Link tags: frontend,development

Who’s Afraid of a Hard Page Load?

Why single-page apps are just not worth it:

Here’s the problem: your team almost certainly doesn’t have what it takes to out-engineer the browser. The browser will continuously improve the experience of plain HTML, at no cost to you, using a rendering engine that is orders of magnitude more efficient than JavaScript.

Meanwhile, the browser marches on, improving the UX of every website that uses basic HTML semantics. For instance: browsers often don’t repaint full pages anymore.

Matthias Ott – Painting With the Web – beyond tellerrand Düsseldorf 20025 - YouTube

A great talk by Matthias on what you can do with web standards today!

Polishing your typography with line height units | WebKit

I should be using the lh and rlh units more enough—they’re supported across the board!

A Web Component UI library for people who love HTML | Go Make Things

I’m obviously biased, but I like the sound of what Chris is doing to create a library of HTML web components.

Hiding elements that require JavaScript without JavaScript :: dade

This is clever: putting CSS inside a noscript element to hide anything that requires JavaScript.

Cascading Layouts | OddBird

A workshop on resilient CSS layouts

Oh, hell yes!

Do not hesitate—sign yourself up to this series of three online workshops by Miriam. This is the quickest to level up your working knowledge of the most powerful parts of CSS.

By the end of this you’re going to feel like Neo in that bit of The Matrix when he says “I know kung-fu!” …except kung-fu isn’t very useful for building resilient and maintainable websites, whereas modern CSS absolutely is.

Better typography with text-wrap pretty | WebKit

Everything you ever wanted to know about text-wrap: pretty in CSS.

A pragmatic browser support strategy | Go Make Things

1. Basic functionality should work on any device that can access the web.
2. Extras and flourishes are treated as progressive enhancements for modern devices.
3. The UI can look different and even clunky on older devices and browsers, as long as it doesn’t break rule #1.

Snook Dreams of the Web - Snook.ca

If we were to follow Jiro’s and his apprentices’ journeys and imagine web development the same way then would we ask of our junior developers to spend the first year of their career only on HTML. No CSS. No JavaScript. No frameworks. Only HTML. Only once HTML has been mastered do we move onto CSS. And only once that has been mastered do we move onto JavaScript.

Stop Using and Recommending React - Lusitos Tech Blog

I can’t recommend React to any project or customer anymore.

Using almost any other modern alternative, you will save time, money and nerves, even if you haven’t used them before.

Don’t stick to technology just because you know it.

Cool native HTML elements you should already be using · Harrison Broadbent

dialog, details, datalist, progress, optgroup, and more:

If this article helps just a single developer avoid an unnecessary Javascript dependency, I’ll be happy. Native HTML can handle plenty of features that people typically jump straight to JS for (or otherwise over-complicate).

Ten years ago today I coined the shorthand “js;dr” for “JavaScript required; Didn’t Read”. - Tantek

Practice Progressive Enhancement.

Build first and foremost with forgiving technologies, declarative technologies, and forward and backward compatible coding techniques.

All content should be readable without scripting.

If it’s worth building on the web, it’s worth building it robustly, and building it to last.

MS Edge Explainers/Performance Control Of Embedded Content / explainer.md at main · MicrosoftEdge/MSEdgeExplainers

I like the look of this proposal that would allow authors to have more control over network priorities for third-party iframes—I’ve already documented how I had to use a third-party library to fix this problem on the Salter Cane site.

CSS Form Control Styling Level 1

This looks like a really interesting proposal for allowing developers more control over styling inputs. Based on the work being done the customisable select element, it starts with a declaration of appearance: base.

Building WebSites With LLMS - Jim Nielsen’s Blog

And by LLMS I mean: (L)ots of (L)ittle ht(M)l page(S).

I really like this approach: using separate pages instead of in-page interactions. I remember Simon talking about how great this works, and that was a few years back, before we had view transitions.

I build separate, small HTML pages for each “interaction” I want, then I let CSS transitions take over and I get something that feels better than its JS counterpart for way less work.

Anchor position tool

This is a great little helper in understanding anchor positioning in CSS.

Chrome-only for now.

google webfonts helper

Google Fonts only lets you download .ttf files meaning that if you want to self-host your fonts (and you should), you have to first convert them to .woff2 files.

Luckily this tool has been online for over a decade, doing what Google Fonts should be doing by default.

mirisuzanne/track-list: Enhance a list of audio tracks with playlist controls

This is very nice HTML web component by Miriam, progressively enhancing an ordered list of audio elements.

Why I Like Designing in the Browser – Cloud Four

This describes how I like to work too.

5 Questions for Jeremy Keith · Frontend Dogma

If you like the prospect of an old man ranting at clouds, this is for you.