Frontend Developer Resources 2020
Tags: javascript, css, html, a11y
Published: 2020-01-06 05:00:06

It’s 2020, post [year in review](https://dev.to/nickytonline/my-2019-year-in-review-23i1), so let’s start off with some 2020 content.

{%twitter 1213657972322324482 %}

I was updating my personal site the other day and thought, why don’t I write about some of the tech I’ve been using, some tools I use in my day-to-day as well as other resources that I use, even if they aren't everyday "go-to"s in regards to frontend. I've also popped in some resources that I think will just be helpful.

Let's get to it!

## Open-Source and Free Resources

### Netlify

I use [Netlify](https://www.netlify.com/) on the free tier to host my site. They offer a great service and it integrates well with GitHub and continuous integration. I am not cheap, it is just that at the moment, I do not need more than the free tier. I actually went over my build minutes last month and paid a small fee, so now that they have my credit card... 😆

I wrote about automating my deployments to Netlify here. 👇

{%link https://dev.to/nickytonline/update-dependencies-with-dependabot-cypress-and-netlify-3lkf %}

Note: [Zeit](https://zeit.co/) is amazing as well. I just happen to be using Netlify.

### Lighthouse CI

I have not used this on a project yet, just the Lighthouse audit tools in the browser, but Lighthouse CI looks pretty amazing. Integrate Lighthouse audits into your continuous integration (CI).

{%github https://github.com/GoogleChrome/lighthouse-ci %}

### undraw.co

This site is amazing if you're looking for some quality illustrations in SVG or PNG format. Katerina Limpitsouni, who created undraw.co has done some fantastic work. She's not on DEV, but [give her a follow](https://twitter.com/NinaLimpi) and [undraw](https://twitter.com/unDraw_co) on Twitter.

### a11y tools

I am not an accessibility expert (so many things in the frontend! 😆), so tools like the ones below are super helpful. Someone who knows quite a bit about this topic though, is Lindsay Kopacz (@lkopacz). Definitely a great follow.

### Tota11y

This is a great accessibility visualization toolkit that was started by [Jordan Scales](https://twitter.com/jdan) while he was working at Khan Academy.

{%github https://github.com/Khan/tota11y %}

Fun fact, I converted it to a Chrome/Firefox extension for those interested.

{%link https://dev.to/nickytonline/an-a11y-extension-coming-to-a-browser-near-you-1mg2 %}

#### axe

Deque's axe browser extension is another great one. It is available for [Chrome](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/axe-web-accessibility-tes/lhdoppojpmngadmnindnejefpokejbdd) and [Firefox](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-CA/firefox/addon/axe-devtools/). It's great for finding accessibility issues in your app.

#### WAVE

WebAIM's [WAVE](https://wave.webaim.org/extension/) browser extension is great as well for finding accessibility issues in your app.

### cssgrid.io

@wesbos has great courses. He teaches things so well and in a fun way. [cssgrid.io](https://cssgrid.io/) is a great course for learning CSS grid that Mozilla sponsored, which is how Wes was able to make this course free. I highly recommend it. Note to self to go through this course again.

### JavaScript 30

Wes at it again with another great free course. Check out [JavaScript 30](https://javascript30.com/) to up your JavaScript game with fun little projects.

### Every Layout

I purchased [Every Layout](https://every-layout.dev/) while on sale last year, but the site content is all free. Andy Bell (@hankchizljaw) and Heydon Pickering do an amazing job.

### Some Staple Sites

There are tonnes of sites out there, so I'm just going to drop a few since this post is already an 11 minute read LOL.

* [CSS Tricks](https://css-tricks.com)
* [MDN](https://developer.mozilla.org/)
* [Dev Docs](https://devdocs.io)

### Know Your CSS Triggers

I do not know the list of all CSS triggers by heart, so [CSS Triggers](https://csstriggers.com/) is a great resource.

Also, speaking of CSS Tricks, here's a [short but quick explanation](https://css-tricks.com/css-triggers/) by Chris Coyier (@chriscoyier) about CSS triggers. 

### Kata Time

One that I revisit every now and then is [JS Katas](https://jskatas.org/), previously called ES6 Katas. This is a great way to keep your JS skills fresh.

### Learning Gamified

This is a great genre of learning. There are paid resources, but a couple of notable free ones are:

* [Flexbox Froggy](https://flexboxfroggy.com/)
* [Flexbox Zombies](https://geddski.teachable.com/p/flexbox-zombies)
* [CSSBattle](https://cssbattle.dev/)

### Anything Stephanie Eckles

All the below resources can be found at [Stephanie's web site](https://thinkdobecreate.com/).

- [ModernCSS.dev](https://ModernCSS.dev) - Modern CSS solutions for old CSS problems
- [smolcss.dev](https://smolcss.dev/) - Minimal snippets for modern CSS layouts and components
- [11ty.rocks](https://11ty.rocks/) - A great [Eleventy](https://www.11ty.dev/) resource
- [stylestage.dev](https://stylestage.dev) - A modern CSS showcase styled by community contributions

### TypeScript

This one, I will admit, is probably overkill for my personal site which is currently pretty much just a blog, but at my current job, we're not using [TypeScript](https://www.typescriptlang.org/), so I decided to keep my TypeScript skills fresh by using it.

Having said that, I've worked on several large projects using TypeScript and can 100% say, it allows for quicker refactorings, discoverability and avoiding silly errors. I have a mini-series on TypeScript for those interested.

{%link https://dev.to/nickytonline/why-you-might-want-to-consider-using-typescript-6j3 %}

If you've been on the fence about TypeScript, consider giving it a try in 2020. There is a huge ecosystem of types now and a lot of the popular frameworks either provide out of the box support or pretty easy setups to get going with TypoScript:

* React via [Create React App](https://create-react-app.dev/docs/adding-typescript/). TLDR; `npx create-react-app my-app --template typescript`
* Angular (TypeScript out of the box)
* Vue with [some simple setup]
(https://vuejs.org/v2/guide/typescript.html)
* Next.js (TypeScript out of the box)
* [NestJS](https://nestjs.com/) has a [TypeScript Starter project](https://github.com/nestjs/typescript-starter)

There is also TSDX, which is some fantastic work by Jared Palmer (@jaredpalmer). It's a great bootstrapping tool for TypeScript for different types of projects and it's officially endorsed by the TypeScript team.

{%github https://github.com/jaredpalmer/tsdx %}

And you know what? If you're still not a fan of types, that's OK. 😺

### The JavaScript Event Loop

[Philip Roberts](https://twitter.com/philip_roberts) talk at JSConf EU "What the heck is the event loop anyway?" is a great explanation of the event loop.

{%youtube 8aGhZQkoFbQ %}

### Some JavaScript Knowledge Nuggets care of Jake Archibald

This is definitely a great watch for those looking to understand JavaScript's event loop building off of Philip Robert's talk above.

{%youtube cCOL7MC4Pl0 %}

Jake also has a great blog post about [Tasks, microtasks, queues and schedules](https://jakearchibald.com/2015/tasks-microtasks-queues-and-schedules/).

### Storybook

Storybook is such a great tool for building components and design systems. It started off as a tool just for React and since then has expanded to all the major frameworks as well as plain old HTML. Check out [learnstorybook.com](https://learnstorybook.com).

### The Keyframers

I will be the first to admit that I have not done a lot of work with animations, so I tend to Google stuff a lot when it comes to this space. Two gentleman that are experts in animation though have a great podcast and YouTube channel where they rebuild animations. The Keyframers is an awesome collaboration by @davidkpiano and @shshaw.

{%twitter 1211998464692891648 %}

I still have many episodes to watch and to learn from.

### VisBug Browser Extension

A newer frontend tool out there that looks really interesting is [VisBug](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/visbug/cdockenadnadldjbbgcallicgledbeoc?hl=en). I tried it out briefly, but I must admit, I have not dug into this too deep yet.

This is the handy work of [Adam Argyle](https://www.twitter.com/argyleink).

{%youtube lc9PZxX6mIQ %}

**Update January 8th 2020:** Adam Tweeted back to me that you can launch tota11y from VisBug. Cool stuff. Thanks Adam!

{%twitter 1215052867716804608%}

Note: This browser extension is currently only available for Chrome.

### Your Browser's Developer Tools

This might sound like an obvious tool, but I have worked with people who do not use them that much.

Someone that knows these tools well and that I highly suggest you follow is Umar Hansa (@umaar). He is on DEV and has no activity, but links in his bio can lead you to other places to find him on the web. He has [a great newsletter for dev tips](https://umaar.com/dev-tips/), that I highly recommend subscribing to.

### Playing in Traffic

What's going on with your web requests? Looks like there is a traffic jam. These tools have your back:

* [Fiddler](https://www.telerik.com/download/fiddler) (cross-platform, but at the moment, it's only decent on a Windows machine.) Fiddler was my go-to for anything network related when I was on a Windows machine. Replaying requests, modifying payloads, proxying through it to capture traffic from the site/application you're working on.
* [Postman](https://www.getpostman.com/)
* [Postwoman](https://postwoman.io/)
{%link https://dev.to/liyasthomas/postwoman-v1-0-a-free-fast-beautiful-alternative-to-postman-mn0 %}

### Josh Comeau's Picks

Josh Comeau is a talented frontend who currently works for Gatsby. He Tweeted during the holidays some other great open-source/free resources that I suggest you check out. Here's the Tweet thread. He's also a great follow.

{%twitter 1212416797254832130 %}

### JavaScript January

Emily Freeman (@editingemily) started this in I believe 2017. Lots of great articles on JavaScript. It's a new January, so check out [javascriptjanuary.com](https://www.javascriptjanuary.com/).

### DEV!

DEV has so many great posts from people from all over the globe in regards to frontend. I'll share some that I love, but definitely navigate around. So many great ones.

{%link https://dev.to/ananyaneogi/html-can-do-that-c0n %}

Lydia Hallie's (@lydiahallie) posts on JavaScript

{%twitter 1213135686502699008 %}

Michael Chan's React Holiday Series

{%link https://dev.to/chantastic/learn-react-in-25-short-lessons-react-holiday-2019-24np %}

### Visual Studio Code

This falls under the obvious category probably, but it's worth mentioning it since it is open-source.

This has been my go-to editor for work-related stuff since believe it or not 2015. Back in 2015, I was working on a product for an e-commerce company and TypeScript was to be used in the frontend. At the time, VS Code was the only editor to have TypeScript support. Back in 2015, there were no extensions for VS Code. It was only about a year and a half later that extension support was added. Since then, the [extension ecosystem](https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/vscode) has exploded.

A great addition to the ecosystem has been the [Live Share extension pack](https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=MS-vsliveshare.vsliveshare-pack). This is such a great way to do [pair programming](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pair_programming). 🍐

{%twitter 1075155769870307329 %}

If you're interested, it is a little outdated, but here is my VS Code setup. These days, I roll with Sarah Edo's [Night Owl](https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=sdras.night-owl) theme and the wonderful font, [Dank Mono](https://dank.sh) (yes I paid for it, but it's nowhere near the price of Operator Mono).

{%link https://dev.to/nickytonline/my-visual-studio-code-setup-2ima %}

### VS Code Tips

I created the [@vscodetips](https://twitter.com/vscodetips) Twitter account back in September 2017. People seem to enjoy the tips I post or things I retweet related to VS Code. If VS Code is your jam, consider giving it a follow.

[VS Code tips is also on DEV](https://dev.to/vscodetips), but I have not done much there yet. You can check out the profile here

### Refined GitHub Browser Extension

Refined GitHub is not frontend specific, but a lot of us use GitHub for work. It's a great extension available for [Chrome](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/refined-github/hlepfoohegkhhmjieoechaddaejaokhf) or [FireFox](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/refined-github-/). The Chrome extension also works for some Chromium-based browsers. The ones I can confirm it does work on are [Brave](http://brave.com/) and the new Microsoft [Edge](https://www.microsoftedgeinsider.com/en-us/).

There are too many features to mention, but my favourites are automatically deleting a branch after it is merged, and prompting you to create a PR if you're on GitHub and just pushed a branch or made changes to a branch that currently does not have a PR open.

![Screen shot of Refined GitHub prompting a user to create a PR](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/qo9qd11owzquv5j3zywa.png)

The extension integrates so well, I no longer know what is a new GitHub feature or a Refined GitHub feature.

{%github https://github.com/sindresorhus/refined-github %}

### Online Editors/Playgrounds

More and more development is being done directly on the web, whether it be proof of concepts or full-blown apps. So much has happened in this space in the past few years. 👏

![Playground smoking and on fire](https://media.giphy.com/media/aXilAPXOrdX3i/giphy-downsized-large.gif)

Here's some staples:

* [codepen](https://codepen.io/)
* [CodeSandbox](https://codesandbox.io/)
* [Stackblitz](https://stackblitz.com/)
* [jsbin](https://jsbin.com/)
* [jsfiddle](https://jsfiddle.net/)
* [repl.it](https://repl.it/)


## Paid Tools/Resources

I do not have any affiliate links in any of the stuff posted below. They are just great resources that help me. Let's get started.

### Refactoring UI

I purchased the [Refactoring UI](https://refactoringui.com/book/) book last year and loved it. I've given it a full read and will probably give it another read. The price varies depending on the type of package you go with. I got a great pre-release sale deal, so I grabbed the whole enchilada.

There is also a YouTube channel that you can subscribe to or just search for Refactoring UI on YouTube.

{%youtube 5gdYHlYAKDY %}

Also, Steve Schoger ([@steveschoger](https://www.twitter.com/steveschoger) on Twitter), one of the authors of the book, Tweets a lot too about Refactoring UI. A great follow.

### Every Layout

As mentioned above, I purchased [Every Layout](https://every-layout.dev/checkout/). This is a great buy and the additional resources are great. I've been reading the ebook (not finished yet) and have really been enjoying it. Great work Andy and Heydon!

### xScope

There are browser extensions that do part of what xScope does, but a few years ago, a co-worker introduced me to [xScope](https://xscope.app). The only downside to this tool is that it is only available for Mac. If you are on a Mac though, I highly recommend it.

![Screenshot of xScope in action](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/z9ib0s1cc88dwa7qvv5n.png) 

### Sizzy

[Sizzy](https://sizzy.app/) is a new one in my toolbelt, but so far I am loving it. I snagged it at a great price during Boxing Day week. In a nutshell, it allows you to work on a site or application and see how it appears in different devices. It has more to it than that, but I am still new to it, so I probably haven't unleashed all its awesomeness yet. Kudos to @thekitze for building this awesomeness.

![Screenshot of Sizzy in action](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/cqu87zz9l97zk55ng3p5.png)

### Learning through Video

These will most likely not come as a surprise, but it's worth mentioning them.

* [Egghead](https://egghead.io) (a happy subscriber)
* [Frontend Masters](https://frontendmasters.com/) (a happy subscriber. Thank you for the subscription [Shotgun](https://www.shotgunsoftware.com/) (my previous employer)!)
* [testingjavascript.com](https://testingjavascript.com/) (a happy license owner. Thanks x 2 Shotgun!)
* Anything Wes Bos. Check out his [courses](https://wesbos.com/courses/).

Also, there is a new kid on the block, [Educative](https://educative.io). Looks like they are gaining some traction, so probably worth checking out as well. They're also on DEV, posting great content.

### That's All She Wrote

There are so many resources out there but this is what my current brain dump brought to the table and at some point we all have to go to the bathroom. 😆 I probably could have organized this better, but for now, this is how the dump came out.

If you have resources not listed that you think other frontend developers would benefit from, drop them in the comments! I hope you enjoyed the read and you can go to the bathroom as well now.

Until next time peeps!

![Stay tuned](https://media.giphy.com/media/J4zA6LplubvC5weDyo/giphy.gif)

The cover image is a partial screenshot of my site's thank you page, but the illustration comes from the wonderful work of Katerina Limpitsouni's [undraw.co](https://undraw.co)