
## Burnout Symptoms for Developers

Burnout is defined by the World Health Organization as "a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed." And this stress is very common among developers who are frequently overworked and stressed. A recent [post on The Next Web goes into detail regarding burnout for developers](https://thenextweb.com/growth-quarters/2020/08/29/developers-watch-out-for-these-burnout-symptoms-syndication/) outlining what is burnout, possible syndromes developers might experience, common causes, and prevention. It is a very educational read that is perfect for anyone, but especially developers.

## Writing a Good Pull Request Description

Pull requests are an integral and important part of open-source and almost any other form of development. This is why writing a good pull request description is critical for maintaining the code base efficiently and effectively. A [post last week on freeCodeCamp outlined the components of a pull request description](https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-to-write-a-pull-request-description/) and why they are necessary. While each developer and even each repository might have its own format, it never hurts to have a refresher on key components for a quality pull request description.

## Improving Novice JavaScript Coding Patterns

There are many different ways to reach the same outcome with JavaScript. But some of these ways may give away that you are a novice developer, or at least have the coding habits of one. A post on Monday in the [DEV Community highlights a couple of ways that you can improve your code](https://dev.to/alexeychang/js-coding-patterns-that-give-you-away-as-a-junior-developer-4h61) to show that you are not just beginning your JavaScript career. Learn the strategies of "not overusing if and else statements" and "not using functional programming in a nonfunctional way."



There's no doubt about it, media queries are one of the most useful CSS features for a modern website. They allow you to create a breakpoint for your website where you can adjust styles for larger or smaller screen sizes. While this is great for use in CSS, what if you want to utilize media queries in JavaScript?

## Recognize a Media Query in JavaScript

As with anything in JavaScript, there are multiple ways to accomplish a task. For example, a method for recognizing media queries in JavaScript is to check if an element is visible. So, if the mobile menu button is visible do a certain JS function. And you would put this in a function whenever the window resizes. While this may get the job done, there is perhaps a better and cleaner way to accomplish the same task.

## matchMedia

There is a window listener in JavaScript called `matchMedia` which will listen for a specific value and trigger when true. For example:

``` js
var mediaQuery = window.matchMedia('(min-width: 768px)');
```

When we add a listener to the variable it can run a function:

``` js
mediaQuery.addListener(console.log);
```

This opens the possibility of passing any function to the listener and only having that function run on certain screen widths.

## Browser Support

The `matchMedia` function is [widely supported](https://caniuse.com/#search=matchmedia), including full support for Internet Explorer 10 and 11.

## Credit

_Today’s Tuesday Tips was adapted from [a post on Daily Dev Tips](https://daily-dev-tips.com/posts/getting-notified-in-javascript-when-a-media-query-changes/)._



A very common blog logic is displaying posts or events on your website based on the date. We may want to not show a post if it is in the future or change how a past event is displayed. When looking at a Jamstack website this can be confusing as there are several places in the build lifecycle that this logic can occur. And each occurence comes with its own limitations.

## Write the HTML

The first option is to hardcode the elements by physically adding or modifying them in the HTML files. This is the most reliable as it happens before the website is built. However, this is also less than optimal: who wants to change their website manually every time a post needs to be published or an event passes?

## Structured Data with Logic at Build

The second option is to write structured data and do the logic at build time. Using a headless CMS or other ways to store data files, such as Markdown, we can utilize a static site generator to build our website. The generator would then use logic during the build process to display what we want. So, we could use conditional logic to say if the post is in the future do not display it or if the event has passed use the grayed out styles.

The issue with this process is that once the website is built it will not change until the next build. So, if we build the website today and have an event tomorrow, our website on the following day would still have it as an upcoming event. We could solve this issue by automating our build process every day or even every hour.

## Logic at the Edge

A less readily available option would be to do the logic with edge workers that would execute on a CDN request. The render function for our website would then update the website files every time a user requests it. This feature is still in the works but the ideal end goal is that it would perform nearly as well as a static site but allow for updates on each request.

## Logic at Run Time

The last option is to pass data to the front end and then execute the logic. For example, we might use an HTML data attribute for our event or post. Then, using this attribute, we could conditionally style the event using front-end JavaScript. This would not require a new build but could seem a bit clunky on the code side. However, if the performance is not affected and your user experience is working well then this might not be an issue.

In the end, it all comes down to the data you are trying to display, when it needs to be updated and how much manual work you are willing to put in each time.

## Credit

_Today’s Tuesday Tips was adapted from [a post on CSS-Tricks](https://css-tricks.com/where-does-logic-go-on-jamstack-sites/)._


Posts Tagged with "javascript"

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