Top all-time · #492
Nicholas C. Zakas
Personal blog · nczonline.net/blogprogrammingweb
Nicholas C. Zakas writes Human Who Codes, a personal blog at nczonline.net about programming and web. Since 2008, 117 different Hacker News readers have linked it 174 times, most often “Why I'm not using your open source project”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-09-30, and you can follow it by feed.
Sometimes recommended · 9 of 31 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Nicholas Zakas's blog for front-end JavaScript and browser writing, such as ECMAScript features, user-agent history and CSS techniques. Commenters call it a standout blog.
- Recommended for · 9 comments
- Called a standout blog, an excellent overview, interesting, and more detailed than another article; told readers to read or check out posts.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 31 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
The Official Web Site of Nicholas C. Zakas
Most-linked posts?
- Why I'm not using your open source project4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2015-12-15
- The care and feeding of software engineers (or, why engineers are grumpy)4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2012-06-12
- React and the economics of dynamic web interfaces3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2016-01-26
- Understanding ECMAScript 6 arrow functions3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2013-09-10
- Generalists and specialists: thoughts on hiring3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2014-12-19
- The innovations of Internet Explorer3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2012-08-22
- The inception of ESLint3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2018-03-02
- A critical review of ECMAScript 6 template strings3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2012-10-26
- I have lyme disease3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2014-04-02
- Node.js and the new web front-end3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2013-10-07
What Hacker News says?
If you are looking for something that is more front-end specific Paul Irish has put together a really great list of blogs, and made a google reader bundle out of them. http://www.google.com/reader/bundle/user/1116587048495144532... Some standout blogs that I always read about programming are: http://www.quirksmode.org/blog/ - Was writing about JS before it was cool, now it just has some of the most detailed coverage…
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: What programming blogs do you read daily?”Submitted Internet Explorer 11: “Don’t call me IE” as a story · 317 points
HN discussionI really wish the browser vendors would come together to establish a plan to clean up User-Agent. It's one of the worst offenders in header legacy[1] and fingerprinting. Exposing what browser I am using and it's major version is fine but I don't think every website I visit deserves to know what OS I am using, nor the details of my CPU. [1] https://www.nczonline.net/blog/2010/01/12/history-of-the-use... (2010, though…
Comment linking /blog/2010/01/12/history-of-the-user-agent-string/
on “HTTP headers we don't want”Submitted My favorite interview question as a story · 227 points
HN discussionCould you expand on how it could hurt you? All I was able to find was this [0] > I found two opinions about using strict mode in production: > > There is no reason to ship “use strict” in your production code. There is no performance gain (verified with V8 team and Brendan a while ago) and I don’t need my users’ VMs doing the extra checks as well. Keep it development only, strip it out during build. This way you als…
Comment linking /blog/2012/03/13/its-time-to-start-using-javascript-strict-mode/
on “Strengthening JavaScript”Submitted The innovations of Internet Explorer as a story · 174 points
HN discussionAs I recall, IE3 was passable, not laughable. IE4 was better than usable; as much as I clung to my Netscape Communicator 4, it was better than NS's offering. In fact, another current HN article right now details all that IE4 innovated: http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2012/08/22/the-innovations-of-... IE3 started Netscape's decline, but it really picked up in the couple years after IE4's release (1998-2000). All that c…
Comment linking /blog/2012/08/22/the-innovations-of-internet-explorer/
on “Microsoft gets a new logo for the first time since 1987”Submitted Node.js and the new web front-end as a story · 165 points
HN discussionSee here [1], under "Why make this change?". [1] https://www.nczonline.net/blog/2016/10/the-ecmascript-2016-c...
Comment linking /blog/2016/10/the-ecmascript-2016-change-you-probably-dont-know/
on “ECMAScript 2016+ in Firefox”Submitted Data URIs make CSS sprites obsolete as a story · 102 points
HN discussionWhile I enjoyed OP's article, this article is a bit more serious and detailed: http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2012/06/12/the-care-and-feedin...
Comment linking /blog/2012/06/12/the-care-and-feeding-of-software-engineers-or-why-engineers-are-grumpy/
on “How to work with Software Engineers”Submitted React and the economics of dynamic web interfaces as a story · 76 points
HN discussionDoes HTML5 validation really matter when your goal is to build an MVC JavaScript app? I'm not trolling btw, many others in the community have long had validation pegged as a red herring [1] [2]. Validation of your attributes is fairly meaningless, and if you have a decent validator setup as part of your workflow (save-time or build-time - I personally wouldn't bother with either), then you should be able to customis…
Comment linking /blog/2010/08/17/the-value-of-html-validation/
on “AngularJS 1.0 released”Submitted The care and feeding of software engineers (or, why engineers are grumpy) as a story · 73 points
HN discussionyou can use mhtml for ie7, see: http://documentcloud.github.com/jammit/#embedding and search for "mhtml" in http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2010/07/06/data-uris-make-css-... as far as keeping it simple, the sass file that I would write would look like: .icon { height: 16px; width: 16px; display: inline-block; } .checkmark-icon { @extend .icon; background-image: inline-image('path/to/checkmark.png'); &:hover { backgrou…
Comment linking /blog/2010/07/06/data-uris-make-css-sprites-obsolete/
on “Glue is a simple command line tool to generate CSS sprites”Submitted So you want to write JavaScript for a living? as a story · 72 points
HN discussionso I am actually wondering why you would even still use a spriting based approach. It seems as if a data-uri based approach would, for all uses I can think of, be more flexible and better, especially if you are using something like compass ( http://compass-style.org/reference/compass/helpers/inline-da... ). for more info: http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2010/07/06/data-uris-make-css-... this stack overflow answer brin…
Comment linking /blog/2010/07/06/data-uris-make-css-sprites-obsolete/
on “Glue is a simple command line tool to generate CSS sprites”Submitted The bunny theory of code as a story · 67 points
HN discussionAlso worth pointing out that the fat arrow lambda expression is coming in ES6 [1] so you will see it in vanilla JS soon! [1] http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/09/10/understanding-ecmas...
Comment linking /blog/2013/09/10/understanding-ecmascript-6-arrow-functions/
on “For modern development Javascript indeed is a shit language”Submitted Is the web platform getting too big? as a story · 58 points
HN discussionRelated: http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/07/09/the-case-for-setimm...
Comment linking /blog/2013/07/09/the-case-for-setimmediate/
on “Windows Timer Resolution: Megawatts Wasted”Submitted The best way to load external JavaScript as a story · 50 points
HN discussionI'd read a very similar article from back in 2013 that spoke about the same concept without really calling it "BFF". The article in question actually talks about just using nodejs, but what we implemented from that at my company was really what "BFF" is, and I really think that every microservice architecture needs the backed for front end layer. Here's the link: https://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/10/07/node-js-and…
Comment linking /blog/2013/10/07/node-js-and-the-new-web-front-end/
on “The ‘Backends for Frontends’ Pattern at SoundCloud”- mk · 2010-03-17
Submitted Empty image src can destroy your site as a story · 41 points
HN discussion I do not agree that node.js revolutionized the company and everyone should start using node.js everywhere. Rather a better approach is what suggested by Nicholas - http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/10/07/node-js-and-the-new...
Comment linking /blog/2013/10/07/node-js-and-the-new-web-front-end/
on “How PayPal is being revolutionized by Node.js and Lean UX”Submitted What makes a great software engineer? as a story · 40 points
HN discussionI've done some investigation and you're right, it seems that it's been fixed in the majority of modern desktop browsers. As far as I can tell Chrome, FF, Opera, Safari and IE (9+) have resolved this issue [1][2][3][4]. Can't find any data on mobile browsers, haven't got the patience. [1] http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2009/11/30/empty-image-src-can... [2] http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2010/03/16/empty-string-urls-i..…
Comment linking /blog/2010/07/13/empty-string-urls-browser-update/
on “Developing a responsive, Retina-friendly site (Part 2)”Submitted My ECMAScript 7 wishlist as a story · 39 points
HN discussionDon't forget the IE11 which pretends to be Gecko and to not be MSIE [0]. [0] http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/07/02/internet-explorer-1...
Comment linking /blog/2013/07/02/internet-explorer-11-dont-call-me-ie/
on “History of the browser user-agent string”Submitted Generalists and specialists: thoughts on hiring as a story · 28 points
HN discussion
