Weeknotes 23:29

September 11, 2023

Week of September 3–9

The State of CSS 2023 survey results

Back in July, I participated in The State of CSS 2023 survey. The results from the survey were recently released. I briefly looked through the results on my own earlier in the week. I watched two different videos that took a look at the results. The first video included several of the people involved with the survey.

The State of CSS 2023 Party: Results, Predictions & More! (YouTube)

Is Tailwind Taking Over CSS? (and some other insights) (Kevin Powell on results of The State of CSS 2023 survey)

There was not anything particularly surprising to me. I enjoyed watching these videos and hearing the insights from the group and from Kevin. I learned a lot from what they observed. I was impressed with all the different ways you can view the data and create custom data views. Kudos to Sacha and his team.

The loss of a Web pioneer

Wednesday came with news of the death of Molly E. Holzschlag. She was a tireless advocate for the open Web and for accessibility. She fought hard for Web standards and had a huge personality.

I was aware of Molly but did not follow her or actively read the things she wrote. I mostly saw what others said about her on Twitter. I did hear her speak once at the UI 10 Conference in Boston in 2005. Her influence was more indirect on me but I am guessing it is pretty significant.

Many times over the course of the week, I thought about what I wanted to write about her. She played such a huge role in shaping the industry that I have worked in over the past two decades and I wanted to honor her. I finally made some space on Sunday and wrote my thoughts. Thank you, Molly.

Splide

I recently started using Splide for slider/carousel solutions. I learned of it through the WordPress Block Creator Course that I have been working through. What attracted me to using it seemed to handle accessibility better than some other solutions that I have used in the past.

I wish that the documentation was a little more thorough and included more examples. I find that many JavaScript solutions assume too much and don’t spell it out. I was having a bit of trouble on Thursday figuring out how to pause the autoplay of my testimonial slider when the user played a video on a modal. I was finally able to figure out a solution. However, the documentation did not help me as much as I would have liked.

Overall, I am pretty happy with it so far and I like that it gets the ARIA stuff right and I don’t receive a lot of errors when testing with Lighthouse. I plan to continue to use Splide in my upcoming projects.

Articles I read

• Scroll progress animations in CSS (Michelle Barker)
• Scroll-based 3D cards
• Four new CSS features for smooth entry and exit animations (developer.chrome.com) – This looks very interesting and will give us more tools to have control over how things animate in and animate out.
• Goodbye Molly Holzschlag–a memoriam post (Bruce Lawson)
• Remembering Molly, one of the greats (Jay Hoffman on The History of the Web)
• ‘Christian Nation’ Puts the Bible on Trial (The Gospel Coalition)
• Why are we not still using tables-for-layout? (Rachel Andrew) – I am glad we evolved past those days. I still remember them, especially when I have to create an HTML email.
• Julia Evans on Blogging (Chris Coyier)
• Some blogging myths (Julia Evans) – The article Chris referred to in his post.
• Some tactics for writing in public (Julia Evans) – She references this piece in her blogging myths article.
• Who’s qualified to do what? (Chris Coyier)
• Rewrite & Rethink (Chris Coyier)
• Never waste your midlife crisis (Austin Kleon)
• Three weeks. (Ethan Marcotte) – His new book, You Deserve a Tech Union, has been out for three weeks. He shares some of the positive feedback he has received.
• The House Seems Large Today (Tim Challies) – I will be facing a child-free house in the years to come. Maybe next year. Not something I am happy about.
• $38,000 (Chris Coyier) – Would you pay for web hosting, domain ownership, and support for a hundred years?
• Travels (Jeremy Keith)
• Our Cultural Confusion over Gender and Sexuality
• Eric Partaker’s post about Slack, success coming from failure. I did not know the Slack origin story. (LinkedIn)
• New approach to lineup strategy has turned No. 2 into No. 1 (MLB.com) – An interesting look into a newer strategy that managers are employing.
• The Day I Lost My Marbles (Stephen McAlpine)
• Why Most Anglican Clergy Now Approve Gay Marriage—and What This Means for the Future of the Church (Carl Trueman)
• Lovers in a dangerous time (Jeremy Keith) – I found this interesting because I visited Croatia several years after the war.

On The Athletic

• Judge: Lawsuits over MLB’s expulsion of two minor league teams can go to trial – I was very interested in this one since Chattanooga had been one of the cities threatened to lose their minor league affiliation.
• MLB just tweaked Triple A’s electronic strike zone: What you need to know and why it matters – I had read about the “robot” umpires they have been experimenting with in the minor leagues a couple of weeks ago.
• Beyond the slap: ‘Whatever you think you know about Tommy Pham, you don’t’ – I was interested in this article because Pham was with the Rays for a couple of years.
• Bobby Witt Jr. and the Royals could find a path to an extension. Here’s how. – I will be interested to see if the Royals pull this off.
• Why coach Sean McVay has kept pondering retirement, and why the Rams admire him for it
• The first immaculate non-immaculate inning in baseball history — it’s officially a thing – Just one of the crazy things about baseball and those who keep track of “statistics” like this.
• The Padres’ Ha-Seong Kim is inspiring the next wave of Korean ballplayers
• After years of self-criticism, Kirk Cousins is trying to chill out – I enjoyed reading this one because I watched The Quarterbacks on Netflix a couple of months ago and Kirk was one of the three QBs they profiled.
• Chiefs drop the ball: How the receivers’ mistakes cost Kansas City on opening night – This was such a painful game to watch. Almost as bad as Super Bowl 55 when they lost to the Buccaneers.
• Was Jawaan Taylor lined up illegally? Explaining the rule and why it’s often overlooked – They talked about this all through the game on Thursday night. I had also seen that he was giving the plays away with a tell with one of his feet.
• Dodgers’ Freddie Freeman sets single-season franchise record with 53rd double – I have always liked a good double, probably because I was more of a contact player and did not have the power to clear the fence.
• Yankees legend David Wells slams ‘woke’ culture in rant against Nike, Bud Light, MLB – David Wells is still as outspoken as ever.

What I watched

Why We Need Aragorn’s Example of Masculinity (YouTube)

These CSS best practices might be holding you back (Kevin Powell)

• The Fellowship of the Ring (Digital copy) – I love the Lord of the Rings and it was time to start rewatching it. A three-day weekend was a great time to start.
• Chiefs vs. Lions (NBC) – Not the result I was hoping for.
• Star Wars: Rebels (Disney+)
• Ashoka (Disney+)
• X-Files (Comet)
• America’s Got Talent (NBC)
• The Chef Show (Netflix)
• American Pickers (Defy)
• Miss Congeniality (Netflix)
• Untold: Hall of Shame (Netflix) – Documentary about BALCO and steroids in sports in the 90s.
• Remember the Titans (Disney+)

Books I am reading

• Why We Love Baseball – I had read Joe Posnanski’s The Baseball 100 and enjoyed it so much. When I heard he was writing another book, I knew I wanted to read it. I was so excited when it arrived on Wednesday. I am really enjoying it so far.
• True to His Word – I will finish this one at the end of this week.
• Awe: Why It Matters for Everything We Think, Say, and Do
• Athanasius of Alexandria: His Life and Impact

What I played

MLB The Show 23 (Rays) – I went 3-3 this week (5 of the games were on the road). I recovered from two losses at Fenway to win the final two games and come away with a split from a series with the RedSox.