The newsletter below is sent to 30,000+ developers at the beginning of each month to give them the latest industry news, trends, free resources, etc. You can join them and be first to get the March 2020 issue by subscribing here.
This is the 20th issue! You can read all of the past issues here.
If it’s your first time here… (otherwise, skip this part)
Being a web developer is a fantastic career option. You have many job opportunities, you can work around the world, and you get to solve hard problems. One thing that is hard, however, is staying up to date with the constantly evolving ecosystem. You want to be a top-performing web developer, coder, programmer, software developer, but you don’t have time to select from hundreds of articles, videos and podcasts each day.
This monthly newsletter is focused on keeping you up to date with the industry, keeping your skills sharp, without wasting your valuable time. I will be sharing the most important articles, podcasts and videos of the month. Think Tim Ferriss and the Pareto Principle (80/20 rule) meeting the Software Development world. What’s the 20% that will get you 80% of the results?
Reminder: If you want to receive the next issue of Web Developer Monthly before anyone else, subscribe here: https://zerotomastery.io/blog/web-developer-monthly-february-2020
What you missed in February as a Web Developer…
The Simplest Security Fix 💣
Here is how to immediately make your apps more secure: update all libraries and dependencies. Cloudflare did an interesting bit of research where they discovered what we all already know deep down inside: JavaScript libraries are almost never updated once they have been added to a project.
Free Tools For Web Developers ✂️
Some tools and assets to help you build your next project since we are best friends by now (unless this is your first time reading my articles… in that case let’s take things slow):
- Open Source People illustrations for your next launch.
- I will 100% be using this in my next project: Old book illustrations
- Easy to build resume templates so you don't have to waste time on completely useless things like making your resume look pretty
- Another free logo maker
- Everything you ever wanted for colors
- You can do that thing that you used to see in movies that was technically impossible but now it is possible.
- Portfolio builder for next time you are looking for a job
- Everything you need in one spot for your design needs
- More free stock photos because I like you
Angular 9 Time 🛡
Everyone (mostly Angular users) is excited about Angular 9. Why? Well, their new rendering engine (compiler and runtime) Angular Ivy which I have talked about before in this newsletter, is finally on by default. All you need to know is that this will result in a bunch of performance benefits out of the box for you. They also added Google Maps and Youtube Player components. You can read all about it here.
Vue.js Documentary 🎞
An excellent documentary on everything to do with Vue and its growth. Haven't watched it yet, but it's on my list and the reviews so far look very promising. Might be worth checking out even if you are not a Vue developer.
Fixing Memory Leaks 🚰
If you ever wondered how to check if you app has a memory leak, this post does a great job of showing you step by step instructions. Although there are a few steps to follow, some general rules covered in the article will probably avoid 80% of common memory leak issues.
How Much Are You Worth? 🗽
Everyone (ok, not everyone, but a lot of people) jumped on twitter under #KnowYourWorth to share how much they make plus a few other tidbits. Someone immediately made a website around it so you can feel good/bad.
React News 💎
Mostly everyone's favourite frontend library. What crazy things have they been up to?
- React Router 6.0 is coming out soon. It's in the alpha stages right now if you want to play around with it. You guessed it, more hooks with this one. While you wait, you can go over how to use React Router 5 hooks here. Also, React Navigation which is the popular way to do navigation with React Native is out with version 5.
- A comprehensive list of libraries that you should be aware of if you are a React developer. No need to try all of them, just simply know they exist so you can decide if you need them in your next project.
- I'm really excited about this one: https://openchakra.app It allows you to visually build components and then export them directly into React component files.
- You know how the latest version of Create React App has templates? Well, now you can generate a React app with all the Redux boilerplate code just from one command!
- Make your own React Dev Tools if you are bored out of your mind or you need that crazy level of control, or you're just curious how it works.
- Popular React UI library, Ant Design came out with version 4.0
Most Popular Websites in History 📽
Not much educational content here, but I guarantee you that if you are a web developer, you will gladly watch 8 minutes of this with intense focus.
Native HTML Lazy Load 🏞
Native lazy loaded images are now officially part of HTML. This means there is now a standard HTML attribute that you can use on <img> and <iframe> to lazy load them.
HTML5 Game Development 🕹
Why am I talking about such a niche topic? Because there are some exciting things announced this month to maybe get you started if you want to try your hand at game development. First check out this great library to build HTML 5 games.
Now the exciting news: Google just announced something called GameSnacks
Contributor to <famous repo> 🦉
Ever wished you could call yourself a contributor to big front end libraries? Here is a website that shows you easy PRs you can make to these projects and boost that contributor clout 😎.
Security News Everywhere 📈
WhatsApp desktop app had a big security vulnerability. The lesson? "If you're going to use Electron, you HAVE to make sure it is updated with each update of Chromium." Speaking of Electron (a way for you to build desktop apps using JavaScript), version 8 is out so you better update that.
6 million Israelis personal info leaked online because passwords were stored in plaintext AND delivered over the network without encryption.
A new way scammers are using Google Ads to make you pay them money.
Jam Alexa from listening to what you have to say while looking like you're on the set of Mad Max.
Firefox is turning on HTTPS over DNS by default starting with the USA. Learn about why this is important here.
MGM Resorts data breach reveals personal data of 10.6 million hotel guests.
Clearview AI which were controversial for scraping images of people online and storing it for their machine learning models, had their customer data breached (mostly law enforcement customers). Pretty ironic.
Do You Need A Framework? 🏗
People are complaining about the complexity of front end frameworks and libraries, but this isn't anything new. Although discussions about these can be found everywhere, this article does a good job just showing you the pros and cons of what each level of abstraction/tooling does to a project. As always, it's always pros and cons and never simply a black and white answer.
PHP 8 🔮
PHP 8 is coming out sometime this year and the features coming to it are pretty interesting. One of them being a JIT compiler. You can read about it all here, and if you want to know specifically how the JIT compiler may improve performance, check this out.
How To Hack Google Maps 🕴🏾
Before you click on the article, try to guess how this person did it. I bet you $1,000,000 you won't guess (disclaimer: I don't have that kind of money so don't hold me to it). Here is how to do it.
402 Payment Required 🍿
A new experimental HTTP response is in the works right now where a 402 Payment Required status can be sent from the server. It can carve the path for some interesting use cases. Originally it was created to enable digital cash or micropayment systems and would indicate that the requested content is not available until the client makes a payment. Interesting discussion happening about this feature right here.
The Best CSS Article Ever 🤔
This is a long post, but if you want to be taken on a journey to learn the beginnings of CSS and what it was like being a developer working with CSS for the last few decades, this is the post for you. My favourite CSS article of all time.
And this is where we are now with CSS.
Nobody likes RegEx 🧶
Wait you do? I'm just going to go out on a limb and say that you are not human or you are lying to yourself. Here is a nifty little tool to help you generate RegEx automatically for common things like usernames and phone numbers.
Along the same lines (sort of), this website allows you to search for different things across millions of code repos online: https://grep.app/
Github CLI + Discussions 🍸
Github Pages (hosting), Github Projects (project management), Github Actions (CI), Github Sponsors...
Github has been doing a lot lately since they got acquired by Microsoft. Their latest development is now in beta: Github CLI
They also announced Github Discussions.
Should You Use Google Fonts? 🎱
This article is interesting not because it talks about Google fonts, but because it shows you the inner workings of what happens when you use libraries. Should you use something stored in another server, or something stored on your server or on your user's devices? You'll get some great insights if you read the whole post.
Libraries To Keep An Eye On 👀
A great documentation website and a fun popover and tooltip library: Popper.js
Uppload.js is a simple way to do image uploads inside your apps.
TypeScript 3.8 is out! More typey things.
Apple announce a new JS library: MusicKit JS.
Keep an eye on these. I have a feeling these will be huge:
Big Tech News 🏢
Google is annoying more people with their privacy practices. One person pointed out that Google sends client device data (that may be able to identify you) to all of its properties. In other news, GCP or Google's cloud division is projected to make about $10 billion this year which shows that it is a strong contender to be around for a long time (lots of advantages especially when it comes to their Machine Learning compute).
Microsoft angered some users with Windows 10 bugs. Then it angered even more people with some anti-Firefox ad on Windows 10.
Uber apparently is now the top ride hailing company in India. This is big news because the Indian market = lots of users.
Amazon spends more money on ads than any company in the world.
Facebook + Dating App? The EU says no thank you due to privacy concerns. Shocker. They also did other Facebook things.
Apple announced their Apple Edge Cache, similar to how Netflix provides specific hardware to ISPs so their content loads faster, Apple is developing its own technology to make their content faster for you.
Completely useless to your career but still great 🙃
Ever wanted to draw pixel art in your free time?? Now you can on this website and showcase your work, while also checking out some of the others with insanely impressive art skills.
Also, this is the best twitter response from the creator of Wikipedia (Jimmy Wales). Also, I am not taking any sides here, but here is a related comic from xkcd.
Do you think your code is performant on your new laptop? That's cute.
Learning to Learn 🏄♂️🏄♀️
I just came out with a new course very different from what I have done in the past. However, I think it is the most important course I have made to date. It covers a skill that is becoming more and more important in a world where skills, technology and information is constantly evolving. Have a look if you want...if not, that's cool too... YOU MONSTER.
Best Resource of the Month ✅
An important read. Adding features is always easier than taking away a feature. This is actually something I write about in my new book.
Finally, I highly recommend you read this article. Although it talks about Machine Learning and AI, as web developers we are still influenced by this field. This is one of the best high-level overviews of the business of AI and some of the challenges that most people forget about.
Trick of the Month 🌗
Tell me this doesn't blow your mind. Completely unrelated to programming, but I thought it was worth sharing. Sorry! Your mind is still not blown? Then watch this.
Ok, just so you are happy and I give you something coding related, here is a project you can build in an afternoon using Tensorflow.js to add to your portfolio and impress people.
We also had a very special Palindrome Day in February... See you next month!
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By the way, my full-time job is to teach people to code in the most efficient way possible. You can learn more about our online coding academy here and see all of my courses by visiting the courses page.
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