On Our Radar This Week: Does JavaScript Suck?

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Animating CSS and making it last.

Spinner - red circle to green square to blue triangle
Alex caught our attention this week with a challenge to recreate this GIF image using just HTML and CSS, where a green square morphs to a blue triangle and then to a red circle. It’s quite the challenge, which has me tempted to use Marka for beautiful icon transformations.

We’re also seeing that CSS can be used to achieve a beautiful front cover of The Hobbit bending open and closed, with access to the CodePen code to see how it’s done.

Much of the above is achieved using strange tricks and techniques. If instead you want your CSS code to endure without needing to be updated, here’s how you can write long-lasting style sheets for rapidly changing, long-lived projects.

Why JavaScript sucks, and how to make it better

Some controversial information about JavaScript arrived on our doorstep today, asking why does JavaScript suck? The article provides good details about issues with its presentation, quirks within the language, and a whole range of annoyances that are important to be aware of. Such problems are vital to know so you can try to steer away from them when developing your own code.

A nice talk took place this month at the Sud Web Conference with JavaScript coding tips, featuring an analysis of GitHub commits to know which conventions are popular, before moving on to style-guide recommendations found in the meta code style guide. Whichever styles you prefer to work with, when working with other people it’s vital to have agreement on a consistent coding style to prevent issues later on.

Taking things further, John Resig has an interesting series on learning advanced JavaScript where you can code live on the page and try out different ways to achieve things. We’ve also been reminded this week about a definitive source of the best JavaScript libraries, frameworks, and plugins.

Hyperlapse videos

Microsoft have also announced an algorithm for first-person Hyperlapse videos that takes the footage and stabilises it to the point where even when played back at ten times the speed, it’s a smooth presentation that’s easy and enjoyable to view. It’ll be great to see what people come up with.

That’s it from us this week, thanks for joining us.

Which links caught your attention? How did you manage Alex’s coding challenge, and do you agree JavaScript sucks? We would love to hear your thoughts.

Paul WilkinsPaul Wilkins
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I'm a web developer living in Christchurch (thanks for all the quakes) where JavaScript is my forte. When off the computer I volunteer down at the local community centre, or enjoy playing tabletop games such as Carcassonne or Stone Age with friends.

css animationcss challengejavascriptnewsstyle guide
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