How can you add advanced front-end features to your website?

Be careful not to rely too heavily on CSS frameworks. While CSS frameworks can be incredibly useful, if you rely on them too much you may find your website has a very similar look and feel to other websites in the ecosystem. This was the case with Bootstrap a few years ago. Bootstrap provided premade components for developers to use which had a good look and feel. Since the components looked fine as is, many developers neglected to customize their website. As a result, the ecosystem was flooded with websites that were clearly made using Bootstrap, which in turn made them seem worse than they were.

While it's great to learn css frameworks and know how to use them, having knowledge of core/vanilla css is also essential. It will always be there to rescue you from tricky situations as not everything can be created/customised with these frameworks. Knowing core concepts of css and existing properties can help someone in more ways than they can imagine.

CSS framework can be greatly beneficial. One of its benefits is that it makes your site more consistent. However, when using a CSS framework like Tailwind, where you essentially write your styling (as classnames) in the html, I believe it is critical to work component-based. Take, for example, a button. When you use buttons throughout your project without a component, you would have to style all buttons with mostly the same classes. If you want to change the padding of a button, you must manually change all of the buttons. In this case, general classes (such as .button .button-state-success) and CSS consistency would be preferable. When you use a Button component, however, you truly leverage the power of a CSS framework like Tailwind.

A CSS framework is a collection of pre-written, reusable code that helps you style your website quickly and efficiently. It provides consistent and responsive layouts, typography, colors, icons, buttons, forms, and other components. Popular CSS frameworks include: Bootstrap: Wide range of pre-designed components. Tailwind: Utility-first framework for custom designs. Bulma: Modern and flexible with a simple grid system. Materialize: Based on Google's Material Design principles. To use a CSS framework, link it to your HTML file and follow its documentation. However, don't rely too heavily on these frameworks.

Absolutely correct! CSS frameworks are essential tools for front-end development. They streamline the styling process by offering pre-designed components and styles that can be easily integrated into your web projects. This accelerates development, maintains consistency, and ensures responsiveness across different devices. Frameworks like Bootstrap, Tailwind, Bulma, and Materialize offer a range of options for designers and developers to choose from. By linking the framework's CSS files to your HTML and following their guidelines, you can quickly build attractive and user-friendly interfaces while minimizing the need to write custom CSS from scratch.

Opt for a CSS preprocessor like Sass or Less. These tools enhance CSS with features like variables and mixins, making your code concise and maintainable. Install on your computer and compile before deploying to boost efficiency, a point not to be overlooked in the journey of mastering front-end development.

Another thing to do is Tree Shaking the css code. A lot of times we end up importing/writing css which might not be referred anywhere in DOM. This happens mostly while using CSS frameworks which doesn't have Tree Shaking built into it. This can drastically reduce css files chunk size & reduce page load times.

A CSS preprocessor, like Sass, Less, or Stylus, is a tool that extends CSS capabilities. It offers variables, mixins, nesting, and functions for more concise, maintainable code. After installing the preprocessor, write code using its features, then compile it into regular CSS before deploying on your site. This boosts efficiency and enables dynamic, consistent web design.

Adding TS when using intensively JS. TS (TypeScript) is JavaScript but with types (as low level programming languages have) TypeScript makes you more confident while writing some code: - it tells you when you are doing a mistake (ex: a function with parameters was defined using TS: while consuming the function, you provide an unexpected value: based on the function definition, typescript will give you an immediate feedback, underlining in red what is wrong in your code, and will remind you that the argument you provided does not match what is expected. This will also: - implicitly provide documentations about the project's code - passively teach you and ensure JavaScript good practices

JavaScript is the key to infusing your website with interactivity and dynamism. This versatile programming language empowers you to create dynamic content, respond to user actions, validate forms, generate animations, and fetch data from APIs. To harness JavaScript's power, write code in a separate file or embed it using the <script> tag within your HTML. This allows you to seamlessly manipulate HTML and CSS elements, elevating user experience and functionality.

The use JavaScript should be mainly for User experience improvement. Avoid unnecessary effects and use minified external file to ensure faster page load. Keep things simple; don't us JavaScript where you can avoid it completely. Use CSS @keyframe animation where you can.

JavaScript frameworks, like React, Angular, Vue, and Svelte, streamline development with rules and components. While enhancing performance, caution is needed. Installing too many libraries for minor tasks may compromise app speed. Striking a balance is key for optimal performance.

Employing a JavaScript framework elevates your development process by streamlining complexity. These libraries, like React, Angular, Vue, and Svelte, offer structured rules, features, and components for building scalable web apps. By installing the chosen framework and adhering to its documentation and guidelines, you ensure efficient development and enhanced functionality. These frameworks simplify tasks, boost productivity, and facilitate the creation of sophisticated and robust web applications.

Well, my advice would be if you want to learn JavaScript - learn about the event loop, Promise, call-stack, callback, ECMA6, asynchronous code block, blocking IO etc these all are part of javaScript only and before going to any javascript library familiarise yourself with these terms and understand them in such a way that if even a 5 year old kid asks you about these topic you should be able to explain it to them. MDN pages by mozilla are the best place to learn about all these.

Lodash isn't a must to learn but one must be aware of methods as to prevent reinventing the wheel but jQuery is obsolete and should not be treated as something to learn unless you are working with a legacy codebase. D3/Three is great but again not everyone needs to use it or encounter a use case for it. One should focus on more essential stuff like knowing core concepts of JavaScript and learning vanilla js. You can always learn new libraries on the fly as and when needed by the project.

Mastering a JavaScript library enriches your development arsenal with specialized functionalities. These compact collections, such as jQuery, Lodash, D3, and Three, address common challenges and tasks with minimal code effort. By linking the library in your HTML and utilizing its methods, you can swiftly implement effects and solutions. This efficient approach enhances your productivity and empowers you to achieve intricate functionalities without extensive coding, streamlining your JavaScript development.

Remember, a front-end build tool makes coding easier. It automates tasks like compiling and testing. Popular tools are Webpack and Gulp. Install one on your computer and set it up for your project. This ensures smoother development.

A front-end build tool automates and optimizes your development workflow, performing tasks like compiling, bundling, minifying, transpiling, testing, and deploying your code. Popular tools include: Webpack: Manages dependencies and bundles modules for complex applications. Gulp: Automates tasks with an easy-to-use syntax. Grunt: Focuses on task automation for repetitive tasks. Parcel: Offers zero-configuration bundling for quick setup. To use a build tool, install it on your computer and configure it according to your project needs. These tools enhance efficiency and ensure high-quality code. However, understanding the underlying processes and customizing configurations to suit your project is crucial.

Incorporating a front-end build tool revolutionizes your development workflow through automation and optimization. Tools like Webpack, Gulp, Grunt, and Parcel excel at tasks such as compiling, bundling, minifying, transpiling, testing, and deploying code. By installing your chosen tool and configuring it to align with your project's requirements, you streamline your development process. This efficient integration enhances code quality, accelerates deployment, and ensures seamless front-end development.

Frontend build tools like webpack has gained so much popularity such that create-react-app also uses webpack to bundle its static asset and finally to serve it. Build tool like webpack do perform multiple tasks and you need to configure it in a seperate file by the name of webpack.config.js. If you are new to Frontend Development then do not worry about this because it is taken care by create-react-app and your maximum focus should be on learning React and understanding React and how it works. Once you understand the underlying framework like react you can spend time to understand how webpack is working by going to the file webpack.config.js

If we are talking about advanced frontend concepts then Visual Regression Testing is also a crucial aspect of frontend development. The tests help ensure web apps function correctly and the UI is consistent and smooth for the end user experience. With the help of AI, tools like Percy and Backstopjs combined with end to end tools like Cypress and Playwright, technologies have come a long way and now help match component snapshots, pixel by pixel identifying visual discrepancies between different versions of our web app. These tests help developers find UI or functional bugs before sending them to production which could then lead to unintentional changes or worse, site breakdown.

Follow the Lighthouse/Page speed performance report to find and fix issues related to your site's performance. Making sure the site supports all mobile viewports with grace.

Always make sure to keep your code minimal & performant. Remember to clear event listeners, timeouts, state mutators, etc. once the requirement is over. Memory leaks can hugely impact mobile & low end devices. You would not want user to keep waiting for pageloads. Don't Forget Error handling. You never want to show user freezed page or a blank page if something crashes. Say API failed or your code is buggy (trying to access variables/objects which does not exists) Make use of things like Error Boundarys, Alerts, Toasts, etc. Keep user informed always :)

Just a piece of advice, Whatever you learn, create a practice project using that learning. For example: If you learn a css framework like Bootstrap, immediately create a practice project using bootstrap so you can validate your learnings.

Setting a bundler when the app gets bigger: For any growing app containing most of the above: you'll end up with a big project, with a lot of files that could be reduced and optimised using a bundler for instance ( webpack, parcel, rollup, ...) This would enhance the page load as the project would be lighter (less files would be loaded) - killing two birds with one stone: this could also minify, obfuscate your code and ensure to polyfill your code( ensuring your code would be correctly interpreted in different browsers ) Otherwise - even without bundlers you could definitely do the mentioned optimisations