John Rush

Posted on Jun 3, 2023 • Updated on Jan 22

21 Mind-Blowing Web Features You Probably Haven't Heard Of

#webdev #javascript #css #news

Hi, I'm John, Multi Startup Builder.
I enjoy both coding and marketing.
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If you're a web developer, buckle up because the web platform has landed some game-changing new features that will alter the way we build websites forever. Let's dive into these incredible new additions!

1. Native HTML Dialog

Gone are the days of building modals from scratch with full screen backdrops and hacked together JavaScript to show and hide elements. Now we have native HTML dialogs, fully supported on all major browsers. Just reference its ID and run showModal() method.

2. Popovers Are Coming

Native popovers provide attributes like popoverTarget and popover, allowing you to show and hide content without any JavaScript or tricky CSS that uses focus within.

3. Web GPU: A Game Changer for Graphics & Games

Web GPU is essentially WebGL's successor, enabling browsers and web apps to take advantage of GPUs for faster graphics rendering in libraries like Babylon.js, Three.js, as well as TensorFlow.js for machine learning models training.

4. Container Queries: Responsive Websites Made Easier

With container queries, developers can now apply different styles based on nearest ancestor containers instead of just viewport size - making responsive design more intuitive than ever before.

5.Color Mix: Mixing Colors Natively in CSS

The color mix function allows mixing colors natively in CSS by specifying two colors arguments along with desired color space creating interesting gradient effects across multiple elements.

6.CSS Nesting

CSS nesting improves code readability by allowing styles to be nested inside parent selectors just like Kangaroos in pouches - no more duplicated class names!

7.Experience Chromatic Fonts

Color fonts (or chromatic fonts) let you customize entire color palettes using multiple colors per glyph offering endless possibilities such as gradients and even 3D effects.

8.Performance Boost with Web Vitals Plugin

The new Web Vitals plugin for Chrome console logs performance metrics pinpointing issues like layout shifts and problematic elements to optimize your website.

9.JavaScript Features: Array At & Deep Copy

Array at method simplifies getting array items using negative indices (e.g., -1 for last item). The structured clone function enables deep copying of objects, making transferring data between them much easier.

10. More Awesome Web Features

Transform Stream Interface: Pipe one fetch call into another
Import Maps: Declare multiple JavaScript modules at once
CSS Individual Transform Properties: Modify scale, translation, and rotation easily
Trigonometric Functions in CSS: Sine, cosine, tangent for circular designs
CSS Initial Letter Property: Magazine-style first letters in articles
Focus Visible & Alert Property: Improved accessibility options
View Transitions API & Animation Timeline (experimental): Better animations between web pages based on scroll position

Congratulations! You've just learned about 21 new features on the web. If you knew every single one of them already, go ahead and redeem your free "web development job" certificate during your next interview! Thanks for reading and stay tuned for more exciting updates.

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Hi, I'm John, Multi Startup Builder.
I enjoy both coding and marketing.
See all my 20 products here
→ johnrush.me
→ my BIO
→ Say Hi to me On Twitter
→ Try my website builder

Top comments (13)

John Rush • Jun 3 '23

credits to twitter.com/fireship_dev

jungar1111 • Jun 9 '23

um dialogs don't work by default. In chrome i get an Uncaught TypeErrorL d1.showmodal is not a function at HTMLButtonElement.onclick. Similar error in Firefox...

any ideas? Didn't see it in the experiemental list.

Jeff Cicero • Jun 16 '23

This worked for me in Chrome, it's show() and not showDialog()

<dialog id="myDialog">
  <p>Some content</p>
</dialog>

myDialog.show()

Jeff Cicero • Jun 16 '23

One more note, apparently the ID appears in global scope as soon as you add it to the document. So be careful about what the ID is - not sure how this jives with anything else in a lexical scope.

The dom ready listener may not be necessary but:

document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded', () => {
      myDialog.show();
    });

jungar1111 • Jun 17 '23

oh… .show works… I was using a .showmodal() for some reason

jungar1111 • Jun 17 '23

thanks

Sloan the DEV Moderator • Jun 7 '23

Hi there, we encourage authors to share their entire posts here on DEV, rather than mostly pointing to an external link. Doing so helps ensure that readers don’t have to jump around to too many different pages, and it helps focus the conversation right here in the comments section.

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John Rush • Jun 7 '23

I dont have other version of this post. This is the only version. I put twitter embeds for the videos , so that viewers could watch videos. And actually they can watch videos right here.