Three Cool (to me) Node.js Features / / No Comments I’ve been using Node.js on the regular now for probably over a decade, but one thing I’ve never done well is keep up to date with its features and new additions. In general, my brain just thinks "use javascript" and that’s all. The last time I really cared about what precisely was supported was when I was using fetch in client-side JavaScript and it wasn’t supported natively in Node. Luckily I could just use node-fetch and be done with it. That being said, I recognize I’ve not done a great job of keeping track of updates to Node itself so I try to notice it when folks mention it. Over the past week or so I’ve encountered not one, not two, but three... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Cool, features, Node.js, three
I’m So Old: Web Edition / / No Comments Time can be a funny thing. I still remember discovering HTML, CSS, and JavaScript coding. I still remember my first college programming course. I still remember my first day at my first coding job, then my first day at my second coding job, and then my first day at Mozilla. I still remember my first day coding for MetaMask. This year marks my 20th year as a professional software engineer and it’s happened in the blink of an eye. Every once in a while I will make an old programming reference to a much younger engineer and then realize they have no idea what I’m talking about. I’m so old… Webpage layouts were being done with <table>s and this new “CSS float”... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Edition, I’m
Responding to HTML Changes in a Web Component / / No Comments While driving my kids to school this morning, I had an interesting thought. Is it possible for a web component to recognize, and respond, when its inner DOM contents have changed? Turns out of course it is, and the answer isn’t really depenedant on web components, but is a baked-in part of the web platform, the MutationObserver. Here’s what I built as a way to test it out. The Initial Web Component # I began with a simple web component that had the following simple feature – count the number of images inside it and report. So we can start with this HTML: <img-counter> <p> <img src="https://placehold.co/60x40"> </p> <div> <img src="https://placehold.co/40x40"> </div> <img... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: changes, Component, HTML, Responding
Using Intl.RelativeTimeFormat for Localized Relative Timings / / No Comments I’ve been singing the praises of the web platform’s Intl object for years now, but it still continues to impress me. While I’ve seen it before, today I came across the RelativeTimeFormat API which looks absolutely fabulous. I played with it a bit and thought I’d share some tips. The Basics # The RelativeTimeFormat API works like so: Given a locale… Given a difference (in either a positive or negative value)… And given a unit of time, like ‘hour’ (or ‘hours’) Report the difference in the user’s desired language. So for example: 3 and day, "in 3 days" -1 and day, "one day ago" 18 and hour, "in 18 hours" Also,... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Intl.RelativeTimeFormat, Localized, Relative, Timings, using
Converting a Vue 2 App to Alpine.js / / No Comments A little over two years ago I published an "idle clicker game" built in Vue.js. I called it "IdleFleet" and was heavily inspired by games like A Dark Room, where I relied on simple text graphics and game mechanics that would change as you played. In my last <Code><Br> session, I walked through the process of building a simple text game and brought up IdleFleet as an example. While playing the game to refresh my memory about what I actually built… I discovered I actually really liked it. I decided it would be good to give it some attention with new features and other updates, but before I could do that, I knew I needed to switch from Vue to Alpine.js. Why... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Alpine.js, Converting
TIL – submit() versus requestSubmit() / / No Comments Today I learned (well, technically, a few days ago, the week has been a lot), that the web platform supports a requestSubmit method. Since the beginning of time (or the beginning of JavaScript), we’ve been able to submit forms like so: var myForm = document.getElementById('theform');myForm.submit(); I intentionally used getElementById there as a reminder of what we had before jQuery. Given that, why do we need another method? Two important requests. Reason the First # When using submit, any validation of form fields is completely skipped. Consider this form: <form method="post" id="theForm"> <p> <label for="name">Name</label> <input... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: requestSubmit, submit, versus
Testing Multiple Variations of Generative AI Prompts / / No Comments In nearly all of my recent explorations of Generative AI, I’ve come to realize how important prompts are. That hasn’t necessarily translated me into writing better prompts all the time, but being aware of the problem is at least one step towards correcting it, right? One of the things that I thought would help me personally would be to have a tool to quickly compare and contrast different prompts. Obviously, I could just open up multiple tabs in a browser, but I really wanted something more direct and simplified for my purposes. With that in mind, let me share what I’ve built. Prompt Tester # Prompt Tester is my incredibly imaginatively named tool to… um… test prompts.... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Generative, multiple, Prompts, Testing, Variations
Adding a Guestbook to Your Jamstack Site (Yes, Seriously) / / No Comments Don’t do this. I’m serious. Or do it, I certainly don’t listen to reason when it comes to building demos. I’ve been in web development for a very, very long time, and I’ve seen many trends come and go. Guestbooks were a way for folks to leave a comment on your site as a whole. I haven’t seen one in ages, but some still linger. In fact, Ana Rodrigues has an absolutely lovely guestbook driven by Webmentions. And if you really want to, you can still download a Perl CGI guestbook over at Matt’s Script Archive. I haven’t written Perl in decades, but I absolutely loved it back in the 90s. That being said, I had a free hour yesterday, was bored, and decided,... more → Posted in: JavaScript Tagged with: Adding, Guestbook, Jamstack, Seriously, Site