Web Developer Monthly Newsletter 💻🚀

Welcome to the 74th issue of Web Developer Monthly!

If it’s your first time here, welcome, I like you already. If you want the full back story on the newsletter, head here.

The quick version: I curate and share the most important articles, news, resources, podcasts, and videos from the world of web and software development.

Think the Pareto Principle (80/20 rule) meeting the programming world. I give you the 20% that will get you 80% of the results.

If you're a long time reader, welcome back old friend.

Alright, let's not waste any valuable time and jump right into this month's updates.

Here's what you missed in August 2024 as a Web Developer…

Porffor Making Waves 🏄🏻‍♂️

A really cool development this month is the creation of Porffor: a unique JS engine/compiler/runtime, compiling JS code to WebAssembly or native ahead-of-time.

Why does this matter?

Because JavaScript is usually Just-in-Time (execution in the browser). The idea is to compile it ahead of time before it's executed by the user so it's even faster. Still experimental but a very cool concept!

You want more details on JIT vs AOT here it is.

What Does Google Do With JS? 👩🏻‍🦯‍➡️

The team at Vercel tried to figure out how Google is using JavaScript and reading JS heavy websites when they index/crawl websites. They debunked several common myths about Google's handling of JavaScript-heavy websites.

Here are the key takeaways and actionable recommendations.

Main takeaway: Google can effectively render and index JavaScript content, including complex SPAs, dynamically loaded content, and streamed content.

React News 💎

React... it's still mostly everyone's favourite frontend library. What crazy things have they been up to?

1. A great writeup of a developer who implemented React from scratch. It's a great read to show you how React works under the hood.

2. React, with its addition of Server Components and Server Actions, is evolving into a full-stack framework. Once the most popular frontend framework, it has now successfully bridged the gap between frontend and backend to reign over both sides of the chasm. Speaking of....

React === Angular? 👯

"Angular and React are essentially the same framework", said Angular lead Minko Gechev.

I actually agree: React got popular by being a simple view library, but now with the recommendation of using NextJS or Remix, and all the other tooling around it, it's becoming a framework like Angular... and they all are just starting to do the same thing.

History will repeat itself... my bold prediction: jQuery is going to make a comeback for those wanting a lightweight solution ;)

npm Garbage Patch 🧌

70% of new NPM packages in last 6 months were spam. The problem of junk/spam packages are increasing and you need to be extra careful that the packages you download for your projects are trusted and have stood the test of time. Never fully trust a 3rd party package!

P.s. here is a guide to creating a proper NPM package in 2024.

The Ultimate CSS Grid Guide 🦾

CSS grid can get confusing, so how about you check out this ultimate guide on CSS Grid. You will come out the other end knowing way more than you should.

Or you can take our CSS Bootcamp if you're a ZTM Academy member 😎.

Regexes Got Good 💅

The history lesson you never thought you needed: The History And Future Of Regular Expressions In JavaScript.

More interesting than you might think even though it's on the topic of the most boring thing in the world.

WD40 and JavaScript 🪜

How I won $2,750 using JavaScript, AI, and a can of WD-40.

I love stories like these that show you how using your skills in problem solving, combined with coding, and a little creativity, can have pretty neat results. Hope this inspires you!

Become An Open Source God ⛩

Who doesn't want to be an Open Source contributor to a big project...like Chromium/Google Chrome web browser. Sounds impossible?

Well, this person managed to do it as a first time contributor. This is a great inspiring read.

New Libraries and Tools 🗿

There are a ton of shiny new libraries and tools every month which is why I have this dedicated section for them...

• Free public APIs for your next personal or portfolio project. You're welcome.

• Material UI v6 is out! One of the old school popular UI library which celebrates its 10th year.

• Rspack is a new JavaScript bundler written in Rust... not another bundler!

News Around the World 🗺

Artificial intelligence’s progress in areas like customer service and content creation is at risk due to a phenomenon known as “model collapse,” where AI models, when trained on data that includes their own previous outputs, gradually produce less accurate and reliable content.

This recursive training loop degrades the model’s performance and can lead to poorer decision-making, reduced content quality, and increased biases. To prevent this, it’s essential to use high-quality human-generated data, maintain transparency in training methods, and periodically refresh models with new, diverse data to preserve AI’s effectiveness and relevance. - Forbes.

I know a few developers who are using older version of models because they produce better results and have less "socially acceptable guardrails" added to their training. Keep an eye out on this space.

Big Tech News 🏢

• Epic Games Store and Fortnite arrive on EU iPhones. In shocking news, EU has required Apple to allow 3rd party marketplaces. This is a small step in installing an app, but a giant leap for digital freedom, and also a giant leap for spam apps.

• Don't worry, Apple still has a stronghold on the app store. In other news, Apple says Patreon must switch to its billing system or risk removal from App Store (so they can get that sweet 30% commish 😉).

• Nvidia keeps making money: Nvidia Revenue Jumps 122% in Positive Sign for Tech’s A.I. Boom. Revenue was $30.04 billion in the quarter, surpassing its $28 billion estimate in May. Net income rose to $16.95 billion from $6.19 billion a year ago, eclipsing the most recent quarterly profits of Meta and Amazon. Apparently that's not good enough as the stock fell by as much as 7 percent in after-hours trading when they announced this... shrug

Completely useless to your career but still great 🙃

• Building Lego Machines to Destroy Tall Lego Towers. Do I need to say more?

• All of Earth's water in a single sphere! It's shocking how little water there actually is on this planet.

• YouTube as an actual TV with channel. Is this better for your attention?

Best Resource of the Month ✅

It's not often that I share a podcast for the Best Resource of the Month... as a matter of fact, this might be only the 2nd time in all these years. It's also a 3 hour podcast but I guarantee it will blow your mind and inspire you.

The big takeaway is to not always focus on the latest trends, over complicating things, and especially focusing on meaningless minutia. Focus on solving a problem and ship. Oh and using PHP and jQuery isn't the end of the world.

Trust me on this one, it will make you a better programmer:

Pieter Levels: Programming, Viral AI Startups, and Digital Nomad Life | Lex Fridman Podcast

Trick of the Month 🌗

Be a real hacker. Stop typing your LLM commands on the web. Use the terminal instead: ell - A command-line interface for LLMs written in Bash.

Thanks for reading!

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See you next month! ❤️

By the way, I teach people how to code and get hired in the most efficient way possible as an Instructor at the Zero To Mastery Academy. You can see a few of our most popular courses below or see all ZTM courses here.