30 Days of HTML

HTML Is Actually a Programming Language. Fight Me | WIRED

When haters deny HTML’s status as a programming language, they’re showing they don’t understand what a language really is. Language is not instructing an interlocutor what to do in a way that leaves no room for other interpretations; it is better and richer than that. Like human language, HTML is conversational. It is remarkably adept at adapting to context. It can take a different shape on any machine, from a desktop browser or an e-reader screen to a mobile app or a screen reader for the blind (so long as that device is built to present hypertext).

Hell, yeah!

Ultimately, even as HTML has become the province of professionals, it cannot be gatekept. This is what makes so many programmers so anxious about the web, and sometimes pathetically desperate to maintain the all-too-real walls they’ve erected between software engineers and web developers.

Hell, yeeeeaaaaahhh!!!

What other programmers might say dismissively is something HTML lovers embrace: Anyone can do it. Whether we’re using complex frameworks or very simple tools, HTML’s promise is that we can build, make, code, and do anything we want.

You can use Web Components without the shadow DOM

So what are the advantages of the Custom Elements API if you’re not going to use the Shadow DOM alongside it?

1. Obvious Markup
2. Instantiation is More Consistent
3. They’re Progressive Enhancement Friendly

HTML Web Components Can Have a Little Shadow DOM, As A Treat | Scott Jehl, Web Designer/Developer

This is an interesting thought from Scott: using Shadow DOM in HTML web components but only as a way of providing sort-of user-agent styles:

providing some default, low-specificity styles for our slotted light-dom HTML elements while allowing them to be easily overridden.

An origin trial for a new HTML <permission> element  |  Blog  |  Chrome for Developers

This looks interesting. On the hand, it’s yet another proprietary creation by one browser vendor (boo!), but on the other hand it’s a declarative API with no JavaScript required (yay!).

Even if this particular feature doesn’t work out, I hope that this is the start of a trend for declarative access to browser features.

But what about the shadow DOM? | Go Make Things

So many of the problems and challenges of working with Web Components just fall away when you ditch the shadow DOM and use them as a light wrapper for progressive enhancement.