Phil Freo Web Development

I just wrote a pretty in-depth article on the Quizlet Blog: “How We Do Product Development at Quizlet: An Inside Look at the Making of Speller” which describes the process of how Andrew and I created “Speller”, the latest study mode on Quizlet.

…a behind the scenes look at how we created Speller, our engineering challenges and processes, and how we obsessed over the user experience and the educational experience.

Includes some technical details of how we programmed it (mostly JavaScript), the text-to-speech, development process and usability testing, and lots of screenshots of the different iterations we did in order to get the UI right.

It’s a little long, but hopefully worth the read!

I launched my first new website in a very long time, and also designed some matching print work. This time the client was tougher than usual. But she was also cuter than usual so it was worth it…

Read the rest of this entry »

I hate to have my first blog post after over a year be a negative one, but I feel like these guys need calling out.

I recently received an email from a company, Honestly.com, that got me quite curious. I looked up the website to see what it was all about, and I saw that they are a way of reviewing former/current coworkers and business partners. Their tag lines are “Get the inside scoop on your potential boss, coworkers, or business partners.” and “Candid community-created reviews of business professionals.” I sort of expected them to be a more extensive version of CubeDuel (which was quite fun for the first few minutes), but with full reviews rather than just ratings…

Read the rest of this entry »

I just accepted a full-time position at a small startup in San Francisco as a lead Developer and Product Manager.  The company is called Old School Industries LLC and is a combination of two businesses: Quizlet and Collectors Weekly.

Read the rest of this entry »

One benefit of doing freelance development work is that I get the opportunity to get involved in many different technologies and frameworks in a short amount of time.

Since the year is over… here’s a quick list of 15 technologies/frameworks that I got to learn in 2009 alone, during my last year in college.

Read the rest of this entry »

I was given another book to review, called “jQuery 1.3 with PHP”, so here it is.  The book is aimed at beginners or intermediate developers wanting to learn how to “enhance your PHP applications by increasing their responsiveness through jQuery and its plugins“.

Read the rest of this entry »

In three weeks from today, I will have graduated, with honors, from the University of Florida with a B.S. in Computer Engineering (software emphasis) and a minor in Business Administration.  Overall, I’ve had an incredible college experience and have learned a ton, had some great experiences, and built relationships with a lot of really great people.

I thought it’d be worth mentioning the classes at UF that, looking back, had the greatest impact on me.  I’ve taken a bunch of classes over the past 4.5 years, but these were the ones that I really can appreciate the most…
Read the rest of this entry »

Currently, web designers are advised to support browser resolutions of widths 1024px and greater based on current browser usage data. The idea is that you want your site’s design to look good, and not require a horizontal scroll bar for those users. But screen resolution and browser width are not the same thing, because of browser chrome, scroll bars, and because many users browse without their window being maximized.
Read the rest of this entry »

I wrote my first module for ExpressionEngine, called “Freo Add-on Installer”, with the aim of saving EE developers a lot of time.  Here’s what it’s all about.

Read the rest of this entry »

I was given a copy of a book called “Magento: Beginner’s Guide” to review, so here goes.  Overall, the book does a good job of giving a high-level walkthrough of all the different aspects of running a store with Magento.

Read the rest of this entry »