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Advice to Young Web Developers

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Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#61

Post by jjoonathan »

non-entity wrote: post #17
mroche wrote: post #5

> Browsers change. Relying on browser-specific behavior means you’re relying on that one browser at that one point in time. Code to the standard, and test everywhere. I wish this was listed at the top of the list, in the middle, and at the end. It’s super annoying when a site or application isn’t “supported” because it wasn’t tested in a separate browser (i.e. non-Chrome browsers). I know it’s not always easy with a…

Nothing pisses me off like getting a message that some website only supports Chrome in 2020

It's so sad that it became "acceptable" to not test in Firefox (as estimated by the number of sites I randomly encounter that don't work in FF but do in Chrome) right around the time that Firefox Quantum happened and Firefox became good again :(

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#62

Post by robertoandred »

speedgoose wrote: post #37
cglace wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one that drives me crazy are websites that say they only support safari on iOS... It’s all safari under the hood.

Safari on iOs is a bit special. Some features are missing compared to the Mac version. You also need quite a few safari ios specific code if you want to build a web app. But this is a bit broken since Apple wants you to publish to the appstore and not release web apps anymore. You also need a Mac to debug safari on iOs. I hate Safari.

If anything, the Mac version is missing features compared to the iOS version...

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#63

Post by robertoandred »

masa331 wrote: post #41
osrec wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another big reason is that developers want to deliver a specific user experience that is simply not possible with the default page loading functionality of most browsers.

You mean the specific experience when back buttons aren't working? Or when urls don't make sense? Or when you can't just share the content by copying the url because it no longer identifies the conten? Or when you can't say if something is loading, missing, or broken? This is my user experience with SPAs regarding navigation.

Use better SPAs.

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#64

Post by naugtur »

orev wrote: post #47
speedgoose wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Safari on iOs is a bit special. Some features are missing compared to the Mac version. You also need quite a few safari ios specific code if you want to build a web app. But this is a bit broken since Apple wants you to publish to the appstore and not release web apps anymore. You also need a Mac to debug safari on iOs. I hate Safari.

The point being made is that if you use Chrome or Firefox on IOS, it’s still actually the Safari engine.

Actually, it's less than that. Safari doesn't share some of the features. IIRC one if them is service workers.

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#65

Post by ogre_codes »

paxys wrote: post #48
CM30 wrote: post #18

Seems like a list of every web development ideal that gets upvoted on Hacker News. Still, I think the list can pretty much condensed down to one point: Use whatever technology is appropriate for this site or web app. Because a lot of developers seem to have a 'when all you have is a hammer' attitude towards web development. They learn React/Vue/Angular/whatever, then seemingly decide everything they will ever build w…

> Your documentation doesn't need to be an SPA. Disagree with this. Having the entire documentation site working as normal on my browser when I have bad/no internet connectivity is extremely useful.

Don't need a SPA for that. Local HTML based documentation was a thing long before SPA was even a term.

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#67

Post by paxys »

ogre_codes wrote: post #65
paxys wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your documentation doesn't need to be an SPA. Disagree with this. Having the entire documentation site working as normal on my browser when I have bad/no internet connectivity is extremely useful.

Don't need a SPA for that. Local HTML based documentation was a thing long before SPA was even a term.

How does that work exactly?

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#68

Post by duskwuff »

paxys wrote: post #67
ogre_codes wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't need a SPA for that. Local HTML based documentation was a thing long before SPA was even a term.

How does that work exactly?

It's literally just a folder full of perfectly normal HTML files. You don't need Javascript or a SPA to double-click one of those and look at it in a browser.

Even better, if your operating system has full-text file indexing, it'll be able to search them normally.

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#69

Post by at_a_remove »

tobr wrote: post #57
mroche wrote: post #5

> Browsers change. Relying on browser-specific behavior means you’re relying on that one browser at that one point in time. Code to the standard, and test everywhere. I wish this was listed at the top of the list, in the middle, and at the end. It’s super annoying when a site or application isn’t “supported” because it wasn’t tested in a separate browser (i.e. non-Chrome browsers). I know it’s not always easy with a…

It’s good advice (like most of the list!) but I’m not sure expecting a beginner[1] to “code to the standard” is realistic. The standard (i.e the spec) isn’t beginner-friendly. You learn by trying things out and seeing what happens. 1: Assuming they meant for the advice to apply to beginners rather than young developers - what age they are seems irrelevant.

I don't know about that.

Okay, this was long ago, but we had to roll out a new top-level website. I decided to be a complete hardass about it. Everything would validate, both for HTML and CSS. I would follow ADA standards as well as I could understand them. I dutifully tried things out in lynx. I even made some print style sheets (a new concept at the time). However, I had almost nothing to test on.

I got a lot of flak for being slow, we should hurry this up, and so on. And yet the emails would come in later from the higher ups, "Wow, this works on my Blackberry!" I had no access to such a device, but plodding adherence to various guidelines, as dull as they were, saved my bacon there. Even the disability folks I could find seemed pleased.

It isn't "move fast and break things" but you can reap a few benefits out of it.

Re: Advice to Young Web Developers

#70

Post by ehutch79 »

masa331 wrote: post #41
osrec wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another big reason is that developers want to deliver a specific user experience that is simply not possible with the default page loading functionality of most browsers.

You mean the specific experience when back buttons aren't working? Or when urls don't make sense? Or when you can't just share the content by copying the url because it no longer identifies the conten? Or when you can't say if something is loading, missing, or broken? This is my user experience with SPAs regarding navigation.

If an spa is behaving like that, the coders have failed at their job.
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