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15 Useful Tools & Resources Worth Checking Out

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As a web designer, you face plenty of challenges, both good and bad. One of the bad ones is to suddenly find out that you’re either in danger of missing a client’s deadline or will be unable to meet it at all.

A missed deadline could be due to something beyond your control and no fault of your own. There are measures you can take to avoid what you do have control over. Such as not having the right design tool or design resources to do a task that has to be done.

An ounce of prevention can definitely be worth a pound of cure in this case. Before starting a project, make sure the tool or tools you will be using will be up to the task.

The 15 design tools presented here are the tops in their respective categories. You should be better able to handle whatever is thrown at you.

1. Be Theme

Its more than 200,000 sales to date have certainly established the BeTheme multipurpose WordPress theme as an all-time favorite among web designers.

In truth, “multipurpose” doesn’t do BeTheme justice. Users might argue that “all-purpose” would be a more accurate description.

Be’s 40+ core features give web designers plenty to work with in terms of page-building tools, design aids, design options, and special effects.

Most notably:

  • The Muffin Builder, which when used with other core features, makes building a website quick, easy, and coding-free;
  • The Admin Panel/Shortcode Generator combo gives all the flexibility designers need;
  • BeTheme’s 600+ customizable pre-built websites could well be the star of the show. They cover 30 business sectors and all the popular website types, they are customizable, responsive, and feature cool UX features, and they can get any project off to a rapid start.

Click on the banner to learn more about Be’s other core features.

2. Timezy Booking Software

Timezy will help you create a booking environment that works best for your business by allowing clients and customers to book your services as easily as possible. You can then integrate Timezy into your website to streamline and speed up your booking operation.

  • Clients and customers can book appointments online 24/7;
  • They can receive real-time email notifications and reminders;
  • Timezy can be integrated with Zoom;
  • You can reorder steps on the booking form to fit your needs;
  • Timezy can be used to manage employee assignments and schedules, vacations, and special days.

If you lack a website of your own, Timezy will provide you with a modern web page you can customize to fit your brand for clients to book appointments at any time.

3. wpDataTables

wpDataTables is the top-selling and most powerful WordPress table and chart-building plugin on the market. There are other good ones, but their table and chart-building capabilities quickly become inadequate as you go down the list of what wpDataTables can do that most others cannot.

wpDataTables key features and capabilities:

  • The ability to create interactive and responsive tables and charts;
  • The ability to create frontend editable and easily maintainable tables and charts;
  • The ability to rapidly process massive amounts of data that come in various formats and from various sources;
  • The ability to build tables and charts using real-time data.

You can also brighten up or improve a table or chart’s readability by highlighting or color-coding key information.

Click on the banner to find out more about what this plugin can do for you.

4. LayerSlider

LayerSlider is not for sliders only. This multipurpose WordPress tool can also be used to create eye-catching animations and engaging content.

  • Add a little spice to a stale website;
  • Create popups with stunning effects to interact better with visitors;
  • Avoid coding, since LayerSlider is drag and drop.

This popular design tool has been assisting web designers for nearly a decade and serves millions of active monthly users.

5. Amelia Booking Plugin

Amelia is a user-friendly WordPress booking plugin you can use to manage your appointments and events on a single platform.

  • Clients can instantly book, change, or cancel appointments online 24/7;
  • Employees and customers can manage meetings, appointments, and events from their own dashboards;
  • Amelia can be integrated with Zoom to conduct training or consultation sessions;
  • Amelia can also create packages of services with discounts and validity periods.

Amelia can service multiple business locations.

6. Uncode – Creative Multiuse & WooCommerce WordPress Theme

With its more than 80.000 sales to date, Uncode has become one of ThemeForest’s all-time best sellers.

  • You can create custom layouts and designs with Uncode’s Dynamic Content feature and use them as templates for category pages;
  • Uncode features the WooCommerce Product Builder, custom Checkout, Cart, My Account, Quick-View, etc.

Uncode has a comprehensive library of tutorial videos and a showcase of user-created websites that is well worth visiting.

7. Total WordPress Theme

Created with perfection in mind, Total is nonetheless an extremely user-friendly WordPress theme.

  • This drag and drop website building tool’s extreme flexibility allows users to create any type or style of website;
  • The WPBakery page builder is accompanied by an assortment of custom modules;
  • Total is RTL and Translation-ready and easily integrates with WooCommerce;
  • Total is developer-friendly.

Click on the banner to learn more.

8. Dr. Link Check

Dr. Link Check saves you the inconvenience of having to periodically conduct a manual search of your site for broken links.

Dr. Link Check inspects for:

  • Broken links and improper URL formatting;
  • Blacklisted malicious content links;
  • Websites that do not contain any valuable content, including ad-only sites.

Dr. Link Check publishes downloadable daily, weekly, or monthly reports.

9. Mobirise Website Builder

Mobirise is not only a top tool for creating fast, responsive, user-friendly websites. It also has the advantages of being offline. Mobirise is also free.

Factors that contribute to Mobirise’s excellent performance include:

  • Google Amp and Bootstrap 4 frameworks;
  • Professionally-crafted website templates, popups, sliders, and eCommerce features;
  • Mobirise is all drag and drop.

Click on the banner to download your very own copy.

10. 8b Website Builder

When a website builder is fast, free, responsive, user friendly, and Google-friendly as well, it is certainly worthy of consideration.

The 8b website builder:

  • Allows you to create websites at home or on the go on any device;
  • Features templates and website sections designed to get projects off to a rapid start;
  • It gives your site a Google ranking with a couple of clicks;
  • It can be hosted wherever you want.

Download your copy now.

11. WHATFONTIS

WhatFontIs, with its database of more than 700K commercial and free fonts and font-finding AI functionality enables you to identify fonts from images you upload.

This top-of-the-line font-finding tool:

  • Identifies an uploaded font 90% of the time;
  • Gives answers in seconds;
  • Identifies cursive fonts (the letters in the image must be separated);
  • Displays 60+ similar fonts for each uploaded image.

12. Litho – The Multipurpose HTML5 Template

Litho is a responsive multipurpose Bootstrap 4 HTML5 template that gives startups, design agencies, and other businesses an ideal website-building starting point.

Litho’s features include:

  • Cool selections of ready-made home pages, inner pages, and template blocks;
  • Page styles for portfolio, shop, and blogging sites;
  • Sliders, banners, forms, and other creative design elements.

Litho offers 5-star professional support.

13. XStore – The Most Customizable WooCommerce Theme Ever

XStore may be the best tool anyone could have at their fingertips when looking for a fast and easy way to create a high-performance eCommerce website –  for only $39.

XStore’s key features include:

  • 100+ customizable ready-to-go shops;
  • $500+ worth of premium WordPress plugins;
  • A Single Product builder and a Header builder.

14. Goodiewebsite

GOODIE’s web development platform assists clients who are eager to get a professionally-coded website quickly up and running.

GOODIE’s services focus on:

  • Web designers seeking a development partner;
  • Startups looking for ways to test their ideas and concepts;
  • Small businesses seeking an online presence or improvement of an existing one.

GOODIE’s specialties include 1-10 page, WordPress, and eCommerce websites.

15. Heroic Inbox

There are several excellent reasons for letting Heroic Inbox manage your business’s departmental email inboxes.

They include:

  • Encouraging efficient staff collaboration on email assignments and responses;
  • Helping staff members accomplish and maintain Inbox Zero status;
  • Tracking key team performance metrics.

Two key Heroic Inbox features are its smart workflows and a fast and friendly UI.

Every web designer owns a toolbox of tips and tricks they use in their website building projects. Even when a toolbox is superbly stocked, it is always challenging to keep it up to date. Doing so requires maintaining a knowledge of the latest and greatest web design resources and tools—some of which you may need to meet ever-changing industry demands.

This article features the top tools & resources for designers and agencies for 2021. Choosing one or more of them could not only help you stay on top of your game but could even make your day.

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The post 15 Useful Tools & Resources Worth Checking Out first appeared on Webdesigner Depot.


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APIs for All: With Postman’s Arlemi Turpault

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While APIs make it simple to share data back and forth between applications, the process of managing APIs can be anything but simple. A developer working with hundreds of different APIs over the course of their work can get bogged down trying to test, implement, and manage it all, turning what is supposed to be something straightforward into another layer of complexity.

Building API integrations is complex, but Postman makes it easy to create an API service. With Postman, developers can simplify every step of building and managing APIs — from development and testing to collaboration and support — so that more people can design APIs with simplicity, usability, and consistency.

Source de l’article sur DZONE

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Selenium Vs. Cypress: Which Is Better in 2021?

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Selenium is one of the most prominent automation frameworks for functional testing and web app testing. Automation testers who use Selenium can run tests across different browser and platform combinations by leveraging an online Selenium Grid. Though Selenium is the go-to framework for test automation, Cypress — a relatively late entrant in the test automation game — has been catching up at a breakneck pace.

Like Selenium, Cypress is also an open-source test automation framework for testing web applications. And that’s where the big Cypress vs Selenium fight begins! Here are some of the most commonly asked questions that might come up when doing a Cypress vs. Selenium comparison:

Source de l’article sur DZONE

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23 Node.js Best Practices For Automation Testing

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If you are in the world of software development, you must be aware of Node.js. From Amazon to LinkedIn, a plethora of major websites use Node.js. Powered by JavaScript, Node.js can run on a server, and a majority of devs use it for enterprise applications. As they consider it a very respectable language due to the power it provides them to work with. And if you follow Node.js best practices, you can increase your application performance on a vast scale.

When it comes to automation testing, it requires a very systematic approach to automate test cases and set them up for seamless execution of any application. This requires us to follow a set of defined best practices for better results. To help you do that, we will let you in on the best Node.js tips for automation testing.

Source de l’article sur DZONE

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Quiz: Can You Spot The Center Of These Shapes?

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It’s Friday, and we wanted to have a little fun with a design test that might make you go cross-eyed.

Here are ten images, each with a dot in the middle of another shape — a square, a circle, or maybe something trickier. Can you tell with a glance if the dot is in the exact center of the shape? See how many you can get right; pathetically easy or fiendishly difficult? You decide!

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How to Intercept and Debug All Java HTTP

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Java and the JVM more generally are widely used for services everywhere, but often challenging to debug and manually test, particularly in complicated microservice architectures.

HTTP requests and responses are the core of interactions between these services, and with their external APIs, but they’re also often invisible and inaccessible. It’s hard to examine all outgoing requests, simulate unusual responses & errors in a running system, or mock dependencies during manual testing & prototyping.

Source de l’article sur DZONE

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3 Essential Design Trends, March 2021

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March is that time of year where the feeling of newness starts, from the first Spring days to fresh design projects. These trends are no exception, with fun new takes on some classic concepts.

Circles are always popular, but the top trend is an animated take on the traditional element; plus, fun pink and purple color palettes and a few faux split screen designs round out trending styles.

Here’s what’s trending in design this month.

Circle Animations

Circles are one of those shapes that never leave the design sphere. They have a lot of classical meaning and are flexible in terms of design options.

Designers are having a lot of fun with this shape right now. From animations to text circles to image frames, they seem to be all over the place.

More recently trending is more circle-shaped animations. This trend maintains a circle’s properties as a unified and harmonious element with movement to create more engagement and make you look at the design just a little bit more.

Each of these examples uses circles in a different but equally interesting – and animated – way.

Universal Favourite uses a circular blob. It’s almost like a giant bubble. It wiggles and flows, and stretches within the space without any help from the user. It has a smoothly quality that makes you want to stare at it. The color here helps, with the circle and background not having an immense amount of contrast. Also, note the cute little circle button in the bottom corner.

Kenta Toshikura put most of the subtle animation for this design inside the circle. With a hover state, the entire circle moves on the screen with a second layer of animation, and the cursor is also a circle that hops around the black background.

Kffein takes a totally different approach with a circle made from the primary test elements. Identifying website information rotates in a circle around another geo shape on the main plane. Not only is there a circular animation, but an almost three-dimensional effect that happens due to the way elements are layered here.

 

 

Pink and Purple Palettes

The prevalent pink and purple color combination isn’t for everyone – although you wouldn’t know it from the number of designs using similar colors.

This bright combination almost screams “spring” and has a lightness to it that almost seems to lift the mood of any project. (Maybe color selection is a reflection of how we all want to feel.)

What’s nice about these colors is that they flow into one another nicely. They can also be expanded to fall into neighboring hues on the color wheel, such as red from pink and blue from purple.

Maybe the most popular use of this color pair is as a gradient. You can find pink to purple everywhere, from background gradients to image overlays to buttons and user interface elements. There’s no lack of use here.

Each of these examples shows opportunities with this color combination.

SMU uses bright pink, blue, and purple to create a giant “road sign” in the design that jumps out from the rest of the project. The sign almost seems out of place and doesn’t fit as part of the normal color palette. This is what draw you right to it.

USA Volleyball uses the popular gradient option and extends the pink to the purple palette to hints of blue and red. What’s great about this design is that it uses a super trend element and color option and makes it work with their current color palette. You can almost imagine the design conversation when someone wanted to use a pink to purple gradient for a brand that features red, white, and blue. The gamble paid off, and it works beautifully without being off-brand.

Blobmixer uses purple, pink, and a few other bright colors – note the animated circles, too – to draw users into the design. The entire project is a fun, customizable experience that you can play with, and the color choices are what make you interested enough to try. This design also offers a great example of tactile animation and elements that feel real even when you interact with them using a mouse on the screen.

 

 

Faux Split Screens

Split-screen designs were a huge trend for about two years. The aesthetic was also functional for content that required a this or that choice on the part of users.

Now, we see the design elements but without the function. (Maybe because it just looks nice and creates a sense of balance without a symmetrical design.)

These projects look like they might offer multiple gateways to content, but there is only one call to action on the dual-screen aside from navigation elements.

What this design option does is help draw the eyes across the screen. One side will immediately appeal to you, and when done well, you’ll feel a subtle push of pull from the color, text, and images to look at the other side as well.

Renaissance TV does it with heavy animation with “dancing dots” from an old TV that doesn’t work. But then you need to look at the green text to understand what is happening.

Yacht uses text weight and space to push the eyes across the screen. Almost everyone will go to the heavier areas first and then gaze across the screen through blocks of space to the final small text on the right side. And it all happens in a fraction of seconds.

Bonjour Paris pairs bold color with black and white images. You may look at either side first, depending on personal preference, but the other half of the screen is necessary for a complete understanding of the website.

 

 

Conclusion

While all of these design trends are evident in new and recent projects, the use of pink and purple color palettes – particularly with a gradient – seems to be everywhere you look. These color choices are popular and come in a lot of forms.

Maybe the most obvious is with brighter pink and purple gradients, but other variations are also trending. It’s definitely one to watch in the longer term.

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What Does It Take to Test in DevOps?: QA Best Practices

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Traditionally, testing has been perceived as a bottleneck in SDLC, something that causes delays in delivery. Organizations have long adopted the Agile/DevOps model, but not without its pitfalls and stumbling blocks, especially in achieving the ideal speed/quality balance.

For enterprise DevOps, it is vital to rethink testing approaches to achieve agility at scale. There is much of an overlap of roles, for instance between business analysts and QA testers. Is the tester’s role diminished because of this overlap or because of automation?

Source de l’article sur DZONE

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12 Tips to Improve Your Web Design Skills in 2021

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There are many reasons you might be wanting to improve your design skills this year. Perhaps you have extra time on your hands and want to put it to good use. Or maybe you’re new to web design and finding that there’s a lot you still don’t know how to do. It could also be that you recognize that the web is changing, and your skills could use some refreshing to keep up.

Whatever the reason, there are many ways to level up your web design skills in 2021. Here are 12 ideas to get you started:

Tip 1: Niche Down If You Haven’t Already

Jack-of-all-trades designers might be able to say “yes” to everyone. However, they’re going to be stretched very thin as they attempt to strengthen every skill needed to keep up with demand.

It’s much easier to become a trusted designer and to improve your skills if you have a smaller and more specific skill set to develop.

Just keep in mind that niching down doesn’t necessarily mean focusing on a particular industry. For instance, you might choose to be a UX designer instead of a web designer. Or you might specialize in designing ecommerce websites instead of monetized blogs. Just find something that you’re passionate about and will be good at doing, and zero-in on the skills needed for it.

Tip 2: Play Around in the Sandbox

Local development environments are useful for staging websites, doing redesigns, and testing updates safely away from live sites. But you can also use them for experimenting with new design techniques, trends, templates, plugins, and more.

Local by Flywheel is the one I prefer to use:

Here’s a good exercise to start with:

Take a website you like — something you’ve looked at in awe and couldn’t imagine ever building on your own. Then, put yourself to the test. See if you can recreate it in your sandbox.

Don’t be hard on yourself if you don’t figure it out right away. Consult your resources and give yourself time to make sense of what’s going on and implement it with the available skills and tools.

Tip 3: Redesign One of Your First Projects

There’s always a clear evolution in a designer’s skill set, from the day they begin designing to the present day. And that’s a good thing. If your work doesn’t improve or change with time, then you’re going to have a lot of catching up to do when the stagnation begins to hurt your business.

Want to see how much progress you’ve made so far? Revisit one of your first projects and look at it with fresh eyes. I bet you’ll see a big change in how you design today from how you designed that site then.

Now, ask yourself what you would do differently. And then, go to your sandbox and do the redesign.

Tip 4: Work on a Passion Project

A friend of mine is taking a UX design course and needed some users to run through a prototype he created for the class. He could create anything he wanted, so he designed an app related to his other love: Music.

While he could’ve easily thrown together some carbon copy of Spotify or SoundCloud, he came up with a completely new concept. And it was really impressive, to the point where I urged him to put it into production and see if he could list it in the app stores.

I think it’s when we’re really passionate about something that we’re willing to push past our limits. So, carve out some time to tackle that passion project you’ve been toying around with and see where it takes you.

Tip 5: Share Your Designs on Dribbble and Ask for Feedback

One of the reasons UX designers do user testing is how valuable users’ raw input is. While it would be nice to think that design is a completely subjective matter, that isn’t really the case when usability becomes compromised due to design choices.

Understanding what users like and dislike is an important part of taking your design skills to the next level. And a good way to do that is to share your designs on Dribbble.

Here’s an example of UI8 asking for feedback:

Tip 6: Create a Design Toolbox

I’m a huge fan of automation and shortcuts powering things behind the scenes in business.

After all, one of the reasons you become a web designer is so you can design, right? When you’re bogged down with administrative and logistical tasks, that’s time spent away from doing what you enjoy.

One way in which you can streamline your backend processes is by putting together a design toolbox. Your preferred CMS. Flexible templates or apps you use from project to project. Website testing tools. And so on.

As you do this, it’ll force you to examine how you build websites. Are you really working as efficiently as possible? Are there newer apps or systems that’ll help you design better sites? And as you improve your design toolbox, you’ll improve your design skills.

Tip 7: Subscribe to Your Favorite Blogs

I have a hard time recommending this one, only because I’m reluctant to sign up for yet another newsletter. That said, I do see the value in subscribing to some blog newsletters as I don’t always remember to revisit their websites and check out the latest content.

What I’d suggest you do is pick one or two design blogs that have a good variety of content and publish regularly. And then pick one small business or freelance blog.

WebdesignerDepot, of course, is a good one to start with as it comes at a good frequency, recommends great reads from all around the web, and is fluff-free:

I’d also recommend signing up for one that’s focused on your niche as well as one for business.

As a freelancer, I’d vote for the Freelancers’ Union newsletter. There’s always something timely and useful in there.

Tip 8: Listen to a Podcast

I just adopted a second dog, so I’ve spent a lot more time on walks while house-training her. At first, I was stressed about it because it was time spent away from work. However, I started to fill that time with podcasts and found that it helped me work better for the rest of the day.

One reason is that I’ve been listening to work-related podcasts, which are always chock full of helpful tips. Another reason is that it gives my eyes a rest from looking at the screen so that when I come back 15 or so minutes later, I feel refreshed and ready to go.

Rebekah Carter has a good set of web design podcast recommendations to get you started.

Tip 9: Take a Free Online Design Course

There’s an overabundance of information online. If you want to brush up on CSS, there are hundreds of YouTube courses that cover it. If you want to learn how to use a new WordPress plugin, you’ll find dozens of great tutorials across various online course platforms, YouTube channels, and even people’s blogs.

There’s no need to go back to school to become a better designer. Here are five places where you’re bound to find free courses for web designers.

Tip 10: Read a Book on Design Principles or Theory

It’s easy to lose sight of design principles when your clients are clamoring for a website that will make them a lot of money, get them a lot of readers, and so on. Sure, you can design a UI and UX that works, but do you remember why the design choices you made are effective?

Choose a book — just one to start — that’ll help you reconnect with the roots of good web design. Not only will you get a good refresher on web design principles or design theory, but you might learn something brand new.

Here are some of my favorite books for web designers:

Tip 11: Find Your People

Now more than ever, finding a community of like-minded web designers, developers, or freelancers is important. It’s not just about having a group of people to vent to when clients drive you nuts (though that’s great, too).

It’s about finding a group that brings something new to the table and enriches your understanding of web design and what it means to be a web designer.

If you’re on Facebook or LinkedIn, start there. There are tons of web design and freelance groups that have productive discussions every day. If you prefer to meet up with local designers and developers, check out Meetup.

You may be surprised by how many groups there are and the kinds of meetups they have planned.

Tip 12: Attend a Virtual Conference

Did any of you attend a design conference last year? I did. I virtually attended Adobe MAX — from the comfort of my home, in my pajamas, for three days.

I scheduled my assignments around the sessions I wanted to attend and didn’t have to pick one over the other (i.e., “Do I make money or do I learn something new?”).

Some of the sessions showed us how to do more with Adobe’s tools, while some of them featured design and business leaders who shared personal insights on how to work more effectively. It was a great way to shake up my normal routine and to get a ton of information about the future of web design in a short period of time.

Which of These Tips Will You Use to Improve Your Design Skills?

Like I said before, there’s a lot you can do to improve your design skills. Just be careful not to overdo it.

Pick one or two things on this list to start with. If you have more time in your schedule and you’re excited about what you’ve learned so far, add a couple more.

Just take it slowly. Your brain will only be able to absorb so much at once. Plus, the last thing you want is to burn yourself out on skills training and not have the energy to complete your work.

 

Featured image via Unsplash.

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Quatre manières de préserver notre planète

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La plupart des pays industrialisés recyclent leurs déchets depuis déjà des décennies. Nous trions le verre, le plastique, le papier et le textile en les jetant dans les poubelles prévues à cet effet. Mais qu’advient-il ensuite de ces déchets ? En faisons-nous assez ? Et qu’en est-il des régions qui sont devenues des dépotoirs ou qui n’ont pas mis en place de systèmes de recyclage ?

Malgré nos efforts, près de 9 millions de tonnes de plastique sont déversés chaque année dans les océans en raison de notre modèle de consommation linéaire actuel Extraire, Fabriquer, Jeter.

L’entassement des déchets dans les décharges n’arrange rien. Pas moins de 1,3 milliard de tonnes de déchets sont mis en décharge chaque année et ce chiffre devrait grimper à 2,2 milliards de tonnes en 2025. Les dommages causés à l’homme, à la faune sauvage et à l’environnement sont considérables, mais nous pouvons prendre des mesures pour les atténuer.

Le cas des vêtements

Outre les déchets plastiques et électroniques, les textiles, notamment les textiles non biologiques, sont en grande partie responsables du problème. Selon l’Agence de protection de l’environnement des États-Unis (EPA), les Américains jettent 13,1 millions de tonnes de textiles par an, dont 15 % seulement sont recyclés. Cela signifie que plus de 11 millions de tonnes de textiles sont déversés chaque année dans les décharges, libérant dans le sol des colorants et des produits chimiques qui contaminent les eaux souterraines et nuisent à l’environnement. Pire encore, à mesure que les textiles se décomposent, ils libèrent du méthane, un gaz à effet de serre nocif qui contribue de manière significative au réchauffement climatique.

L’industrie textile est la plus polluante après le logement, le transport et l’alimentation. L’apparition des achats en ligne a bouleversé nos habitudes. Aujourd’hui, les consommateurs commandent les articles en plusieurs tailles ou plusieurs couleurs, les essaient et retournent ce qui ne leur convient pas, ce qui crée de nouveaux défis pour les commerçants. De nombreux détaillants sont contraints de jeter plus de 25 % des articles retournés, soit des tonnes de marchandises neuves déversées chaque année dans les décharges.

Dans ce contexte, le secteur de la mode éphémère est soumis à de fortes pressions pour repenser sa stratégie de production et merchandising en vue de réduire les dommages écologiques.

Quatre gestes pour réduire les déchets

La protection de l’environnement relève de la responsabilité collective. Si les gouvernements, les consommateurs, les fabricants et les détaillants font leur part du travail, il est encore possible d’inverser la tendance. En tant que citoyens et consommateurs, nous avons un rôle important à jouer.

Nous pouvons tous refuser d’acheter des articles en plastique à usage unique, des produits vendus dans des emballages superflus ou des vêtements bon marché qui finissent dans des décharges après avoir été portés une ou deux fois.

Nous pouvons réduire les déchets en évitant d’en générer, par exemple en réduisant le volume des marchandises achetées en ligne, puis retournées au vendeur. Pour ce qui est de la réutilisation, cette pratique est en plein essor. Des friperies aux associations caritatives, il existe de nombreux moyens de remettre des textiles, meubles et appareils sur le marché plutôt que de les déverser dans les décharges.

Enfin, le recyclage doit être l’objectif ultime. Il permet non seulement de réduire la dépendance à l’égard des matières premières, mais il crée des emplois et diminue l’impact de notre société de consommation sur l’environnement.

Toutefois, il existe encore un énorme fossé entre ce que nous aspirons à faire en tant que consommateurs et notre comportement au quotidien.

Même si plusieurs études, telles que l’enquête sur les emballages plastiques de 2017 réalisée par l’institut britannique de sondage Populus, confirment la motivation des consommateurs à mieux gérer leur consommation et leurs déchets de matières plastiques, il reste encore beaucoup à faire. Par exemple, les étiquettes d’emballage sont souvent source de confusion et la communication des collectivités locales sur les options de recyclage disponibles n’est pas suffisamment claire.

Une participante à une enquête a donné un excellent exemple de la complexité à laquelle les consommateurs sont confrontés lorsqu’ils tentent d’adopter les bons gestes. « J’ai effectué des recherches sur les couches biodégradables, qui me semblent être une bonne idée », a-t-elle déclaré. « Mais apparemment, ces couches peuvent uniquement être recyclées dans un composteur. Si elles sont mises en décharge, elles produisent du méthane, ce qui est réellement nocif pour l’environnement. »

Le défi de SAP concernant les matières plastiques

S’agissant des matières plastiques et de la pollution qu’elles engendrent, une manière de résoudre le problème serait de les éliminer tout simplement de la chaîne logistique.

L’an passé, l’équipe SAP Leonardo a lancé un projet d’innovation collaborative dans le cadre du UK Plastics Pact de WRAP afin de trouver de nouvelles solutions face au problème de pollution plastique. L’initiative a débuté par une enquête ethnographique visant à déterminer comment les citoyens perçoivent le défi de la pollution plastique. Sur la base des résultats de l’enquête, cinq personas ont été développées pour représenter les attitudes et comportements qui prévalent aujourd’hui dans la société britannique, depuis les sympathisants jusqu’aux ardents défenseurs de l’écologie.

Plusieurs thèmes sont ressortis de cette étude : le devoir de réduire la consommation de matières plastiques, la confusion et les mythes sur le recyclage, la nécessité d’apprendre et de répondre de manière appropriée et, enfin, la nécessité de sensibiliser.

Dans le cadre de la deuxième phase du projet, un marathon de programmation et une session de conception créative organisés sur trois jours ont rassemblé des experts et des innovateurs de SAP et de grandes entreprises internationales comme Unilever, HSBC et Deliveroo. Les équipes ont été invitées à concevoir des prototypes de produits et services autour des cinq thèmes pour les différents personas. Les prototypes sont en cours de développement et de test dans une phase d’incubation. Les solutions visant à éliminer le plastique seront présentées à l’occasion de l’exposition collective Design Frontiers, qui se déroulera au London Design Festival en septembre prochain.

Autres bonnes nouvelles

Pour ce qui est de la gestion des déchets industriels et ménagers, le lot d’efforts déployés varie d’un pays à l’autre. La Suède importe à présent des déchets, car moins de 1 % de ceux générés dans le pays se retrouvent dans des décharges. Le reste est recyclé ou brûlé pour chauffer les maisons. Le processus est tellement efficace que la Suède s’est mise à manquer de déchets et a commencé à en importer auprès de pays voisins pour alimenter son programme national de valorisation énergétique.

L’Allemagne est un autre exemple : sur les 45,9 millions de tonnes de déchets ménagers produites en 2017, seules 0,5 million de tonnes ont été mises en décharge grâce aux directives de l’UE, à des réglementations nationales strictes en matière de gestion des déchets et à des installations de traitement des déchets de pointe. La ville de Heidelberg, par exemple, a ajouté des capteurs intelligents à ces bacs à ordures et les a connectés à la solution SAP Connected Goods. La ville dispose désormais d’une visibilité en temps réel sur l’état des déchets, ce qui réduit le nombre de camions à ordures sur la route, en éliminant le ramassage inutile et le remplissage excessif. Cela a également contribué à la réduction du bruit, du trafic et de la pollution.

On constate aussi des progrès dans le Global Fashion Agenda. À la fin du premier semestre de l’année dernière, l’Engagement 2020 en faveur du système de mode circulaire avait été signé par 94 entreprises représentant 12,5 % du marché mondial de la mode. Ces entreprises se sont engagées à collecter et revendre des vêtements et des chaussures, de même qu’à accroître la part de vêtements et chaussures fabriqués à partir de fibres recyclées. Elles ont également promis de rendre compte des progrès annuels et, plus important encore, de transformer leurs pratiques commerciales linéaires actuelles.

De plus en plus d’entreprises prennent conscience des avantages d’une approche circulaire et de plus en plus de consommateurs réclament des produits et services plus durables. Dès lors, il est encore possible d’inverser la tendance.

Découvrez Isabelle Pierard et son entreprise Soulyé

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Découvrez Isabelle Pierard et son entreprise Soulyé

Publié initialement en anglais sur Forbes dans la catégorie Brandvoice

The post Quatre manières de préserver notre planète appeared first on SAP France News.

Source de l’article sur sap.com

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