The lovely folks at Goto Conference just released the high quality recordings of my talks at their Copenhagen edition earlier this month.

Fixing the image problem of the web using Machine Learning was a impromptu presentation as one of the presenters had to pull out and they needed another presentation.

Progressive Web Apps – return of the web talks about what PWAs mean to the web as a platform and features lots of Star Wars references.

My next GotoCon will be in Berlin on the 14th of November.

At the Microsoft/Mozilla Progressive Web Apps workshop in Seattle I ran into Chris Wilson and took the opportunity to interview him on Web Standards, JavaScript dependency and development complexity.

In this first interview we covered the need for JavaScript in today’s web and how old-school web standards stand up to today’s needs.

You can see the video and get the audio recording of our chat over at the Decoded blog:

Chris has been around the web block several times and knows a lot about standards and how developers make them applicable to various different environments. He worked on various browsers and has a high passion for the open web and empowering developers with standards and great browsers.

Here are the questions we covered:

• A current hot topic that seems to come up every few years is the dependency of web products on JavaScript, and if we could do without it. What is the current state there?
• Didn’t the confusion start when we invented the DOM and allowed for declarative and programmatic access to the document? JavaScript can create HTML and CSS and give us much more control over the outcome.
• One of the worries with Web Components was that it would allow developers to hide a lot of complexity in custom elements. Do we have a problem understanding that modules are meant to be simple?
• Isn’t part of the issue that the web was built on the premise of documents and that a nature of modules needs to be forced into it? CSS has cascade in its name, yet modules shouldn’t inherit styles from the document.
• Some functionality needed for modern interfaces seem to be achievable with competing standards. You can animate in CSS, JavaScript and in SVG. Do different standard working groups not talk to each other?
• Declarative functionality in CSS and HTML can be optimised by browser makers. When you – for example – create animations in JavaScript, we can’t do that for you. Is that a danger?
• A lot of JavaScript enhancements we see in browsers now is enhancing existing APIs instead of inventing new ones. Passive Event listeners is a great example. Is this something that will be the way forward?
• One thing that seems to be wasteful is that a lot of research that went into helper libraries in the past dies with them. YUI had a lot of great information about animation and interaction. Can we prevent this somehow?
• Do you feel that hacks die faster these days? Is a faster release schedule of browsers the solution to not keeping short-term solutions clog up the web?
• It amazes me what browsers allow me to do these days and create working layouts and readable fonts for me. Do you think developers don’t appreciate the complexity of standards and CSS enough?

At SmashingConf Freiburg this year I was lucky enough to find some time to sit down with Monica Dinculescu (@notwaldorf) and chat with her about Web Components, extending the web, JavaScript dependency and how to be a lazy but dedicated developer. I’m sorry about the sound of the recording and some of the harsher cuts but we’ve been interrupted by tourists trying to see the great building we were in who couldn’t read signs that it is closed for the day.

You can see the video and get the audio recording of our chat over at the Decoded blog:

I played a bit of devil’s advocate interviewing Monica as she has a lot of great opinions and the information to back up her point of view. It was very enjoyable seeing the current state of the web through the eyes of someone talented who just joined the party. It is far too easy for those who have been around for a long time to get stuck in a rut of trying not to break up with the past or considering everything broken as we’ve seen too much damage over the years. Not so Monica. She is very much of the opinion that we can trust developers to do the right thing and that by giving them tools to analyse their work the web of tomorrow will be great.

I’m happy that there are people like her in our market. It is good to pass the torch to those with a lot of dedication rather than those who are happy to use whatever works.

Over the last few weeks I was busy recording interviews with different exciting people of the web. Now I am happy to announce that the first edition of Decoded Chats is live on the new Decoded Blog.

In this first edition, I’m interviewing Rob Conery about his “Imposter Handbook“. We cover the issues of teaching development, how to deal with a constantly changing work environment and how to tackle diversity and integration.

We’ve got eight more interviews ready and more lined up. Amongst the people I talked to are Sarah Drasner, Monica Dinculescu, Ada-Rose Edwards, Una Kravets and Chris Wilson. The format of Decoded Chats is pretty open: interviews ranging from 15 minutes to 50 minutes about current topics on the web, trends and ideas with the people who came up with them.

Some are recorded in a studio (when I am in Seattle), others are Skype calls and yet others are off-the-cuff recordings at conferences.

Do you know anyone you’d like me to interview? Drop me a line on Twitter @codepo8 and I see what I can do :)

Also on Medium, in case you want to comment.

When I first heard about Crossfit, I thought it to be an excellent idea. I still do, to be fair:

• Short, very focused and intense workouts instead of time consuming exercise schedules
• No need for expensive and complex equipment; it is basically running and lifting heavy things
• A lot of the workouts use your own body weight instead of extra equipment
• A strong focus on good nutrition. Remove the stuff that is fattening and concentrate on what’s good for you

In essence, it sounded like the counterpoint to overly complex and expensive workouts we did before. You didn’t need expensive equipment. Some bars, ropes and tyres will do. There was also no need for a personal trainer, tailor-made outfits and queuing up for machines to be ready for you at the gym.

Fast forward a few years and you’ll see that we made Crossfit almost a running joke. You have overly loud Crossfit bros crashing weights in the gym, grunting and shouting and telling each other to “feel the burn” and “when you haven’t thrown up you haven’t worked out hard enough”. You have all kind of products branded Crossfit and even special food to aid your Crossfit workouts.

Thanks, commercialism and marketing. You made something simple and easy annoying and elitist again. There was no need for that.

One thing about Crossfit is that it can be dangerous. Without good supervision by friends it is pretty easy to seriously injure yourself. It is about moderation, not about competition.

I feel the same thing happened to JavaScript and it annoys me. JavaScript used to be an add-on to what we did on the web. It gave extra functionality and made it easier for our end users to finish the tasks they came for. It was a language to learn, not a lifestyle to subscribe to.

Nowadays JavaScript is everything. Client side use is only a small part of it. We use it to power servers, run tasks, define build processes and create fat client software. And everybody has an opinionated way to use it and is quick to tell others off for “not being professional” if they don’t subscribe to it. The brogrammer way of life rears its ugly head.

Let’s think of JavaScript like Crossfit was meant to be. Lean, healthy exercise going back to what’s good for you:

• Use your body weight – on the client, if something can be done with HTML, let’s do it with HTML. When we create HTML with JavaScript, let’s create what makes sense, not lots of DIVs.
• Do the heavy lifting – JavaScript is great to make complex tasks easier. Use it to create simpler interfaces with fewer reloads. Change user input that was valid but not in the right format. Use task runners to automate annoying work. However, if you realise that the task is a nice to have and not a need, remove it instead. Use worker threads to do heavy computation without clobbering the main UI.
• Watch what you consume – keep dependencies to a minimum and make sure that what you depend on is reliable, safe to use and update-able.
• Run a lot – performance is the most important part. Keep your solutions fast and lean.
• Stick to simple equipment – it is not about how many “professional tools” we use. It is about keeping it easy for people to start working out.
• Watch your calories – we have a tendency to use too much on the web. Libraries, polyfills, frameworks. Many of these make our lives easier but weigh heavy on our end users. It’s important to understand that our end users don’t have our equipment. Test your products on a cheap Android on a flaky connection, remove what isn’t needed and make it better for everyone.
• Eat good things – browsers are evergreen and upgrade continuously these days. There are a lot of great features to use to make your products better. Visit “Can I use” early and often and play with new things that replace old cruft.
• Don’t be a code bro – nobody is impressed with louts that constantly tell people off for not being as fit as they are. Be a code health advocate and help people get into shape instead.

JavaScript is much bigger these days than a language to learn in a day. That doesn’t mean, however, that every new developer needs to know the whole stack to be a useful contributor. Let’s keep it simple and fun.