The Elements of UI Engineering - Overreacted

The Great CSS Expansion | Butler’s Log

Web development follows a familiar cycle. First we glue together a solution with whatever we have — JavaScript, image hacks, Flash, anything. Then the platform matures, and CSS or HTML eventually makes that same workaround native. Rounded corners, custom fonts, smooth scrolling, sticky positioning: all of these started as JavaScript-heavy hacks before CSS turned them into a single declaration.

We are in another one of those transition moments. A new wave of long-requested CSS features is finally landing, and many of them are explicitly designed to replace patterns that used to require JavaScript. Not as approximations — as first-class platform primitives that handle the edge cases, run in the right thread, and need zero dependencies.

Reduce the JS Workload with no- or lo-JS options

This is an excellent one-stop shop of interface patterns:

This is an organic collection of common JS patterns that can be replaced with just HTML, CSS, and no, or very low, JS. As HTML and CSS continue to mature, this collection should expand.

NoLoJS: Reducing the JS Workload with HTML and CSS - Web Performance Calendar

You might not need (much) JavaScript for these common interface patterns.

While we all love the power and flexibility JS provides, we should also respect it, and our users, by limiting its use to only what it needs to do.

Yes! Client-side JavaScript should do what only client-side JavaScript can do.

How to Make Websites That Will Require Lots of Your Time and Energy - Jim Nielsen’s Blog

1. Install Stuff Indiscriminately From npm
2. Pick a Framework Before You Know You Need One
3. Always, Always Require a Compilation Step

But what if I really want a faster horse? | exotext

Overall, consistency, user control, and actual UX innovation are in decline. Everything is converging on TikTok—which is basically TV with infinite channels. You don’t control anything except the channel switch. It’s like Carcinisation, a form of convergent evolution where unrelated crustaceans all evolve into something vaguely crab-shaped.