My Web Development Wishlist 2024
Published on Jan聽7, 2024, filed under development, quality. (Share this post, e.g., on Mastodon.)
This is one of 180 articles that you can also read in an ebook: On Web Development聽II.
Adding to the rekindled tradition, I鈥檇 like to make a few wishes for our field of web development:
Treat everyone with respect. We cannot provide a great user experience or be great professionals if we don鈥檛 respect our users or our peers. We may need to draw lines, but also stay empathetic.
Put user experience (including accessibility) first, developer experience second. We can always optimize our setups and workflows, seemingly for the good of everyone. At the end of the day, however, a second saved for the user is more important than a second saved for us.
Ship quality output, starting with actual (i.e., valid) HTML. It鈥檚 neither good for the user experience nor a sign of professionalism to ship code that works accidentally, or not at all. Not checking on conformance is also what severely limits web and frontend development as professions, and therefore our opportunities within them.
Run your own website. This is the greatest demonstration that we understand the website development cycle, lets us own our content and our reputation, and challenges us to keep growing.
Our peers working on web standards, add as much as necessary, but as little as possible. In the web development community, we cannot constantly, exclusively talk about new features, let alone understand and master the complexity that ever-growing standards bring. Never-ending growth is cancer.
Yes, these wishes are fairly broad. Yes, I keep repeating them (listening, professionalism, commitment to conformance, challenges for frontend development, running one鈥檚 own website, spec growth). Yes, we aren鈥檛 doing poorly everywhere (with a few who demonstrate how to master everything). But even if only aspired to, and not yet fulfilled, these wishes help us make more impact, in a healthier profession.
About Me
I鈥檓 Jens (long: Jens Oliver Meiert), and I鈥檓 an engineering lead, guerrilla philosopher, and indie publisher. I鈥檝e worked as a technical lead and engineering manager at various companies (e.g., Google); I鈥檓 an active web and tool developer (code optimization, digital defense), a contributor to web standards (like HTML, CSS, WCAG), and a book author (O鈥橰eilly, Frontend Dogma).
I love trying things鈥攊n web development and engineering management, but also in politics and philosophy, where I hold to one idea in particular: that we can only be well if we take good care of everyone. Here on meiert.com I talk about some of my perspectives and experiences. (Please share feedback: Interpret charitably, keep it friendly, but do be critical.)