Learn D3, Flexbox and Radium

It's tempting to pick up a framework which has preselected flexbox or grid as the layout tool of choice, but it's important to learn when and why to use each method. This leads to slimmer stylesheets which results in better site performance, and less likelihood for "hacks" to make one method do what the other does inherently better.

Throughout this collection, we will be progressively styling a responsive landing page template while building your knowledge on when to select grid or flexbox for any layout scenario. Spoiler alert: sometimes the best solution is using both!

The specification describes a CSS box model optimized for user interface design. In the flex layout model, the children of a flex container can be laid out in any direction, and can “flex” their sizes, either growing to fill unused space or shrinking to avoid overflowing the parent.

flexbox

Create a Landing Page with CSS Grid and Flexbox

Flexbox is a powerful way to layout HTML so that elements can grow to fit the size of their container.  It can also control how the elements are positioned within a flexed container.  

Once you start thinking in `rows` and `columns`, you can control almost any flexed layout with just a few simple flexbox layout primitives.

Get Started with Flexbox CSS Layouts

This playlist covers various aspects of CSS including different rules, selectors, and patterns

CSS Tips and Tricks

In this course we will learn and demonstrate the fundamental concepts and APIs of D3, on our way to building several common chart types. We’ll start with the building blocks upon which all D3 visualizations are built; things like scales, interpolators, and selections. We’ll see how to load data with D3, and how to put its full name, Data Driven Documents, into action. We’ll build column and bar charts, scatter plots, and area charts. Most importantly, we’ll gain an understanding of the conventions and patterns that underlie all D3 projects and examples, enabling you to dissect, understand, and build virtually any D3 visualization on the internet.

D3.js is a JavaScript library for manipulating documents based on data. D3 helps you bring data to life using HTML, SVG and CSS. D3’s emphasis on web standards gives you the full capabilities of modern browsers without tying yourself to a proprietary framework, combining powerful visualization components and a data-driven approach to DOM manipulation.

Build Interactive JavaScript Charts with D3 v4

Flexbox is a wonderful tool built into the CSS specification. Using flexbox doesn't require any special framework or library, just a browser with CSS3 support. It is so awesome, and makes the arranging elements on a page almost fun!

Flexbox Fundamentals

This course covers D3 v3. If you'd like to learn about v4 of D3 (the latest version) [click here for the course on that](https://egghead.io/courses/build-interactive-javascript-charts-with-d3-v4).

This series will gently guide you through the first steps in getting to know D3. The curve can be steep, but with a few simple tools, you'll be charting your buns off in no time flat.

Use D3 (v3) to Build Interactive Charts with JavaScript

After setting `display: flex` on a parent element, you can use `flex-direction` to switch the container to be either a `row` or a `column`.

We also switch the body between `row` and `column`.

Flex into a Row or a Column with flex-direction

We can space items inside of a flexed component in the "on-axis" direction, with `justify-content`.

Justify content can take the following values: `flex-start`, `flex-end`, `center`, `space-between`, `space-around`, or `space-evenly`

Change the Spacing of Flexed Components with justify-content

We changed the axis layout with 'justify-content', and the "off axis" layout is controlled by 'align-items'.  The most common values are `flex-start`, `flex-end`, or `center`.

Change the off-axis Alignment of a Flexed Container with `align-items`

To set the wrap settings of elements inside of a container, we can set the `flex-wrap` css attribute.  The most common values are: `nowrap`, `wrap`, or `wrap-reverse`

Wrap Elements Inside of a Flexed Container with `flex-wrap`

To stretch individual elements to fit the given space, we can set the `flex-grow` or `flex` attributes to any integer.  Other surrounding elements will grow proportionally to their `flex-grow` or `flex` attributes.

Proportionally Grow a Flexed Element by Setting `flex-grow` or `flex` Styles

We have a parent HTML element that takes up the height and width of the page. We will make that parent element into a flex container, and then vertically center its child element using `align-items: center;`. Finally, we'll use `justify-content: center;` to horizontally center the element.

Center an Element Horizontally and Vertically using Flexbox

Learn the fundamental difference between CSS grid and flexbox layout, and create utility classes for each `display` value. Then begin to apply and expand these concepts to style the landing page navigation.

Choose Between Grid or Flexbox for CSS Layout

See how to use flexbox to layout variable-width content in columns, and take advantage of `justify-content` to keep flex children center-aligned on smaller viewports. We'll also learn how `margin` can be applied to resolve for lack of a well-supported `gap` property in flexbox. At the end of the lesson, we'll have styled both the "Subscribe" section and the site footer.

Use Flexbox to Responsively Layout Variable-Width Content

CSS Grid and Flexbox are very useful tools for providing the overall layout of a page.  I take a specific design and create the high level layout using css grid and then arrange an individual section using flex box.

Layout a webpage using css grid and flexbox

With just a handful of CSS properties, we can create an intrinsically responsive photo gallery using flexbox. This is accomplished by setting our preferred width as the `flex-basis` value and allowing items to both shrink and grow. The use of `object-fit: cover` on images allows them to fully fill up the list item without distortion or overflow. We finish the gallery with a small animated effect that alters `opacity`.

Create an Automatically Responsive Flexbox Gallery

Most of D3’s native selection APIs also return the selection (or a new selection), to enable multiple method calls to be chained together. Since the code you write isn’t on the selection prototype, chaining your methods would take some extra work. `selection.call()` will call any function reference you give it, providing the selection as the first parameter, and then it returns the selection for you to ensure chaining is supported.

Better Code Organization with selection.call() with D3 v4

Making SVGs responsive is unfortunately not as simple as adding some media queries. This lesson introduces the `viewBox` attribute, which is used to control how SVGs scale. We’ll also examine a reusable function that can be used to make nearly any visualization responsive.

Make D3 v4 Charts Responsive with the viewBox attribute

In D3, the General Update Pattern is the name given to what happens when a data join is followed by operations on the enter, update, and exit selections. When a chart's data changes over time and each update can both create new elements and destroy existing ones, the General Update pattern can help convey meaning to users. This lesson demonstrates the pattern using animated transitions on a column chart.

Animate with the General Update Pattern in D3 v4

Ensuring your charts are responsive is essential if you want them to work regardless of the user's device and screen size. In this lesson we'll learn how the viewBox attribute of SVG elements works, and apply that knowledge to make a future-proof D3 chart.

Responsive D3 charts with the viewBox attribute

Since D3 outputs standard markup, you can use familiar dev tools and inspectors to debug your visualizations. In this lesson we’ll look at how to use Chrome Dev Tools to examine the data associated with your generated markup and experiment with styles to speed up the development process.

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