Thursday Tips and Tools

Thursday Tips & Tools: 25 Free Tools to Test Your Website

Regularly testing your ecommerce website’s performance will ensure it’s running at an optimal level. There are plenty of free resources available to help. Here is a list of free tools to test your website. There are tools to measure download speed, monitor user experience, test accessibility, locate broken links, evaluate search engine and browser compatibility, and check mobile friendliness. All of these tools have free plans, and most offer premium options.

Mobile Monday

Mobile Monday: Mobile-First CSS: Is It Time for a Rethink?

Classic mobile-first CSS development is based on the principle of overwriting style declarations: you begin your CSS with default style declarations, and overwrite and/or add new styles as you add breakpoints with min-width media queries for larger viewports (for a good overview see “What is Mobile First CSS and Why Does It Rock?”). But all those exceptions create complexity and inefficiency, which in turn can lead to an increased testing effort and a code base that’s harder to maintain. Admit it—how many of us willingly want that?

Security Sunday

Security Sunday: Cross-Site Scripting: The Real WordPress Supervillain

Cross-Site Scripting is a type of vulnerability that allows a malicious actor to inject code, usually JavaScript, into otherwise legitimate websites. The web browser being used by the website user has no way to determine that the code is not a legitimate part of the website, so it displays content or performs actions directed by the malicious code. XSS is a relatively well-known type of vulnerability, partially because some of its uses are visible on an affected website, but there are also “invisible” uses that can be much more detrimental to website owners and their visitors.