RabblR Home – Page 13 – peer2peer distributed n-tier supernode media ballistics toolkit

BRASH SELF-ASSURANCE BEATS OPEN-MINDED PATIENCE

Why is it that strident assholes who’re usually proven wrong in the end triumph time and time again in competition with intelligent nuanced decency? Merton Futon speculates about this strangely irrational truism.

DON’T CONFLATE ISLAMOPHOBIA WITH ANTI-ISLAMIC RELIGIOUS PRACTICE

contrariannewslegionsociety

The response to cultural “offences” in the name of Islam is generally “on message” in a tribal way but this tribal reaction to the Muslim world and its anti-Islam rhetoric is a bad choice. It’s only going to make things worse.

DON’T BE CONDITIONED BY PROPAGANDA – IT HIDES IN PLAIN SIGHT

contrarianexternalnewslegion

In real-time conversations with teenagers studying politics and propaganda, Merton found himself trying to explain how important it was not to be conditioned by the media. This article is an attempt to distill what he was trying to say.

CONDITIONED DISASSOCIATION IS A SURRENDER BUT MAYBE A WISE ONE

newslegionperspectives

This is a “long read” archetype as Agoston does his best to explain the contradictory reality of living a happy life with an aspirant truthful one, how the pragmatic logic says truth must suffer for happiness but the contradictory idealism must choose happiness as the victim of truth should the two collide.

HATE BREXIT? LOATHE TRUMP? WE REAP WHAT WE SOW

externalnewslegionpolitics

Thinking about the state of modern society and the self-sabotaging inertia driving the UK off the Brexit cliff, Laura uses her ‘long read’ article to try to explore the theme and shed some light on the “how, why and where” towards which we’re heading.

Journal: “tesst wghen wrirtinting witgot withou7t correctiongh he errorors”

extractsjournalscribble

Extracts from the first weeks of a detox journal kept throughout the summer of 2016.Read More

STONED SPECULATION ABOUT STRAIGHT LINES IN SPACETIME

newslegionphilosophyscience

Our Local Group of galaxies is falling towards the gravity-centre of Laniakea. The Milky Way is falling towards Andromeda. The Sun is falling towards the centre of our galaxy. The Earth is falling towards the centre of the Sun. Everything on our planet is falling towards the centre of the Earth. Is that why they call it falling in love? WOMWOMWOM.Read More

PSYCHEDELIA – OPENING THE THIRD EYE – MEETING THE MACHINE ELVES

braincultureexternalnewslegion

Personality is the iceberg tip of a multidimensional internal universe of the mind. The conscious tip doesn’t know much about what’s happening in the exponentially larger elsemind but psychedelic excitation – like a D.M.T. trip – brings tip and base into profound contact. Temporarily.

A PATHETIC APOLOGY FOR APATHETIC ANALOGY…

archivescribble

There’s nothing here but an apology for indulging apathy, taking the path of least resistance in the hope it’s some kind of therapy.Read More

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WATCH: Iran Rolls Out Digital Food Rationing

19 May 2022

Iran is set to be the first country to roll out a food rationing scheme based on new biometric IDs. Where vaccine passports failed, food passports will now be eagerly accepted by hungry people who can’t afford rapidly inflating food prices. This is the realization of a longstanding agenda by the Rockefeller/UN/WEF crowd to, as …

Farmers’ Struggle Not Over: Corporate Takeover of Indian Agriculture Still Looms

18 May 2022

Colin Todhunter The following is an unpublished transcript of an interview the author did for a UK-based TV channel that covers issues of interest to the worldwide Sikh diaspora. It concerns three pieces of farm legislation in India that were repealed in late 2021 after a prolonged protest by India’s farmers that gained global support …

Big Pharma-funded paper recommends taxing the unvaccinated

17 May 2022

Kit Knightly A new paper published by Oxford University’s Center for Business Taxation discusses – and in the end supports – the idea of a special tax levied on those who decline to be “vaccinated” against “Covid19”. The paper’s authors argue that a vaccine-related tax would be “justified” because “Taxes on behaviour that is considered …

Empire of Hypocrisy

17 May 2022

Paul Cudenec via Winter Oak In the middle of the 19th century, the British Empire ran into what what would today be termed a “public relations crisis”. Influential domestic voices were starting to criticise its industrial system and worldwide domination on ethical grounds, not least the art critic John Ruskin. He wrote that all he had …

The Function of the Fake Binary

16 May 2022

Catte Audio Version New Feature! In his 1998 book The Common Good, Noam Chomsky describes the key role that managed disagreements play in modern politics… The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum — even encourage the …

This Week in the New Normal #30

15 May 2022

Our successor to This Week in the Guardian, This Week in the New Normal is our weekly chart of the progress of autocracy, authoritarianism and economic restructuring around the world. 1. California law allows 12 year olds to be vaccinated…without parental consent All the information you really need is right there in the title. On …

The Subtleties of Anti-Russia Leftist Rhetoric

15 May 2022

Edward Curtin While the so-called liberal and conservative corporate mainstream media – all stenographers for the intelligence agencies – pour forth the most blatant propaganda about Russia and Ukraine that is so conspicuous that it is comedic if it weren’t so dangerous, the self-depicted cognoscenti also ingest subtler messages, often from the alternative media. A …

Current Members of the U.S. House of Representatives

4 May 2022

This is a list of individuals currently serving in the United States House of Representatives as of the 117th Congress

U.S. Senate Seats up for Reelection in 2022

4 May 2022

It's 2022 vision time. The U.S. Senate elections will be held on Tuesday, November 8, 2020. Thirty-four of the 100 Senators are up for reelection and will serve a six-year term from January 3, 2023, until January 3, 2029. The time to start organizing is now.

Why Do So Many Elderly Run America?

31 March 2022

Why are US politicians so old compared to other countries?

Could Putin Be Vulnerable to a Coup?

14 March 2022

Could Putin be vulnerable to a coup or uprising? All of the grievances that traditionally motivate a coup against a dictator are in place.

Should U.S. Flight Attendants Be Paid During Boarding?

18 February 2022

The majority of U.S. airlines don't pay their flight attendants until the airplane door closes, even though plane boarding is one of the most stressful parts of their job.

QAnon vs. Hitler's Brownshirts

28 January 2021

The world has seen QAnon before. It was called Nazism.

World Headlines: Capitol Siege by MAGA Mob

10 January 2021

On January 6, 2021, white insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol, proudly displayed the confederate flag, and set up gallows on the Capitol grounds.

A Swiss farmer works in his field with his tractor in Sullens

10 May 2022

The post A Swiss farmer works in his field with his tractor in Sullens appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

Verstappen beats Leclerc to win first Miami Grand Prix

9 May 2022

The post Verstappen beats Leclerc to win first Miami Grand Prix appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

Judge releases Oath Keepers member pending trial for U.S. Capitol attack

5 May 2022

The post Judge releases Oath Keepers member pending trial for U.S. Capitol attack appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

In race for Georgia’s election chief, it’s all about Trump and 2020

5 May 2022

The post In race for Georgia’s election chief, it’s all about Trump and 2020 appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

People enjoy the sunset in Vlora

4 May 2022

The post People enjoy the sunset in Vlora appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

Liverpool fight back to reach Champions League final with win over Villarreal

4 May 2022

The post Liverpool fight back to reach Champions League final with win over Villarreal appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

U.S. President Joe Biden travels to Alabama

3 May 2022

The post U.S. President Joe Biden travels to Alabama appeared first on Reuters News Agency.

Pennsylvania Surges Left at the Polls

19 May 2022

Izzy Smith-Wade-El talks about his primary win in the race for a Pennsylvania state House seat.

The post Pennsylvania Surges Left at the Polls appeared first on The Intercept.

Jeffrey Sachs Presents Evidence of Possible Lab Origin of Covid-19

19 May 2022

An article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences calls for an independent investigation of information held by U.S.-based institutions that could shed light on the origins of Covid.

The post Jeffrey Sachs Presents Evidence of Possible Lab Origin of Covid-19 appeared first on The Intercept.

Israel Used U.S. Weapons to Destroy U.S. Assets and Aid Projects in Gaza

19 May 2022

Documents show that in 2021, arms made and funded by the United States destroyed UNRWA schools, USAID projects, and a Coca-Cola plant.

The post Israel Used U.S. Weapons to Destroy U.S. Assets and Aid Projects in Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.

Israeli Investigation Into Killing of Palestinian American Journalist Ends Before It Begins

19 May 2022

Israel won’t investigate soldiers who fired in the direction of Shireen Abu Akleh, even though new evidence undermines their account of what happened.

The post Israeli Investigation Into Killing of Palestinian American Journalist Ends Before It Begins appeared first on The Intercept.

Civilian Victim of U.S. Drone Strike Starts GoFundMe to Save His Legs — and His Life

18 May 2022

Because of a broken civilian casualty compensation system, the U.S. military never made a payment to Yemeni drone strike survivor Adel Al Manthari.

The post Civilian Victim of U.S. Drone Strike Starts GoFundMe to Save His Legs — and His Life appeared first on The Intercept.

Military-Industrial Complex Is Itching to Send “Hunter-Killer” Drones to Ukraine

18 May 2022

The dangerous, restricted unmanned fighter planes would be a major step up in the arms the U.S. is giving to Ukraine.

The post Military-Industrial Complex Is Itching to Send “Hunter-Killer” Drones to Ukraine appeared first on The Intercept.

Google and Amazon Face Shareholder Revolt Over Israeli Defense Work

18 May 2022

"Project Nimbus" would insulate the Israeli government's cloud computing from political pressures stemming from the military occupation of Palestine.

The post Google and Amazon Face Shareholder Revolt Over Israeli Defense Work appeared first on The Intercept.

I didn’t know I could do that.

19 May 2022

submitted by /u/Evaleenora to r/funny [link] [comments]

Average Land Value by Zip Code in the US

20 May 2022

submitted by /u/vagq1994 to r/MapPorn [link] [comments]

Crazy

19 May 2022

submitted by /u/staticmelts to r/conspiracy [link] [comments]

75% of Canada's population lives in the red areas [OC]

19 May 2022

submitted by /u/wtrfll_ca to r/dataisbeautiful [link] [comments]

Does this describe you?

19 May 2022

<20yo, male, politically left, atheist, anime fan, virgin

View Poll

submitted by /u/Ok-Place7169 to r/polls [link] [comments]

Stay classy London

19 May 2022

submitted by /u/danbcooper to r/london [link] [comments]

It's all a political game

19 May 2022

submitted by /u/MonsterJuiced to r/conspiracytheories [link] [comments]

UX London should be your off-site

18 May 2022

Check out the line up for this year’s UX London. I know I’m biased, but damn! That’s objectively an excellent roster of smart, interesting people.

When I was first putting that page together I had the name of each speaker followed by their job title and company. But when I stopped and thought about it—not to be too blunt—I realised “who cares?”. What matters is what they’ll be talking about.

And, wow, what they’ll be talking about sounds great! Designing for your international audiences, designing with the autistic community, how to win stakeholders and influence processes, the importance of clear writing in product development, designing good services, design systems for humans, and more. Not to mention workshops like designing your own research methods for a very diverse audience, writing for people who hate writing, and harnessing design systems.

You can peruse the schedule—which is almost complete now—to get a feel for how each day will flow.

But I’m not just excited about this year’s UX London because of the great talks and workshops. I’m also really, really excited at the prospect of gathering together—in person!—over the course of three days with my peers. That means meeting new and interesting people, but frankly, it’s going to be just as wonderful to hang out with my co-workers.

Clearleft has been a remote-only company for the past two years. We’ve still got our studio and people can go there if they like (but no pressure). It’s all gone better than I thought it would given how much of an in-person culture we had before the pandemic hit. But it does mean that it’s rare for us all to be together in the same place (if you don’t count Zoom as a place).

UX London is going to be like our off-site. Everyone from Clearleft is going to be there, regardless of whether “UX” or “design” appears in their job title. I know that the talks will resonate regardless. When I was putting the line-up together I made sure that all the talks would have general appeal, regardless of whether you were a researcher, a content designer, a product designer, a product manager, or anything else.

I’m guessing that the last two years have been, shall we say, interesting at your workplace too. And even if you’ve also been adapting well to remote work, I think you’ll agree that the value of having off-site gatherings has increased tenfold.

So do what we’re doing. Make UX London your off-site gathering. It’ll be a terrific three-day gathering in the sunshine in London from Tuesday, June 28th to Thursday, June 30th at the bright and airy Tobacco Dock.

If you need to convince your boss, I’ve supplied a list of reasons to attend. But you should get your tickets soon—standard pricing ends in just over two weeks on Friday, June 3rd. After that there’ll only be last-chance tickets available.

Image previews with the FileReader API

15 May 2022

I added a “notes” section to this website eight years ago. I set it up so that notes could be syndicated to Twitter. Ever since then, that’s the only way I post to Twitter.

A few months later I added photos to my notes. Again, this would get syndicated to Twitter.

Something’s bothered me for a long time though. I initially thought that if I posted a photo, then the accompanying text would serve as a decription of the image. It could effectively act as the alt text for the image, I thought. But in practice it didn’t work out that way. The text was often a commentary on the image, which isn’t the same as a description of the contents.

I needed a way to store alt text for images. To make it more complicated, it was possible for one note to have multiple images. So even though a note was one line in my database, I somehow needed a separate string of text with the description of each image in a single note.

I eventually settled on using the file system instead of the database. The images themselves are stored in separate folders, so I figured I could have an accompanying alt.txt file in each folder.

Take this note from yesterday as an example. Different sizes of the image are stored in the folder /images/uploaded/19077. Here’s a small version of the image and here’s the original. In that same folder is the alt text.

This means I’m reading a file every time I need the alt text instead of reading from a database, which probably isn’t the most performant way of doing it, but it seems to be working okay.

Here’s another example:

the original image, the alt.txt file, and the note itself.

In order to add the alt text to the image, I needed to update my posting interface. By default it’s a little textarea, followed by a file upload input, followed by a toggle (a checkbox under the hood) to choose whether or not to syndicate the note to Twitter.

The interface now updates automatically as soon as I use that input type="file" to choose any images for the note. Using the FileReader API, I show a preview of the selected images right after the file input.

Here’s the code if you ever need to do something similar. I’ve abstracted it somewhat in that gist—you should be able to drop it into any page that includes input type="file" accept="image/*" and it will automatically generate the previews.

I was pleasantly surprised at how easy this was. The FileReader API worked just as expected without any gotchas. I think I always assumed that this would be quite complex to do because once upon a time, it was quite complex (or impossible) to do. But now it’s wonderfully straightforward. Story of the web.

My own version of the script does a little bit more; it also generates another little textarea right after each image preview, which is where I write the accompanying alt text.

I’ve also updated my server-side script that handles the syndication to Twitter. I’m using the /media/metadata/create method to provide the alt text. But for some reason it’s not working. I can’t figure out why. I’ll keep working on it.

In the meantime, if you’re looking at an image I’ve posted on Twitter and you’re judging me for its lack of alt text, my apologies. But each tweet of mine includes a link back to the original note on this site and you will most definitely find the alt text for the image there.

Agile design principles

10 May 2022

I may have mentioned this before, but I’m a bit of a nerd for design principles. Have I shown you my equivalent of an interesting rock collection lately?

If you think about design principles for any period of time, it inevitably gets very meta very quickly. You start thinking about what makes for good design principles. In other words, you start wondering if there are design principles for design principles.

I’ve written before about how I think good design principles should encode some level of prioritisation. The classic example is the HTML design principle called the priority of consitituencies:

In case of conflict, consider users over authors over implementors over specifiers over theoretical purity.

It’s wonderfully practical!

I realised recently that there’s another set of design princples that put prioritisation front and centre—the Agile manifesto:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools Working software over comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over contract negotiation Responding to change over following a plan

And there’s this excellent explanation which could just as well apply to the priorty of constituencies:

That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.

Yes! That’s the spirit!

Ironically, the Agile manifesto also contains a section called principles behind the Agile manifesto which are …less good (at least they’re less good as design principles—they’re fine as hypotheses to be tested).

Agile is far from perfect. See, for example, Miriam Posner’s piece Agile and the Long Crisis of Software. But where Agile isn’t fulfilling its promise, I’d say it’s not because of its four design principles. If anything, I think the problems arise from organisations attempting to implement Agile without truly internalising the four principles.

Oh, and that’s another thing I like about the Agile manifesto as a set of design principles—the list of prioritised principles is mercifully short. Just four lines.

Even more UX London speaker updates

5 May 2022

I’ve added five more faces to the UX London line-up.

Irina Rusakova will be giving a talk on day one, the day that focuses on research. Her talk on designing with the autistic community is one I’m really looking forward to.

Also on day one, my friend and former Clearleftie Cennydd Bowles will be giving a workshop called “What could go wrong?” He literally wrote the book on ethical design.

Day two is all about creation. My co-worker Chris How will be speaking. “Nepotism!” you cry! But no, Chris is speaking because I had the chance to his talk—called “Unexpectedly obvious”—and I thought “that’s perfect for UX London!”:

Let him take you on a journey through time and across the globe sharing stories of designs that solve problems in elegant if unusual ways.

Also on day two, you’ve got two additional workshops. Lou Downe will be running a workshop on designing good services, and Giles Turnbull will be running a workshop called “Writing for people who hate writing.”

I love that title! Usually when I contact speakers I don’t necessarily have a specific talk or workshop in mind, but I knew that I wanted that particular workshop from Giles.

When I wrote to Giles to ask come and speak, I began by telling how much I enjoy his blog—I’m a long-time suscriber to his RSS feed. He responded and said that he also reads my blog—we’re blog buddies! (That’s a terrible term but there should be a word for people who “know” each other only through reading each other’s websites.)

Anyway, that’s another little treasure trove of speakers added to the UX London roster:

Irina Rusakova Cennydd Bowles Chris How Lou Downe Giles Turnbull

That’s nineteen speakers already and we’re not done yet—expect further speaker announcements soon. But don’t wait on those announcements before getting your ticket. Get yours now!

Bugblogging

3 May 2022

A while back I wrote a blog post called Web Audio API weirdness on iOS. I described a bug in Mobile Safari along with a hacky fix. I finished by saying:

If you ever find yourself getting weird but inconsistent behaviour on iOS using the Web Audio API, this nasty little hack could help.

Recently Jonathan Aldrich posted a thread about the same bug. He included a link to my blog post. He also said:

Thanks so much for your post, this was a truly pernicious problem!

That warms the cockles of my heart. It’s very gratifying to know that documenting the bug (and the fix) helped someone out. Or, as I put it:

Yay for bugblogging!

Forgive the Germanic compound word, but in this case I think it fits.

Bugblogging doesn’t need to involve a solution. Just documenting a bug is a good thing to do. Recently I documented a bug with progressive web apps on iOS. Before that I documented a bug in Facebook Container for Firefox. When I documented some weird behaviour with the Web Share API in Safari on iOS, I wasn’t even sure it was a bug but Tess was pretty sure it was and filed a proper bug report.

I’ve benefited from other people bugblogging. Phil Nash wrote Service workers: beware Safari’s range request. That was exactly what I needed to solve a problem I’d been having. And then that post about Phil solving my problem helped Peter Rukavina solve a similar issue so he wrote Phil Nash and Jeremy Keith Save the Safari Video Playback Day.

Again, this warmed the cockles of my heart. Bugblogging is worth doing just for the reward of that feeling.

There’s a similar kind of blog post where, instead of writing about a bug, you write about a particular technique. In one way, this is the opposite of bugblogging because you’re writing about things working exactly as they should. But these posts have a similar feeling to bugblogging because they also result in a warm glow when someone finds them useful.

Here are some recent examples of these kinds of posts—tipblogging?—that I’ve found useful:

Eric wrote about flexibly centering an element with side-sligned content using CSS. Rich documented how to subset a variable font on a Mac. Stephanie wrote about a CSS technique for animating in a newly added element.

All three are very handy tips. Thanks, Eric! Thanks, Rich! Thanks, Stephanie!

Suspicion

28 April 2022

I’ve already had some thoughtful responses to yesterday’s post about trust. I wrapped up my thoughts with a request:

I would love it if someone could explain why they avoid native browser features but use third-party code.

Chris obliged:

I can’t speak for the industry, but I have a guess. Third-party code (like the referenced Bootstrap and React) have a history of smoothing over significant cross-browser issues and providing better-than-browser ergonomic APIs. jQuery was created to smooth over cross-browser JavaScript problems. That’s trust.

Very true! jQuery is the canonical example of a library smoothing over the bumpy landscape of browser compatibilities. But jQuery is also the canonical example of a library we no longer need because the browsers have caught up …and those browsers support standards directly influenced by jQuery. That’s a library success story!

Charles Harries takes on my question in his post Libraries over browser features:

I think this perspective of trust has been hammered into developers over the past maybe like 5 years of JavaScript development based almost exclusively on inequality of browser feature support. Things are looking good in 2022; but as recently as 2019, 4 of the 5 top web developer needs had to do with browser compatibility.

Browser compatibility is one of the underlying promises that libraries—especially the big ones that Jeremy references, like React and Bootstrap—make to developers.

So again, it’s browser incompatibilities that made libraries attractive.

Jim Nielsen responds with the same message in his post Trusting Browsers:

We distrust the browser because we’ve been trained to. Years of fighting browser deficiencies where libraries filled the gaps. Browser enemy; library friend.

For example: jQuery did wonders to normalize working across browsers. Write code once, run it in any browser — confidently.

Three for three. My question has been answered: people gravitated towards libraries because browsers had inconsistent implementations.

I’m deliberately using the past tense there. I think Jim is onto something when he says that we’ve been trained not to trust browsers to have parity when it comes to supporting standards. But that has changed.

Charles again:

This approach isn’t a sustainable practice, and I’m trying to do as little of it as I can. Jeremy is right to be suspicious of third-party code. Cross-browser compatibility has gotten a lot better, and campaigns like Interop 2022 are doing a lot to reduce the burden. It’s getting better, but the exasperated I-just-want-it-to-work mindset is tough to uninstall.

I agree. Inertia is a powerful force. No matter how good cross-browser compatibility gets, it’s going to take a long time for developers to shed their suspicion.

Jim is glass-half-full kind of guy:

I’m optimistic that trust in browser-native features and APIs is being restored.

He also points to a very sensible mindset when it comes to third-party libraries and frameworks:

In this sense, third-party code and abstractions can be wonderful polyfills for the web platform. The idea being that the default posture should be: leverage as much of the web platform as possible, then where there are gaps to creating great user experiences, fill them in with exploratory library or framework features (features which, conceivably, could one day become native in browsers).

Yes! A kind of progressive enhancement approach to using third-party code makes a lot of sense. I’ve always maintained that you should treat libraries and frameworks like cattle, not pets. Don’t get too attached. If the library is solving a genuine need, it will be replaced by stable web standards in browsers (again, see jQuery).

I think that third-party libraries and frameworks work best as polyfills. But the whole point of polyfills is that you only use them when the browsers don’t supply features natively (and you also go back and remove the polyfill later when browsers do support the feature). But that’s not how people are using libraries and frameworks today. Developers are reaching for them by default instead of treating them as a last resort.

I like Jim’s proposed design princple:

Where available, default to browser-native features over third party code, abstractions, or idioms.

(P.S. It’s kind of lovely to see this kind of thoughtful blog-to-blog conversation happening. Right at a time when Twitter is about to go down the tubes, this is a demonstration of an actual public square with more nuanced discussion. Make your own website and join the conversation!)

Trust

27 April 2022

I’ve noticed a strange mindset amongst front-end/full-stack developers. At least it seems strange to me. But maybe I’m the one with the strange mindset and everyone else knows something I don’t.

It’s to do with trust and suspicion.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I’m suspicious of third-party code and dependencies in general. Every dependency you add to a project is one more potential single point of failure. You have to trust that the strangers who wrote that code knew what they were doing. I’m still somewhat flabbergasted that developers regularly add dependencies—via npm or yarn or whatever—that then pull in even more dependencies, all while assuming good faith and competence on the part of every person involved.

It’s a touching expression of faith in your fellow humans, but I’m not keen on the idea of faith-based development.

I’m much more trusting of native browser features—HTML elements, CSS features, and JavaScript APIs. They’re not always perfect, but a lot of thought goes into their development. By the time they land in browsers, a whole lot of smart people have kicked the tyres and considered many different angles. As a bonus, I don’t need to install them. Even better, end users don’t need to install them.

And yet, the mindset I’ve noticed is that many developers are suspicious of browser features but trusting of third-party libraries.

When I write and talk about using service workers, I often come across scepticism from developers about writing the service worker code. “Is there a library I can use?” they ask. “Well, yes” I reply, “but then you’ve got to understand the library, and the time it takes you to do that could be spent understanding the native code.” So even though a library might not offer any new functionality—just a different idion—many developers are more likely to trust the third-party library than they are to trust the underlying code that the third-party library is abstracting!

Developers are more likely to trust, say, Bootstrap than they are to trust CSS grid or custom properties. Developers are more likely to trust React than they are to trust web components.

On the one hand, I get it. Bootstrap and React are very popular. That popularity speaks volumes. If lots of people use a technology, it must be a safe bet, right?

But if we’re talking about popularity, every single browser today ships with support for features like grid, custom properties, service workers and web components. No third-party framework can even come close to that install base.

And the fact that these technologies have shipped in stable browsers means they’re vetted. They’ve been through a rigourous testing phase. They’ve effectively got a seal of approval from each individual browser maker. To me, that seems like a much bigger signal of trustworthiness than the popularity of a third-party library or framework.

So I’m kind of confused by this prevalent mindset of trusting third-party code more than built-in browser features.

Is it because of the job market? When recruiters are looking for developers, their laundry list is usually third-party technologies: React, Vue, Bootstrap, etc. It’s rare to find a job ad that lists native browser technologies: flexbox, grid, service workers, web components.

I would love it if someone could explain why they avoid native browser features but use third-party code.

Until then, I shall remain perplexed.

Two pathogens linked to salmon health and survival in British Columbia

19 May 2022

Many wild salmon populations in British Columbia (B.C.) have experienced substantial declines over the last three decades. New UBC research published in FACETS helps chart a course towards better protection of wild salmon.

First record of a gall-forming aphid fighting off predator

19 May 2022

A researcher reports evidence of a gall-forming aphid defending itself against predators, a first for the species, Mordwilkoja vagabunda. The insects inject saliva into leaf stalks, inducing the plant to form small growths called galls that the aphids live inside.

What's in your weed? You might be surprised

19 May 2022

Labels like indica, sativa and hybrid—commonly used to distinguish one category of cannabis from another—tell consumers little about what's in their product, and could be confusing or misleading, suggests a new study of nearly 90,000 samples across six states.

Lost or extinct? Study finds the existence of more than 500 animal species remains uncertain

19 May 2022

An international study provides the first global evaluation of all terrestrial vertebrate species that have not been declared extinct and identifies more than 500 species considered to be "lost"—those that haven't been seen by anyone in more than 50 years.

Forecasting the effects of roads and railways on endangered tigers

19 May 2022

A new University of Michigan study that forecasts the impacts of expanding roads and a planned railway on endangered tigers in Nepal's Chitwan National Park has yielded important findings that can aid conservation efforts.

Poll the audience: Using data from citizen science to keep wild birds in flight

19 May 2022

Using the eyes and ears of public volunteers can stretch the reach of science, according to a new analysis from Erica Stuber from the Department of Wildland Resources and the Ecology Center. Stuber and a team of researchers examined the accuracy of information produced by citizen science apps for monitoring bird populations. They compared publicly-produced data with officially tracked numbers from monitoring programs and found that with some refinement, data from citizen scientists could offer a lot of utility for researchers.

Policy and farm management help China mitigate climate change

19 May 2022

Production of animal protein in China has increased by 800% over the past 40 years, driven by population growth, urbanization and higher worker wages. However, the amount of climate-warming nitrous oxide released from animal farming in the country has not risen as quickly, thanks to science-led policy and farm management interventions in the way animals are fed and their manure recycled.