Yearly Blog Archives

  1. 2025

    1. On Freedom, Curiosity & Happiness

      I have been recently contemplating the intricate relationship between my personal life and the work I do, particularly how these domains inevitably get...

    2. Generating LLMs.txt Using Eleventy

      Large Language Models are increasingly relying on information found on the web, but often struggle to handle most websites in their entirety because the context...

    3. Community Assets in Nord Design System

      As mentioned in my previous post, we recently introducing a completely new section for the Nord Design System, called Community Assets. These are...

    4. Figma MCP Server

      I’m intrigued to see Figma announce their own Model Context Protocol server to help LLMs achieve design-informed code generation. I’ve been also prototyping one...

    5. Introducing Brands for Nord Design System

      Over the past six weeks, my colleague and I have been working on a new major update for the Nord Design System. The latest 4.0 version launched a few weeks ago...

    6. Modern Way to Center Elements with CSS

      If you’ve worked with CSS for a longer period, you’ve probably seen and used about a dozen different ways to center block-level elements on the page. These...

    7. View Transitions for Any Website

      View Transitions are probably one of my favorite CSS features at the moment. You can enable them for any site today by adding the following code snippet into...

    8. Building Search Index with Eleventy

      One of the features that I’m quite happy about on my new website is the built-in search functionality and how the search index gets built for it. You can test...

    9. Optimizing Webfont Performance

      Webfonts play a crucial role in giving our websites personalized feel, but they can also be a hidden culprit behind sluggish load times. If you’ve ever wondered...

    10. The 10th Edition of Arielsalminen.com

      Over the past month I’ve been slowly handcrafting a new website for myself to better showcase what I do and have a future home for experiments I may want to...

    11. Remember Webrings?

      Sometimes I find vintage technology fascinating and since I couldn’t find a Design Systems Webring (remember those things from the 90s?!), I just created one....

    12. The Blog Questions Challenge

      This challenge has been recently making rounds on the Internet and as I’ve seen a lot of my friends and people I follow in the tech industry take part, I...

  2. 2024

    1. A Love Letter

      On the terrace of my old home, I ponder in silence the fairy tale I now live in. The love that was born when I met you. In that beautiful part of Helsinki,...

    2. Interview with Design System Guide

      I recently sat down with the team behind the Design System Guide to talk about Nord Design System and how it’s been shaping our work at Nordhealth. We discussed...

    3. My Song

      A frozen lake, stars gazing above I can hear them play my song And I’m swiveling. Vague as a fog, barely visible Hauling through the zephyr Snowflakes falling...

  3. 2023

    1. Finalist for the Best Design System Award

      Nord Design System was recently nominated for the Best Design System award at Grand One competition and won an honorable mention for the best developer...

    2. Leading Successful Product Teams

      I’ve been leading various successful design systems teams over the past years and in this post I wanted to share a simple set of fundamental rules we’ve...

    3. Supporting Dark Mode on Your Website

      Dark mode is an user interface mode that displays light text on a dark background. Dark mode is helpful for those viewing device screens at night, in dark...

    4. What’s a Design Systems Lead

      A Design Systems Lead role includes driving the vision, strategy, roadmap, build and implementation of a design system. This person has a systems-mindset to...

    5. What’s a Product Design Architect

      In the context of design systems, a Product Design Architect provides strategic and creative direction for the design system. This person partners with...

    6. Nevertheless, I Am The Same

      Once upon a time a child was born. This was no ordinary child, this was a child who was trapped inside a body she didn’t belong in. For the next thirty...

  4. 2022

    1. Where Do We Belong

      I’ve been years watching everyone around me change. Seasons coming and going. People growing roots. Building houses. Giving birth to their babies. Becoming...

    2. Finalist for the Jamstack Conf Jammies

      Nord Design System was recently nominated for the Jamstack Conf Jammies award in “Project of the Year” category. Winners will be announced live at Jamstack Conf...

    3. Interview with Ariel Salminen

      I was recently interviewed by Lovers Magazine about what led me into design and what type of things inspire me as a designer. I think it was refreshing to...

    4. Launching Nord Design System

      We’re excited to announce the first major release of Nord Design System, v1.0. With this release, our design systems team is shipping a number of new tools and...

    5. Nord Statistics For The First Year

      You’re reading the ninth Nord Design System monthly update. During the past month we’ve been preparing the system for official launch and making sure we offer...

    6. Nord Design System Architecture

      You’re reading the eigth Nord Design System monthly update. This month I wanted to give a little more insight into how we’ve architectured Nord’s packages and...

  5. 2021

    1. Nord Design System October 2021 Update

      You’re reading the fifth Nord Design System monthly update. This month we’ve gained great momentum and have published four new packages, and made many...

    2. Nord Design System September 2021 Update

      You’re reading the fourth Nord Design System monthly update. This month we’ve been working on making sure that everyone at Nordhealth understands how and why...

    3. Nord Design System June 2021 Update

      You’re reading the third Nord Design System monthly update. This month we’ve been focusing on onboarding new team members and also rolling out the new brand...

    4. Nord Design System May 2021 Update

      You’re reading the second Nord Design System monthly update. Since February, we’ve been busy rethinking our design processes and brand identity that was...

    5. Nordhealth Rebranding

      I’m happy to announce Three Plus Group’s and Finnish Net Solutions’ new name and corporate identity, Nordhealth. The name change is a result of a rebranding...

    6. Nord Design System February 2021 Update

      You’re reading the first ever Nord Design System monthly update. We’re just starting our design systems journey at Nordhealth and have created this...

    7. Design Principles of Nord Design System

      Nordhealth hired me in 2020 to help reimagine what the company’s approach to designing, building and shipping digital products at scale should look like. I...

  6. 2020

    1. A Missed Opportunity

      Why does it feel like the devices we use are getting slower over time? A smartphone I bought a few years ago seems to be losing its edge when browsing websites....

    2. CodePen as a Component Editor

      When we started working on Duet Design System early last year, one of our goals was to create similar component playgrounds as I had previously built for Vue...

    3. Duet Design System September 2020 Update

      You’re reading the ninth Duet monthly update. During the past month we’ve been busy improving the existing features, fixing bugs, and open sourcing Duet Date...

    4. Building Layouts with Duet Design System

      Following this tutorial you will learn how to build simple page layouts using Duet’s Design Tokens, CSS Framework, Web Components and other features. For the...

    5. Duet Design System June 2020 Update

      You’re reading the eighth Duet monthly update. Last month we asked from our users how we’re doing and what we could improve. We’ll share some of the results in...

    6. Duet Design System April 2020 Update

      You’re reading the seventh Duet Design System monthly update. This time last year we published our first Web Components package, version 0.0.1-alpha.1. As our...

    7. Using Duet Design System’s CLI Tools

      Following this tutorial you will learn how to utilize Duet’s Command Line Interface to create simple websites that can be shared via GitHub Pages, Amazon S3,...

    8. Duet Design System March 2020 Update

      You’re reading the sixth Duet Design System monthly update. This time the update covers both February and March as it looks like we forgot to push an update out...

    9. Duet Design System January 2020 Update

      You’re reading the fifth Duet Design System monthly update. This update focuses on new feature and component improvements we’ve been working on. The past month...

    10. SSR with Duet Web Components

      Following this tutorial you will learn how to server side render Duet Design System’s Web Components using Eleventy and other static site generators. For this...

  7. 2019

    1. Why We Use Web Components

      It’s August, 2018. I’m at the office, sitting by the window staring rain pouring down from the sky. A warm cup of tea in my hand, about to sip it, but the phone...

    2. Design System Won’t Fix Your Problems

      Ever read an article praising design systems and how they magically solve design and frontend challenges? I’ve sure seen this being repeated in one form or...

    3. Duet Design System December 2019 Update

      You’re reading the fourth Duet Design System monthly update. In this update we’ll share statistics and feedback we’ve received regarding Duet’s public...

    4. Duet Design System November 2019 Update

      You’re reading the third Duet Design System monthly update. This month marks a major milestone for us as we’re launching our new design system publicly. After...

    5. Duet Design System October 2019 Update

      You’re reading the second Duet Design System monthly update. This update focuses on accessibility and performance updates that we’ve been working on. During the...

    6. Duet Design System September 2019 Update

      You’re reading the very first Duet Design System monthly update. As this is the first of its kind, we’ll do a short recap on what has been accomplished...

    7. Design Principles of Duet Design System

      LocalTapiola hired me in 2019 to help reimagine what the company’s approach to designing, building and shipping digital products at scale should look like. I...

  8. 2018

    1. Vue Design System

      Vue Design System is a set of organized tools, patterns, and practices that work as the foundation for Vue.js application development. What initially started as...

    2. Workspace

      I’m happy. I’ve been succesfully running my design studio for the past 8 months and recently moved into a new office space. Since then I’ve been setting up the...

  9. 2017

    1. Design Principles of Nosto Design System

      Nosto hired me in 2017 to help reimagine what the company’s approach to designing and building digital products at scale should look like. I started this work...

    2. Work in Progress

      March, 2017. We were still living in the United States. It was a time of great anxiety for us. Just a couple weeks earlier I had been laid off from my previous...

    3. On Design Tools and Processes

      For the past year(s) I’ve been chasing for answers. Looking for new tools, thinking about design processes and figuring out what design really means to me. At...

  10. 2016

    1. The Future of Web Fonts

      We love typefaces. They give our sites and applications personalized feel. They convey the information and tell a story. They establish information hierarchy....

    2. Typography for User Interfaces

      Back in 2004, when I had just started my career, sIFR was the hottest thing out there. It was developed by Shaun Inman and it embedded custom fonts in a small...

  11. 2015

    1. Relocating to San Francisco, CA

      I’m terribly excited to tell that we’re moving to San Francisco Bay Area in the beginning of 2016! I’m joining a new company, Idean, as a Senior Interaction...

    2. The 7th Edition of Arielsalminen.com

      I designed the 6th edition of this website almost 5 years ago, which is an eternity by today’s standards. The previous version was one of the first responsive...

    3. The Iconic Work of Reid Miles

      Reid Miles was an American modernist designer, a genius of his time, best known for his work for Blue Note Records through the 1950’s and 60’s. During this...

    4. The Many Faces of The Web

      During the winter 2014, me and my family rented an apartment from San Diego, CA for few months through my work. While staying there, we had an AT&T hotspot...

    5. Interview With Workspiration

      I am Ariel Salminen, a designer and developer living in Helsinki, Finland. I have worked in the web industry for over a decade and have designed websites,...

    6. Dashes in Web Typography

      This is an experiment I did months ago, but eventually never ended up posting it here. I had already forgotten the whole thing until it few weeks ago suddenly...

  12. 2014

    1. Molten Leading

      Manually adjusting line-height with media queries for optimum readability across vast number of screen sizes can be hard. What makes it even harder, is, that...

    2. Interview With .Net Magazine

      I was recently interviewed by .Net Magazine (in issue 254) about how web experts manage cross-platform testing. There’s a quote from me in the article that I...

    3. Fixed Single Page Navigation

      Today, we are open sourcing the JavaScript code and the assets we used to build the responsive navigation on Adtile’s website. The code and examples are hosted...

    4. A Dive Into Plain JavaScript

      While I’ve worked over a decade building various web services and systems, it has only been the past 3 years that I’ve started learning more on how to work with...

  13. 2013

    1. A New Path

      Today, after over two years, I’ll be leaving my position at Kisko Labs. I’ve started working on a new responsive advertising solution for smartphones and...

    2. Plugin For Responsive Navigation

      Responsive Nav is a tiny JavaScript plugin which weighs only 1.6KB minified and Gzip’ed, and helps you to create a toggled navigation for small screens. It uses...

    3. Prototyping Responsive Typography

      The history of typography dates back about 5,000 years. It starts from a series of pictograms, which then evolved to hieroglyphs in Egypt and later around...

  14. 2012

    1. File Upload Support on Mobile

      I were quite surprised few weeks ago when I found out with Matt, my colleague, that no one has tested thoroughly which mobile browsers support input type=file...

    2. Remote Preview

      Remote preview is a tiny JavaScript based tool which I built for our test lab. It allows you to preview any URL on large number of mobile devices...

    3. Building A Device Stand

      Not so long after the device lab was born I realized that we need a much better way to store and charge all the 40+ devices. There didn’t seem to be any...

    4. Establishing An Open Device Lab

      I wrote an article to Smashing Magazine. It’s an in-depth guide about how to establish an open device lab. The article gives practical tips about things like...

    5. Helsinki Open Device Lab

      If you’ve been building websites during the past two years you must know that the web doesn’t live on a desk anymore. The reality is that we now need to test...

    6. Responsive Workflow

      During the last week I was at the Webshaped conference listening Stephen Hay’s talk about responsive design workflow. This post isn’t going to be strictly about...

    7. Modular Grids

      Couple months ago while I were designing a website I remembered a technique I had long forgotten. I used to use this technique before I moved from print design...

    8. Extending CSS With Sass

      CSS is designed primarily to enable the separation of content from presentation, including elements such as the layout, colors, and fonts. This separation...

    9. Scaling with EM units

      Recently I started testing how proportional scaling of bigger layouts would work in reality and if it makes any sense. It’s possible when using EM units and...

    10. Adaptive vs Responsive, What’s The Difference?

      There seems to be some confusion about these terms and what they mean, so here’s my thoughts on the subject and few links to back them up. I’m usually not very...

    11. On Typography

      I have been intrigued by the idea of making a typographic scale out of a musical scale that would not only be very readable, but also aesthetically pleasing....

    12. Convert A List To A Select

      I created another responsive jQuery plugin during the Christmas holidays. It’s called TinyNav and it can convert <ul> or <ol> based navigation to a...

  15. 2011

    1. Fluid Image Replacement Techniques

      While you can find two dozen blog posts and articles about various image replacement techniques using Google, I couldn’t find any article that would help when...

    2. ResponsiveSlides.js

      I created this plugin while I were developing my own site and decided few days ago to release it as an open source version. Its basic function is to create...

    3. New Website

      Since you are here, you have probably noticed that there’s a new design which I have been working on for some time now. I wanted to focus on the content and...

    4. Responsive jQuery Slideshow Revisited

      I wrote a blog post about making responsive jQuery slideshow on 18 May 2010 (You can read it here). Since then much has happened and there’s now quite a lot of...

  16. 2010

    1. Responsive jQuery Slideshow

      This example makes it possible to have a fluid jQuery slideshow which scales responsively. This is the same method that I used on the new kiskolabs.com. I am...

    2. Google Favicon Re-Created with CSS

      Forget CSS3, images, semantics, better methods and that it doesn’t make any sense. I did this just for fun. Larger versions are here for illustration purposes...

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