This newsletter isn’t necessarily intended to revolve around frontend work and Javascript, but that’s definitely the direction it’s been going lately! This week I’ve been pounding on my JS fundamentals, and practicing building interesting UIs.

1. Class vs. Factory in JavaScript

• “In a nutshell, a factory is a function that returns an object, while a class is a template for an object.”
• “While differences may seem trivial, factories are more robust against bugs due to avoiding the this keyword. You should use them in almost all cases.”
• “Classes are slightly faster to instantiate, but we’re talking a fraction of a fraction of a millisecond. And as rule, choose readability over speed, 99.99% …

I tell you what you guys, this week really kicked my butt. It was definitely one of those valley weeks where I felt the exertion of trying to get better at my job while having to sit with where I am right now.

Whenever I get down about the uphill battle of work, I turn to my why, the reasons I want to be a developer. Those reasons are many, but the most important ones are:

• I am a lifelong learner, and being a developer is a way to get to constantly learn while getting to build awesome stuff.
• I am a part of the world of technology, which powers the future. …

About a month ago, I decided I was going to get serious about posting on Medium. I hadn’t ever really considered Medium as an option, and I was looking for a new outlet to write, teach, and communicate. I chose Medium because it’s where I seemed to keep ending up when researching or Googling things I was interested in.

This month I published two to three times per week, though I was a little more zealous earlier on. …

This week I’ve been continuing to focus on improving my efficiency when it comes to working in the front end.

1. What is the difference between Flexbox and CSS Grid?

Digging right on into how to effectively use Flexbox and CSS Grid is a great way to make framing up a new UI element quick!

Key article takeaways:

• “The most important thing to know is that flexbox is one-dimensional, while CSS Grid is two-dimensional. Flexbox lays out items along either the horizontal or the vertical axis, so you have to decide whether you want a row-based or a column-based layout.”
• “On the other hand, CSS Grid lets you work along two axes: horizontally and vertically. Grid allows you to create two-dimensional layouts where you can precisely place grid items into cells defined by rows and columns.” …

I am a leaf on the tree
Tiny and green
Broadening and lengthening through my summer
Drying in colorful rebellion in the autumn of my season

The wind, the rain, they are tests, it is true
But, clinging to the branch I’ve been given
I hear the rustle of countless others
Just like me

Though, finally, I’ll fall to the earth
Browned and brittle
Having served

I am the tree
Repeating my task, year by year, surviving
The layer of each hot, fruitful summer
Each frigid, dark winter
Building strength

I will grow old for a time,
To be felled by man, disease, or weather
Perhaps laid to rest in the timeless woods
Among the new and old trees around me
Perhaps taken to be used to create…

1. How does the Javascript Call Stack Work?

A couple of articles on this topic today! Javascript is a single-threaded language, meaning it has only one call stack and one memory heap. The article below walks us through the way event loops, callbacks, and browser Web APIs enable concurrent processes and frees up our code to multi-task.

First, read this article on the ways in which Javascript is and is not asynchronous:

Second, this article does an awesome job explaining (with pictures!) how the call stack works in the browser:

2. Frontend Facts: Better options for mailto and tel links

Using mailto: has always seemed weird to me. As someone who uses a mac for projects and gmail for communication, clicking a contact link and having my system’s default email client open is super annoying — and I’m sure I’m not the only user that feels that way! This article gives some great examples of giving your site a better UX for contact links, without too much extra work or fuss. …

I am a little less than a year into a new career. I am currently a web application developer with little formal training. Throughout my life, the most amazing experiences I’ve had were because I listened for opportunities and said yes to the awesome ones, even if I wasn’t particularly ready to do whatever the job or task required. I always figure I’ll pick things up along the way.

Every time I’ve jumped off a new job cliff, or picked up some freelance work I was pretty sure I could google how to do, I go through the same cycle. There is the awe of new work, of new things to learn and play with, of new people to know and collaborate with. …

What Are We Learning?

• Show and hide components using routes as opposed to input and output properties
• Keep those components in communication with each other by passing data in the route
• Learn how to set up routes in the routing module
• Use routerLink to set up click events and pass data to the route

In another tutorial I published recently, I walked through using input and output properties to pass data around your Angular app. We also used those properties to manage what the user could see in the UI. This setup definitely worked and is a great way to get child components the data they need, but it’s not very clean to look at. …