8 ms·

Wow, really? Who knew overuse of JS and fancy graphical effects where they're not needed could negatively impact user experience? Could it be that all the web d

Wow, really? Who knew overuse of JS and fancy graphical effects where they're not needed could negatively impact user experience? Could it be that all the web devs using 20 CDNs, cramming 900 frameworks, 100 externally provided analytics, advertisement providers and fancy layout eye-candy were wrong all along? What a surprise! I'm already sick when I have to visit a webpage and it won't even load ANYTHING if I don't enable scripts on it. At least load the god damn text, I don't care if it'll look like trash, just don't show me a blank page... The irony is that everyone calls for people to not use Flash, and then they go out of their way to recreate the abysmal experience without it, so really nothing changed as far as UX goes. Remember when pages didn't load at all unless you had flash installed? Well here's some nostalgia for you, won't load unless you run all the JS on the page and then you have to "enjoy" a bloated joke of a website, but Jesus does it have eye-candy!!!

minikites 10y ago
>Wow, really? Who knew overuse of JS and fancy graphical effects where they're not needed could negatively impact user experience? Clearly not enough people, because it keeps happening. I think it would also help if people kept in mind that the internet is global, it isn't just for developed nations.
- jmcdiesel 10y ago
  It's not a matter of whether the internet is global, its who your audience is... if you audience is primarily in developed nations, then the rest of the world isn't much of an issue.
  - minikites 10y ago
    If you're running a purely domestic web store, maybe, but people in developing nations are not that different from people in developed nations, they can be just as interested in a a wide variety of topics, that's what makes the internet so appealing and wonderful.
    - chickenfries 10y ago
      Sure, we're humans and all, but jmcdiesel isn't saying that people in the developing world aren't interested in similar things, just that many businesses do have audiences which are limited to certain countries. Much of the internet is a business, not a passion project. There are plenty of businesses that are completely OK with being inaccessible to users on 2g/3g in the developing world.
    - mynameisvlad 10y ago
      Even if you're running an international web store, shipping to developing countries plus the increased rate of fraud and different payment technologies generally mean that you're not keen to expand to those places anytime soon.
  - dsfyu404ed 10y ago
    "Why hasn't the campaign hired anyone to make phone calls?" "Bill, phone calls are so 1992, they hired a web dev to create online polls"
- tomjen3 10y ago
  Even if your audience members are global, the west is going to be where most of your revenue streams are going to be. If you are facebook it may be worth optimizing for rural India, because they have few places left to grow, but for most companies it is just not worth it - and companies exist to make money.
lotyrin 10y ago
Honestly, they don't even look that great. Lots of sites could be using lots of modern browser features to be fairly innovative from a visual design and user experience standpoint, but it's mostly just really inefficient (and inaccessible, with no compat fallbacks) implementations of the same old shit.
- brilliantcode 10y ago
  yes lot of these web pages are the size of mp3 files. it's just fucked up. we decided static html webpages are sooo 1999. Yet it remains the most secure and user friendly medium to deliver value. bring back the 1999 frame side bar. what was wrong with that?
  - 0xCMP 10y ago
    There is making the web more janky and hard to use and making it a simpler page. I think there is a balance here we can find.
    - brilliantcode 10y ago
      I think AMP is that "bring back the 90s movement". No Javascript. Just super light and fast loading webpages like in the good ol' days. God I miss the late 90s and the internet. Even looking through neocities gives me a pang of nostalgia. Now everything has to be "Material Design" or "Flat". ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
      - 0xCMP 10y ago
        Everyone thought it was silly when I did that for my site (minimal css, no js, static pages with hugo). But yea I agree, that's the right future for the web and design.
  - clarry 10y ago
    > bring back the 1999 frame side bar. what was wrong with that? That's funny. Back in the day, every Real web developer learned that frames are Evil and must be abolished, because they are breaking the back button and now the poor user can't provide a link to the view he sees, because the state of all the frames isn't encoded in the URL. Then web2.0 happened and all the Cool web devs knew it's the time to start abusing ajax, use modal dialogs, break the back button, and turn simple websites serving text and images into complex stateful web apps and in doing so, ensure that people don't have nice URLs that encode the view they see, for linking. Hello??
minxomat 10y ago
Every time I get angry about this I'll open https://purecss.io/ https://purecss.io/ or http://skytorrents.in http://skytorrents.in and look at the source. It's a form of meditation to browse fast websites.
- solidr53 10y ago
  http://motherfuckingwebsite.com http://motherfuckingwebsite.com
  - aembleton 10y ago
    That uses Google Analytics
- chjh 10y ago
  Thanks!! First I heard of purecss. Will use asap
- discreditable 10y ago
  https://bestmotherfucking.website https://bestmotherfucking.website
thinkloop 10y ago
JavaScript is not the enemy here, it's very possible and easy to make full SPAs with judicious use of micro libs, lazy loading of images/assets, non-blocking styles/fonts/code, and ad-free. The problem is just not caring or knowing - misuse of the technology, rather than the technology itself.
- SquareWheel 10y ago
  Agreed. I really enjoy building static websites. With no databases, no server-side logic or caching, everything becomes extremely fast and simple. It does mean moving any logic to the client-side with Javascript though.
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  As a JS hater.... I completely agree. I think the problem is that bad designers are misusing a good tool. It's like salt: If I add a little to my meal, it makes it better. If I add a LOT of it to my meal, it doesn't keep getting better. Unfortunately this causes a knee-jerk reaction to anything JS. Although I don't think JS is to blame, I think the hatred of JS comes from a good reason.
- j3097736 10y ago
  Lazy loading really sucks when you're left with a blurry image because it timed out while serving the full image (can happen even with an acceptable connection). Unless it's really clever I'd prefer if they just let the browser do it's thing with an img tag, because that worked fine in the 56K times.
w8rbt 10y ago
Many younger devs may have never lived outside of large, very-well connected cities (NY, Chicago, West Coast, etc.). They may assume that everyone has the connectivity and speeds that they do, or in the least they may not fully understand with 1.5 Mbps down really feels like.
flamedoge 10y ago
reminds me of node-noop

minikites 10y ago

>Wow, really? Who knew overuse of JS and fancy graphical effects where they're not needed could negatively impact user experience? Clearly not enough people, because it keeps happening. I think it would also help if people kept in mind that the internet is global, it isn't just for developed nations.

jmcdiesel 10y ago
It's not a matter of whether the internet is global, its who your audience is... if you audience is primarily in developed nations, then the rest of the world isn't much of an issue.
- minikites 10y ago
  If you're running a purely domestic web store, maybe, but people in developing nations are not that different from people in developed nations, they can be just as interested in a a wide variety of topics, that's what makes the internet so appealing and wonderful.
  - chickenfries 10y ago
    Sure, we're humans and all, but jmcdiesel isn't saying that people in the developing world aren't interested in similar things, just that many businesses do have audiences which are limited to certain countries. Much of the internet is a business, not a passion project. There are plenty of businesses that are completely OK with being inaccessible to users on 2g/3g in the developing world.
  - mynameisvlad 10y ago
    Even if you're running an international web store, shipping to developing countries plus the increased rate of fraud and different payment technologies generally mean that you're not keen to expand to those places anytime soon.
- dsfyu404ed 10y ago
  "Why hasn't the campaign hired anyone to make phone calls?" "Bill, phone calls are so 1992, they hired a web dev to create online polls"
tomjen3 10y ago
Even if your audience members are global, the west is going to be where most of your revenue streams are going to be. If you are facebook it may be worth optimizing for rural India, because they have few places left to grow, but for most companies it is just not worth it - and companies exist to make money.

lotyrin 10y ago

Honestly, they don't even look that great. Lots of sites could be using lots of modern browser features to be fairly innovative from a visual design and user experience standpoint, but it's mostly just really inefficient (and inaccessible, with no compat fallbacks) implementations of the same old shit.

brilliantcode 10y ago
yes lot of these web pages are the size of mp3 files. it's just fucked up. we decided static html webpages are sooo 1999. Yet it remains the most secure and user friendly medium to deliver value. bring back the 1999 frame side bar. what was wrong with that?
- 0xCMP 10y ago
  There is making the web more janky and hard to use and making it a simpler page. I think there is a balance here we can find.
  - brilliantcode 10y ago
    I think AMP is that "bring back the 90s movement". No Javascript. Just super light and fast loading webpages like in the good ol' days. God I miss the late 90s and the internet. Even looking through neocities gives me a pang of nostalgia. Now everything has to be "Material Design" or "Flat". ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    - 0xCMP 10y ago
      Everyone thought it was silly when I did that for my site (minimal css, no js, static pages with hugo). But yea I agree, that's the right future for the web and design.
- clarry 10y ago
  > bring back the 1999 frame side bar. what was wrong with that? That's funny. Back in the day, every Real web developer learned that frames are Evil and must be abolished, because they are breaking the back button and now the poor user can't provide a link to the view he sees, because the state of all the frames isn't encoded in the URL. Then web2.0 happened and all the Cool web devs knew it's the time to start abusing ajax, use modal dialogs, break the back button, and turn simple websites serving text and images into complex stateful web apps and in doing so, ensure that people don't have nice URLs that encode the view they see, for linking. Hello??

minxomat 10y ago

Every time I get angry about this I'll open https://purecss.io/ https://purecss.io/ or http://skytorrents.in http://skytorrents.in and look at the source. It's a form of meditation to browse fast websites.

solidr53 10y ago
http://motherfuckingwebsite.com http://motherfuckingwebsite.com
- aembleton 10y ago
  That uses Google Analytics
chjh 10y ago
Thanks!! First I heard of purecss. Will use asap
discreditable 10y ago
https://bestmotherfucking.website https://bestmotherfucking.website

thinkloop 10y ago

JavaScript is not the enemy here, it's very possible and easy to make full SPAs with judicious use of micro libs, lazy loading of images/assets, non-blocking styles/fonts/code, and ad-free. The problem is just not caring or knowing - misuse of the technology, rather than the technology itself.

SquareWheel 10y ago
Agreed. I really enjoy building static websites. With no databases, no server-side logic or caching, everything becomes extremely fast and simple. It does mean moving any logic to the client-side with Javascript though.
CaptSpify 10y ago
As a JS hater.... I completely agree. I think the problem is that bad designers are misusing a good tool. It's like salt: If I add a little to my meal, it makes it better. If I add a LOT of it to my meal, it doesn't keep getting better. Unfortunately this causes a knee-jerk reaction to anything JS. Although I don't think JS is to blame, I think the hatred of JS comes from a good reason.
j3097736 10y ago
Lazy loading really sucks when you're left with a blurry image because it timed out while serving the full image (can happen even with an acceptable connection). Unless it's really clever I'd prefer if they just let the browser do it's thing with an img tag, because that worked fine in the 56K times.

w8rbt 10y ago

Many younger devs may have never lived outside of large, very-well connected cities (NY, Chicago, West Coast, etc.). They may assume that everyone has the connectivity and speeds that they do, or in the least they may not fully understand with 1.5 Mbps down really feels like.

flamedoge 10y ago

reminds me of node-noop