4 ms·

The awesome thing about that period was how we learned. You'd be on a web page, see something funky (positioning, rounded corners, etc) and be like "how the hec

The awesome thing about that period was how we learned. You'd be on a web page, see something funky (positioning, rounded corners, etc) and be like "how the heck did they do that?". Then you do the ol' "View Source" and now that technique is in your toolkit. In fact you'd prob head right over to your geocities site and try it out right away.

p2p_astroturf 5y ago
AKA the web was always a bunch of cargo cult, NIH about the most basic computer programming tasks, etc.
theK 5y ago
Yeah this was awesome time and it did teach you more than just the trick, navigating unknown codebases, extracting the meaningful parts of a non trivial piece in f code… I really think the web community lost something with the transition to compiled uglified js and css…. Sure google will show you to some code if you manage to put what you are looking for into words but that isn’t always easy. Pitty that there is no standardised solution to publish the source along with the Minimized script nowadays.
- 3np 5y ago
  There is. Source Maps. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/SourceMap https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/So... Can’t tell if you’re sarcastic or not, assuming not all comment readers will be aware either way.
  - hajile 5y ago
    Very few sites ship source maps to production.
  - theK 5y ago
    Just for the record, source maps are awesome and (unfortunately) typically disabled on production. The original remark was criticism towards this practice.
dehrmann 5y ago
With developer tools, this has only gotten easier.
- jspash 5y ago
  Except now it just shows <html> <script src="obfuscated.javscript-pack.chunk-12384123.chunkittychunk-packweb.der.huhwhat?{this?:this-v3.2123-notcompatiblewithv3.2122}.js"> <div id="modern-web-app-goez-here"></div> </html> Good luck with that!
  - vntok 5y ago
    What developer tools doesn't show you the generated html? Are you using a major web browser?
    - Oddskar 5y ago
      Just seeing the generated HTML is trying to figure out the blueprint of the building by looking at the facade. Sure there's source map files, but most of the time you'll fine those aren't distributed together with the minified bundles.
  - ornornor 5y ago
    I’ve struggled for ever with modern pages to find out what even listeners are attached to particular html elements. Is that even possible to find out? Say you’re on a webpage, and when you click a button a bunch of JS happens. Except it’s all minifies uglified. But the browser must know what JS will run when clicking that button. How do I make it show me what that code/function is without trawling through the JS code and hunting for a CSS selector or ID?
    - jraph 5y ago
      At least Firefox makes it easy to show which listeners are on which elements in the Web Developers tools. <old schmuck>The thing that looks like Firebug anyway.</old schmuck> That you'll be able to actually read the code is another completely different story.
nunez 5y ago
This is the thing I miss the most. View-Source was the source of truth. No JavaScript filling in empty <div>s bullshit, No minifying, no uglifying.
goshx 5y ago
Yes, and I hated who came up with the tableless websites lol
laurent123456 5y ago
For CSS and HTML it's still easy and even easier to do so by right clicking and selecting "Inspect element" (something we didn't have back then). I often do that to understand how a page is setup and I don't see what's so hard about it it. For JS it's a different story of course but it was never that easy to begin with since the code that affects an element can be anywhere.

p2p_astroturf 5y ago

AKA the web was always a bunch of cargo cult, NIH about the most basic computer programming tasks, etc.

theK 5y ago

Yeah this was awesome time and it did teach you more than just the trick, navigating unknown codebases, extracting the meaningful parts of a non trivial piece in f code… I really think the web community lost something with the transition to compiled uglified js and css…. Sure google will show you to some code if you manage to put what you are looking for into words but that isn’t always easy. Pitty that there is no standardised solution to publish the source along with the Minimized script nowadays.

3np 5y ago
There is. Source Maps. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/SourceMap https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/So... Can’t tell if you’re sarcastic or not, assuming not all comment readers will be aware either way.
- hajile 5y ago
  Very few sites ship source maps to production.
- theK 5y ago
  Just for the record, source maps are awesome and (unfortunately) typically disabled on production. The original remark was criticism towards this practice.

dehrmann 5y ago

With developer tools, this has only gotten easier.

jspash 5y ago
Except now it just shows <html> <script src="obfuscated.javscript-pack.chunk-12384123.chunkittychunk-packweb.der.huhwhat?{this?:this-v3.2123-notcompatiblewithv3.2122}.js"> <div id="modern-web-app-goez-here"></div> </html> Good luck with that!
- vntok 5y ago
  What developer tools doesn't show you the generated html? Are you using a major web browser?
  - Oddskar 5y ago
    Just seeing the generated HTML is trying to figure out the blueprint of the building by looking at the facade. Sure there's source map files, but most of the time you'll fine those aren't distributed together with the minified bundles.
- ornornor 5y ago
  I’ve struggled for ever with modern pages to find out what even listeners are attached to particular html elements. Is that even possible to find out? Say you’re on a webpage, and when you click a button a bunch of JS happens. Except it’s all minifies uglified. But the browser must know what JS will run when clicking that button. How do I make it show me what that code/function is without trawling through the JS code and hunting for a CSS selector or ID?
  - jraph 5y ago
    At least Firefox makes it easy to show which listeners are on which elements in the Web Developers tools. <old schmuck>The thing that looks like Firebug anyway.</old schmuck> That you'll be able to actually read the code is another completely different story.

nunez 5y ago

This is the thing I miss the most. View-Source was the source of truth. No JavaScript filling in empty <div>s bullshit, No minifying, no uglifying.

goshx 5y ago

Yes, and I hated who came up with the tableless websites lol

laurent123456 5y ago

For CSS and HTML it's still easy and even easier to do so by right clicking and selecting "Inspect element" (something we didn't have back then). I often do that to understand how a page is setup and I don't see what's so hard about it it. For JS it's a different story of course but it was never that easy to begin with since the code that affects an element can be anywhere.