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You might not need JavaScript

youmightnotneedjs.com

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Re: You might not need JavaScript

#171

Post by Jazcash »

Some of these are ok, but others are just misusing features for their intended purpose. An input gaining focus is not the same as a click event. Using the :checked peudoselector to keep client-side state is not an alternative to using JS.

Using HTML/CSS hackery where you should be using JS instead creates an anti-SEO, non-semantic mess that causes headaches for others to work on and nightmares for anybody needing to extend or modify functionality.

Don't get me wrong, I love pure CSS solutions and try to use them as much as possible where it makes sense. But sometimes, it definitely doesn't make sense. JS isn't something users or developers should be scared of anymore, it's much better supported and much less intrusive than it used to be.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#172

Post by nkassis »

nfriedly wrote: post #143

When I was hired on the Watson team, the first thing they asked me to do was help improve performance of their AngularJS-based website. It was all-around slow, especially for the initial page view. I stripped out AngularJS and most of the other JavaScript, and published a website that was almost pure static HTML. It loaded very quickly. My manager thought it was hilarious - his "JavaScript expert" came in and deleted…

I've had interview candidates for frontend developer positions who only know how to build web pages using frameworks like Angular and React. They don't seem to understand how those frameworks work but essentially patch together a bunch of example online to get something going. It's truly unfortunate that many beginner web development tutorial introduce these technologies first in my view. Without giving new developers understanding basics of the web platform they get siloed into only knowing one way to do things and it results in using the wrong tools for the job as this example shows.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#173

Post by nkassis »

klodolph wrote: post #147
agumonkey wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More than hilarious, I find it a serious skill manifestation.

A large percentage of the "very skilled" developers I know will much sooner brag about how much code they deleted or didn't write than how much code they wrote.

Lazyness is a virtue for software engineers in my opinion.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#174

Post by 20years »

nfriedly wrote: post #143

When I was hired on the Watson team, the first thing they asked me to do was help improve performance of their AngularJS-based website. It was all-around slow, especially for the initial page view. I stripped out AngularJS and most of the other JavaScript, and published a website that was almost pure static HTML. It loaded very quickly. My manager thought it was hilarious - his "JavaScript expert" came in and deleted…

I would say that is what makes you truly a "JavaScript expert". Knowing when to use it and when not to but most importantly knowing how to implement alternative solutions when needed.

It would be cool to see the before (with AngularJS) & after (pure HTML) of this.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#175

Post by AffluentApe »

nfriedly wrote: post #143

When I was hired on the Watson team, the first thing they asked me to do was help improve performance of their AngularJS-based website. It was all-around slow, especially for the initial page view. I stripped out AngularJS and most of the other JavaScript, and published a website that was almost pure static HTML. It loaded very quickly. My manager thought it was hilarious - his "JavaScript expert" came in and deleted…

I've been a Frontend Dev for almost 5 years now. I feel a large part of performance is knowing when and where to remove unnecessary JS.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#176

Post by valarauca1 »

Semiapies wrote: post #54

You might not, but you probably do. The validation examples and input types are a case in point. Even on browsers where they work, the alerts can't be styled and the behaviors can't be controlled.

Or you can just respond with a "Bad Input" static HTML page.

Your Back End should be validating the Front End. As it is possible for people to make their own HTTP Post messages to your Back End. This is actually fairly trivial to do if you can use wireshark+curl/hippie/wget.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#178

Post by BinaryIdiot »

robinson7d wrote: post #168
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #58

So let's show off what you can do without JavaScript...but also include SCSS as a dependency when the opening paragraph complains about a JavaScript dependency? Madness...but I digress. Some of these are cool examples. Others, like the modal, won't scale very well because now you can trigger modals by tabbing (breaks keyboard navigation) or most of the form examples as you'll likely hit many endpoints that require JS…

None of these requires SCSS at all. You may verify by grabbing the SCSS they provide in the codepen and pasting it into http://www.sassmeister.com/ Most examples are equally compact in plain old CSS. In fact, many of them are just plain CSS displayed in a window labeled "SCSS". The places using SCSS seem like they're simply being more sane in allowing a user to change numbers trivially. Instead of saying "just change…

> I'm not saying that I disagree with your assertion that CSS is a bad place to layer logic from a maintainability standpoint; I'm more pointing out that blaming it on SCSS makes no sense in this context

I don't see where I blamed anything on SCSS just found it amusing the page purports to axe dependencies (JavaScript) but uses SCSS. The rest of my post is far more on topic and interesting. Everyone is focusing on my SCSS poke though, heh.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#179

Post by BinaryIdiot »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #92
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they're different but the article mentions JavaScript as a dependency. SCSS would also be a dependency it just comes into the stack at a different place but it's there nonetheless. Regardless my other points still stand.

One is a server-side depencency and one is a client-side dependency. Don't conflate them.

I never did conflate them. I've worked in this industry for 12 years now. I really don't get the disconnect here. I called it a dependency because it is and everyone is trying to tell me it's a different type of dependency. Well no shit but that was never my point to begin with.

My point was hijacked and contorted here.

Re: You might not need JavaScript

#180

Post by noobermin »

nkassis wrote: post #172
nfriedly wrote: post #143

When I was hired on the Watson team, the first thing they asked me to do was help improve performance of their AngularJS-based website. It was all-around slow, especially for the initial page view. I stripped out AngularJS and most of the other JavaScript, and published a website that was almost pure static HTML. It loaded very quickly. My manager thought it was hilarious - his "JavaScript expert" came in and deleted…

I've had interview candidates for frontend developer positions who only know how to build web pages using frameworks like Angular and React. They don't seem to understand how those frameworks work but essentially patch together a bunch of example online to get something going. It's truly unfortunate that many beginner web development tutorial introduce these technologies first in my view. Without giving new developer…

Here's another perspective. I started learning JS in reverse and ended up just creating my own framework because it was less verbose. But you would hire me over your patch-and-patch fellows?

Perhaps the right answer is to code know the basics but also have a handle on the popular frameworks too.

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