Runtime Rundown - JavaScript and Web Development

The One About Slow Jest Tests

In this episode, we cover "Why is My Jest Test Suite So Slow" by Steven Lemon and completely nerd out on it. This one is chock-full of practical tips for improving your Jest suite time as well as your general understanding of how Jest works "under the hood". Evan does a "Cookie Corner" and hyper-speaks through a bunch of reasons why you shouldn't use client side cookies. Joe talks about memory leaks while sounding mildly depressed, and we actually have good news this week! Extra resources for Jest testing: 1. Use the time shell built-in for enhanced timing. time npm run --takeyourtime 2. See this issue on why Jest workers are slow sometimes 3. See this issue on why userEvent.type is slow all the time 4. Check out this package for reporting slow individual tests 5. For finding Jest memory leaks, try node --inspect-brk --expose-gc ./node_modules/.bin/jest --runInBand --logHeapUsage

The One About Things They Didn't Teach You

This week we read Things They Didn't Teach You About Software Engineering by Vadim Kravcenko. Along the way we mention the #NoEstimates movement and this talk by Allen Holoub. Joe talks about games that make him sick, Evan talks about GraphQL, and Good Gripes goes WAY off the rails. Books we mention this episode: • Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke • System Design Interview: An Insider's Guide by Alex Xu • So Good They Can't Ignore You by Cal Newport Music by Hina and Kevin MacLeod

The One About Deep Work

In this episode, we cover "Cultivating depth and stillness in research" by Andy Matuschak. We go over tons of actionable strategies and tips to optimize your brain for longer periods of focus. The article is chock full of graphs and data, so make sure to check it out. Along the way, Joe and I realize we suck at deep work (for now), we make New Year's Resolutions (even though we just claimed we don't like them in a recent episode), and Evan has an epiphany about ChatGPT.

The One About Typescript

The time has come for a feature length episode on Typescript with guest star Scott Kaye! In this magnum opus, Scott, a Typescript Wizard, details some of the stronger points of Typescript through the lens of two conflicting articles - "Typescript is Terrible for Library Developers" and "Stop Using 'any', There's a Type for That". Evan yells at clouds nearly the entire time. To be serious for a minute - this is a good two-sided conversation about the strengths and (gasp) weaknesses of Typescript - it's worth a listen if you want to finally hear something other than "tYpESCripT Is tHE bESt!!!!!!" Scott introduces Scott's Principles of Typescript™, Evan claims Typescript is an elaborate scheme perpetrated on the developer community by Microsoft, and Joe loses us all talking about "bit shifting". Also, Scott will blow out your eardrums at some point so it's best you just live in fear the entire episode in anticipation. Some links we mentioned: 1. ThePrimeagen on "making an algorithm faster" 2. Scott's Portfolio 3. HackerNews thread about "Typescript is Terrible For Library Developers" 4. ESLint rewrite discussion

The One About Writing Great Tech Docs

In this episode, we talk about "Writing docs well: why should a software engineer care" by Lorin Hochstein. We cover the importance of technical writing, how to structure your docs for maximum impact, and some of the secondary benefits of writing things down. No matter where you are in your career in software, there's something in here to help you improve how you put your ideas on paper. In other news: Joe isn't learning anything and Evan is starting an evil plan to break the blogging industry. Oh, and use Hemmingway Editor to make your writing punchier. Happy New Year!