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Thoughts on inline JavaScript event handlers in the <head>

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I’ve been thinking about Scott Jehl’s “simplest way to load external CSS asynchronously” technique. I’m interested in its use of an inline (onload) event handler for running JavaScript-based enhancements in the <head>, in the context of some broader ruminations on how best to progressively enhance UI elements with JavaScript (for example adding toggle show/hide) without causing layout jank.

One really interesting aspect of using inline event handlers to apply enhancements was highlighted by Chris Ferdinandi today: as JavaScript goes, it’s pretty resilient.

Because we’re dealing with an HTML element directly in the document, and because the relevant JS is inline on that element and not dependent on any external files, the only case where the JS won’t run is if someone has JS completely turned off – a sub-1% proportion. The other typical JavaScript resilience pitfalls – such as network connections timing out, CDN failure and JS errors elsewhere blocking your code from running – simply don’t apply here.

“Doing It Right” Podcast, with Dotty Charles

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An interview with Ashley ‘Dotty’ Charles, a writer and broadcaster, on the topic of online outrage.

By shouting about the little things, are we neglecting to talk about the bigger issues in modern society? We discuss performative outrage, the role of the social media provocateur and the strange case of Rachel Dolezal.

I really enjoyed this. It totally chimed with how I currently feel about the state of online discourse, and Dotty has some great ideas and insights. I’ve already bought her book, Outraged and am looking forward to reading that soon.

Thanks to Rita (Kelly) for the tip!

Inclusive Datepicker (by Tommy Feldt)

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A human-friendly datepicker. Supports natural language manual input through Chrono.js. Fully accessible with keyboard and screen reader.

Sign-in form best practices (on web.dev)

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Sam Dutton advises how to use cross-platform browser features to build sign-in forms that are secure, accessible and easy to use.

The tips of greatest interest to me were:

  • on using autocomplete="new-password" on registration forms and autocomplete="current-password" on sign-in forms to tap into browser password suggestion and password manager features;
  • on how best to provide “Show Password” functionality; and
  • on using aria-describedby when providing guidance on password rules.

Rodney P’s Jazz Funk (on BBC Four)

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UK rap legend Rodney P reveals how the first generation of British-born black kids was inspired by the avant-garde musical fusions of black America in the 70s to lay the foundations of modern-day multiculturalism by creating the first black British music culture with the jazz-funk movement.

A brilliant documentary featuring great music from Pharoah Sanders, War, Hi-Tension, Ronnie Laws and more.

Three CSS Alternatives to JavaScript Navigation (on CSS-Tricks)

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In general this is a decent article on non-JavaScript-based mobile navigation options, but what I found most interesting is the idea of having a separate page for your navigation menu (at the URL /menu, for example).

Who said navigation has to be in the header of every page? If your front end is extremely lightweight or if you have a long list of menu items to display in your navigation, the most practical method might be to create a separate page to list them all.

I also noted that the article describes a method where you can “spoof” a slide-in hamburger menu without JS by using the checkbox hack. I once coded a similar “HTML and CSS -only” hamburger menu, but opted instead to use the :target pseudo-class in combination with the adjacent sibling selector, as described by Chris Coyier back in 2012.

The Simplest Way to Load CSS Asynchronously (Filament Group)

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Scott Jehl of Filament Group demonstrates a one-liner technique for loading external CSS files without them delaying page rendering.

While this isn’t really necessary in situations where your (minified and compressed) CSS is small, say 14k or below, it could be useful when working with large CSS files and want to deliver critical CSS separately and the rest asynchronously.

Today, armed with a little knowledge of how the browser handles various link element attributes, we can achieve the effect of loading CSS asynchronously with a short line of HTML. Here it is, the simplest way to load a stylesheet asynchronously:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="my.css" media="print" onload="this.media='all'">

Note that if JavaScript is disabled or otherwise not available your stylesheet will only load for print and not for screen, so you’ll want to follow up with a “normal” (non-print-specific) stylesheet within <noscript> tags.

Color Theme Switcher (on mxb.dev)

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Max shows us how to build a colour theme switcher to let users customise your website. He uses a combination of Eleventy, JSON, Nunjucks with macros, a data attribute on the html element, CSS custom properties and a JavaScript based switcher.

Thanks, Max!