Hello 👋🏼 frontendies! Welcome to the seventh issue of our newsletter!
It was a relatively uneventful month: some platform updates on features we heard a couple months ago, cool tools, and pretty nice major release of Prettier. Other than that, it looks like everyone uses summertime properly - taking a break 🏖 That or Threads App sucked us in, and we're just mindlessly scrolling through Zuckenverse 🤷🏼♂️ Either way, I hope you enjoy this month's newsletter - happy reading!
The latest version of Google's Chrome, Chrome 115, has arrived with exciting new features. Experience smooth scroll-driven animations, fenced frames, a new privacy-respecting way to embed content, and the Topics API. I think ScrollTimeline is worth paying attention to. It's currently only available in Chrome, but it looks really cool nonetheless!
TC39 got a new proposal on the table: a?.b = c. This nifty little feature would let you assign a property to an object, but only if that object actually exists. No more guarding assignments with an if statement! It's still in the early stages, but keep an eye on this one!
Have you heard of CSS nesting? It enables you to nest a style rule within another, creating a Russian doll-style effect for style rules. Previously, this was only achievable with a CSS pre-processor. However, most browsers, including Chrome, Edge, Safari, and Firefox, now support this feature. Firefox 117 was the final piece of the puzzle and is anticipated to be released by the end of August!
It has been a long journey for CSS Subgrid to reach production, but it seems that the final browser, Chrome, is planning to release it in version 117. This means that it should be available on all four browsers by September. Personally, I am excited for this feature to finally arrive. Go Grid!
Last month, I missed some important news - Apple has finally improved the PWA experience on MacOS Sonoma. Users can now add websites to their Home Screen or Dock, giving them a more app-like experience. This may not seem like a huge deal, but having Apple's support could indicate that PWAs are preparing for their prime time!
I absolutely love Chrome dev tools! It's amazing how many features it has, and even after using it for years, I keep finding new ones. If you're already familiar with it, there are even more cool features to discover, like network response header override, CSS custom property previews, autofill debugging for forms, inline editors for CSS and animations, and accessibility audits. Check out Addy's thread for more details.
The beta version of Material Web Components is out! The updated components include dynamic color, support for native HTML forms, enhanced accessibility, and bug fixes. The complete 1.0 release is scheduled for Q3 2023 but you can start experimenting now! 🚀
Prettier 3.0 is here, and it's prettier than ever! The team has migrated to using ECMAScript Modules for all their source code - finally, we should be able to use ESM configs without any weirdness! There are also some breaking changes to markdown formatting, and the plugin interface got a major makeover, now supporting plugins written using ECMAScript Modules and async parsers.
Get ready to add some color to your coding life! Randoma11y is a cool tool that promises to generate random yet accessible color pairs for your projects. No more squinting at the screen trying to figure out if your color combo is a hit or miss. Let Randoma11y do the work and keep your designs vibrant and user-friendly!
Astro was featured in almost every issue. Still, this time around, I have a perfect excuse - view transitions 🚀 This standard has been getting a lot of traction in recent weeks and may be one of the most anticipated features for upcoming months/years. Are we getting close to saying farewell to our old friend, SPA? 🤷🏼♂️
In a recent update, Vite 4.4 included experimental support for Lightning CSS, which I previously wrote about. This new feature has the potential to further enhance the already incredibly fast performance of Vite.
Nicholas C. Zakas offers valuable insights and recommendations on how to effectively manage tech lead time and interruptions. I highly recommend reading this article to avoid learning these lessons the hard way.
Karl Groves argues that focusing on whether a website works with a specific assistive technology, like JAWS, is a flawed approach to web accessibility and a rather weak legal defense.
Software is like a car - it's meant to take people from point A to B, making their lives easier and better. So, while it's cool to geek out over the latest programming languages and frameworks, remember the real goal: delivering value to users.
Want updates like that every month?
Sign up for our newsletter!