Micro Components proposal, the joy of web with games, costly cloud mistakes and analysing 42 programming languages in one month.
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WeAreDevelopers Dev Digest

Issue 142 - All the components are here

Hello fellow developer, we want to know how we can do better, we have a video to rediscover the joy of the web with games and a brand new proposal to make Components on the web easier. So, dig in! 

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News and Articles

We've been busy with some great articles on our magazine. First of all, we wonder if junior developers an endangered species because of AI and we have an interesting proposal of Micro Components, a different approach to a component-based web. 

If you always wondered what happens when you enter a URL, exploring the browser rendering process has all the details. Companies seem to be a leaving the cloud, as discussed in the the rise of cloud repatriation and it is not surprising, considering that wrong WebSocket usage could result in a $1M AWS bill. The Swiss army knife of video and image conversion, FFmpeg is now 94x faster after moving it to handwritten AVX-512 assembly code. HTML has some new interface features and it may be hard to differentiate between popovers and dialogs. Furthermore, details/ summary are becoming easier to style. Justine Tunney gave llamafile a syntax highlighter and she had to analyse the grammar of 42 languages in one month.

Code and Tools

JavaScript has an operator you may not now about, ??= which makes default values much simpler and there are some good JavaScript dos and donts to follow. If you want to create games with web technology, there is a step-by-step guide how to create a breakout game and a collection of Three.js resources. Centering things are a solved problem so skip the CSS jokes. Copying ChatGPT code is not easy, but you can add a "copy" button with a browser extension. If you want to use AI on-device here are learnings about running local LLMs. MacOS has a terminal network speed checker - networkQuality - and other useful built-in command-line utilities.

Some tools for you: 

  • npmpackage.info - detailed information about npm packages.
  • Easily download files and directories from a GitHub repository.
  • An syntax highlighter with TextMate grammars + VSCode themes.
  • Frontend Boilerplates to get you started.

Cool code demos

water simulation in JavaSxcript
Rectangles animation

Water

Rects 3D

Talks and Videos

Nolen Royalty Thumbnail copy

Nolen Royalty is the brain behind the viral 1 million checkboxes game, created a blinking competition with strangers and Flappy Bird in MacOS Finder. We caught up with him for Coffee with Developers to talk about how to rediscover the joy of the web of the early 2000s. Learn how just "messing around" is a grand thing.

Other videos and talk write-ups of note:

  • Alexander Günsche - Interface Contracts in Microfrontend Architectures  
  • Daniel Savenkov - Beyond Autocomplete: Local AI Code Completion

Events

ATD positive

Advanced Technology Days returns to Zagreb on November 28th, 2024, bringing together top professionals and influential speakers who push the boundaries of IT innovation. Join a vibrant community of tech leaders and enthusiasts for two days packed with insights and transformative networking opportunities. Explore the future of IT and elevate your expertise — secure your place now!

Work and Jobs

One question in interviews that always feels odd is what you would like to be paid - as "competitive salary" doesn't mean much. Here's a detailed guide how to answer salary expectations questions. Sticking with interviews, there are bad questions for Senior Frontend Developers to avoid. Habits of great engineers lists some good things you could apply to get ahead. Much like junior developers are endangered, it seems that hands-on engineering managers are going away. Another thing that is debated are the concept of sprints as they are taking the joy out of building software. And in the "AI does horrible things" arena, it seems that automatic resume-screening has a bias favouring white males.

Are you looking for opportunities or fancy a change? How about these?
  • Blockchain Developer at Crypton Studio
  • Staff /Principal Engineer - Golang & Distributed Systems at Impossible Cloud
  • Senior Developer in Berlin at Expert Systems AG
  • Senior Softwareentwickler*in at Aktion Mensch e.V.
  • Solution Engineer at shopware AG
More jobs here: Remote positions - Germany - Austria

Some companies to check out are:

Expert Systems AG - shopware AG - msg - ALDI SÜD - Dirk Rossmann

Procrastination Corner / Wonderful Weird Web

  • Your name in Landsat
  • Audio drawing tool

What's happening at WeAreDevelopers…

WeAreDevelopers LIVE, our online events. Next, on 20/11, is Accessibility Day. We always look for presenters, and you can apply here.

WeAreDevelopers World Congress returns 9-11 July 2025. Secure your ticket with a 15% discount using code "devdigest"

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