Tags: learning

The web without the web - DEV Community 👩‍💻👨‍💻

I love React. I love how server side rendering React apps is trivial because it all compiles down to vanilla HTML rather than web components, effectively turning it into a kickass template engine that can come alive. I love the way you can very effectively still do progressive enhancement by using completely semantic markup and then letting hydration do more to it.

I also hate React. I hate React because these behaviours are not defaults. React is not gonna warn you if you make a form using divs and unlabelled textboxes and send the whole thing to a server. I hate React because CSS-in-JS approaches by default encourage you to write completely self contained one off components rather than trying to build a website UI up as a whole. I hate the way server side rendering and progressive enhancement are not defaults, but rather things you have to go out of your way to do.

An absolutely brilliant post by Laura on how the priorites baked into JavaScript tools like React are really out of whack. They’ll make sure your behind-the-scenes code is super clean, but not give a rat’s ass for the quality of the output that users have to interact with.

And if you want to adjust the front-end code, you’ve got to set up all this tooling just to change a div to a button. That’s quite a barrier to entry.

In elevating frontend to the land of Serious Code we have not just made things incredibly over-engineered but we have also set fire to all the ladders that we used to get up here in the first place.

AMEN!

I love React because it lets me do my best work faster and more easily. I hate React because the culture around it more than the library itself actively prevents other people from doing their best work.

Pseudo Code | CSS-Tricks

I find myself doing pseudo code before I write real code, sure, but I also leave it in place sometimes in code comments.

Same!

Frontend Design, React, and a Bridge over the Great Divide

Brad describes how he has found his place in the world of React, creating UI components without dabbling in business logic:

Instead of merely creating components’ reference HTML, CSS, and presentational JS, frontend designers can create directly consumable HTML, CSS, and presentational JS that back-of-the-frontend developers can then breathe life into.

What’s clear is that the term “React” has become as broad and undefined as the term “front-end”. Just saying that someone does React doesn’t actually say much about the nature of the work.

When you say “we’re hiring a React developer”, what exactly do you mean by that? “React developer” is almost as vague as “frontend developer”, so clarify. Are you looking for a person to specialize in markup and styles? A person to author middleware and business logic? A person to manage data and databases? A person to own build processes?

Smashing TV — Webinars and Live Sessions — Smashing Magazine

Don’t miss this—a masterclass in SVG animation with Cassie (I refuse to use the W word). Mark your calendar: August 20th.

Why Did I Have Difficulty Learning React? - Snook.ca

When people talk about learning React, I think that React, in and of itself, is relatively easy to understand. At least, I felt it was. I have components. I have JSX. I hit some hiccups with required keys or making sure I was wrapping child elements properly. But overall, I felt like I grasped it well enough.

Throw in everything else at the same time, though, and things get confusing because it’s hard at first to recognize what belongs to what. “Oh, this is Redux. That is React. That other thing is lodash. Got it.”

This resonates a lot with Dave’s post:

React is an ecosystem. I feel like it’s a disservice to anyone trying to learn to diminish all that React entails. React shows up on the scene with Babel, Webpack, and JSX (which each have their own learning curve) then quickly branches out into technologies like Redux, React-Router, Immutable.js, Axios, Jest, Next.js, Create-React-App, GraphQL, and whatever weird plugin you need for your app.

What I Learned Co-Founding Dribbble – SimpleBits

Twenty hard-won lessons from Dan from ten years of Dribbble.

We sent 50 shirts along with a card to friends and colleagues announcing Dribbble’s beta back in 2008. This first batch of members played a pivotal role in the foundation of the community and how it would develop. The shirt helped guilt them into actually checking out the site.

I think I still have my T-shirt somewhere!

Finch Front-End · Edinburgh · 23rd-25th September 2019

This looks like an excellent conference line-up! Alas, I won’t be able to make it (I’m out of the country when it’s on) but you should definitely go if you can.

Julio Biason .Net 4.0 - Things I Learnt The Hard Way (in 30 Years of Software Development)

Lots and lots of programming advice. I can’t attest to the veracity and efficacy of all of it, but this really rang true:

If you have no idea how to start, describe the flow of the application in high level, pure English/your language first. Then fill the spaces between comments with the code.

And this:

Blogging about your stupid solution is still better than being quiet.

You may feel “I’m not start enough to talk about this” or “This must be so stupid I shouldn’t talk about it”.

Create a blog. Post about your stupid solutions.

A Complete Beginner’s Guide to React by Ali Spittel

This really is a most excellent introduction to React. Complete with cheat sheet!

7 absolute truths I unlearned as junior developer

This is a wonderfully written post packed with hard-won wisdom.

This are the myths that Monica dispelled for herself:

1. I’m a senior developer
2. Everyone writes tests
3. We’re so far behind everyone else (AKA “tech FOMO”)
4. Code quality matters most
5. Everything must be documented!!!!
6. Technical debt is bad
7. Seniority means being the best at programming

HTML is the Web ~ Pete Lambert

The lowest common denominator of the Web. The foundation. The rhythm section. The ladyfingers in the Web trifle. It’s the HTML. And it is becoming increasingly clear to me that there’s a whole swathe of Frontend Engineers who don’t know or understand the frontend-est of frontend technologies.

The CSS Mindset | Max Böck - Frontend Web Developer

This post absolutely nails what’s special about CSS …and why supersmart programmers might have trouble wrapping their head around it:

Other programming languages often work in controlled environments, like servers. They expect certain conditions to be true at all times, and can therefore be understood as concrete instructions as to how a program should execute.

CSS on the other hand works in a place that can never be fully controlled, so it has to be flexible by default.

Max goes on to encapsulate years of valuable CSS learnings into some short and snappy pieces of advices:

• Everything is a rectangle
• The Cascade is your Friend
• As much as necessary, as little as possible
• Shorthands have long effects
• Always Be Flexible
• Context is Key
• Content will change
• Find Patterns and re-use them
• Use consistent Names

No matter what your level of CSS knowledge, this post has something for you—highly recommended!

You got this. | Zeldman on Web & Interaction Design

I can relate to this.

Complexity Explorables

A cornucopia of interactive visualisations. You control the horizontal. You control the vertical. Networks, flocking, emergence, diffusion …it’s all here.

TIL (Today I learned) - Manuel Matuzović

At Clearleft, we’re always saying “Everything is a tiny lesson!”, so I love, love, love this bit of Manuel’s website where notes down short code snippets of little things he learns.

Unraveling The JPEG

A deep, deep, deep dive into the JPEG format. Best of all, it’s got interactive explanations you can tinker with, a la Nicky Case or Bret Victor.

Norbert Wiener’s Human Use of Human Beings is more relevant than ever.

What would Wiener think of the current human use of human beings? He would be amazed by the power of computers and the internet. He would be happy that the early neural nets in which he played a role have spawned powerful deep-learning systems that exhibit the perceptual ability he demanded of them—although he might not be impressed that one of the most prominent examples of such computerized Gestalt is the ability to recognize photos of kittens on the World Wide Web.

Interview with Kyle Simpson (O’Reilly Fluent Conference 2016) - YouTube

I missed this when it was first posted three years ago, but now I think I’ll be revisiting this 12 minute interview every few months.

Everything that Kyle says here is spot on, nuanced, and thoughtful. He talks about abstraction, maintainability, learning, and complexity.

I want a transcript of the whole thing.

Front-end Developer Handbook 2019 - Learn the entire JavaScript, CSS and HTML development practice!

The 2019 edition of Cody Lindley’s book is a good jumping-off point with lots of links to handy resources.

Why you should learn vanilla JS first | Go Make Things

Frameworks (arguably) make building complex applications easier, but they make doing simple stuff more complex.

And that’s why I think people should learn vanilla JS first. I’ve had many students who tried to learn frameworks get frustated, quit, and focus on vanilla JS.

Some of them have gone back to frameworks later, and told me that knowing vanilla JS made it a lot easier for them to pick up frameworks afterwards.