creation process in…
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Eric Howey • March 25, 2020 • 4 Min
10 reasons to use Theme-UI in your next Gatsby project
Combining Theme-UI with Gatsby has been a huge productivity win for me; design tokens, quick mobile styles, a robust component library and more. I am building every new project using Theme-UI and here are 10 reasons I think you should consider it too. Consistent design system At the heart of…
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Eric Howey • March 06, 2020 • 3 Min
Should we be thinking differently about imposter syndrome?
Before you read. I write from a place of significant social privilege and my experiences are not reflective of everyone's experiences. I work full time as a mental health therapist and have a Masters in Social Work degree. References are at the end. I was at a mental health training recently where…
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Eric Howey • February 24, 2020 • 3 Min
Building a sub-menu with Gatsby
You have a great Gatsby site! You followed all the tutorials and it is blazing fast. But wait, you need a sub-menu (or dropdown menu) in your navigation? It is not as easy as it sounds if you want to keep a modern component architecture and use things like the javascript .map method. This is a…
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Eric Howey • February 08, 2020 • 1 Min
Using Theme-UI with SANITY.io
Gatsby, SANITY.io and Theme-UI are quickly becoming my go-to stack of development tools. Gatsby on the frontend. SANITY on the backend. Theme-UI as the design system interface. Combining these three tools has been fairly smooth, but it took me a while to realize I could link Theme-UI design…
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Eric Howey • February 01, 2020 • 2 Min
Examples of using options in Gatsby themes
The ability to define options for Gatsby themes unlocks a powerful set of development opportunities. You may have already used an option like contentPath before but there is so much more you can do! Before you go any further, you need to pause and read Chris Biscardi's excellent post about…
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Eric Howey • January 28, 2020 • 2 Min
Getting Started With Gatsby-Theme-Catalyst-Writer
This theme has been depreciated, instead use gatsby-theme-catalyst-hydrogen , which is an updated version of this theme with an improved API. This Gatsby theme is for freelance writers and journalists who want a fast, easy to maintain, and elegant portfolio. The backend data is provided by SANITY…
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Eric Howey • January 12, 2020 • 2 Min
Understanding latent component shadowing in Gatsby themes
As I worked on building themes for Gatsby I went through a number of different iterations trying to find an approach that would allow for easy composition and clear separation of concerns. The lightbulb went off for me when I read John Otander’s blog post on the topic of latent component shadowing…
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Eric Howey • January 08, 2020 • 1 Min
How to display alternate content in dark mode using Theme-UI
Theme-UI provides a great pattern for implementing dark mode on your Gatsby website. If your site is primarily text, this can be as straightforward as changing a few colors in your theme and off you go. Most websites are not so minimal and include images, icons, background patterns, etc. If you…
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Eric Howey • January 01, 2020 • 2 Min
Introduction to Gatsby Theme Catalyst
Gatsby Theme Catalyst v1.0 has been launched along with a new website and docs . Gatsby Theme Catalyst is my opinionated view of a modern tech stack relying on a combination of Gatsby , MDX , and Theme-UI . I built this series of themes to accelerate the development process and have a modular…
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