Javascript

Animations in Svelte

Published Sep 7, 2021

Updated Feb 14, 2023

7 min read

This article was written over 18 months ago and may contain information that is out of date. Some content may be relevant but please refer to the relevant official documentation or available resources for the latest information.

Animations in Svelte

Animations are more present than ever in our websites and applications. They can make them look and feel different if done right, engaging your users. In this post, we'll learn how animations can be used in Svelte, and how you can extend those that are shipped with the library.

Modules

Svelte ships a series of modules that will help us while creating animations. We'll explore each of these to understand what they do.

animate
easing
motion
transition

svelte/easing

This package contains a series of functions with equations to produce different easing curves Available curves are:

back
bounce
circ
cubic
elastic
expo
quad
quart
quint
sine

But you can create your custom function as long as it's a function that will accept 1 parameter varying from 0 to 1 (1 represents the total duration of the animation) and returns another value, also ranging from 0 to 1.

svelte/motion

Two functions are exported in this package: tweened and spring.

Both of them will return a reactive value, interpolating in-between values given a set of parameters.

Note that these functions do not necessarily animate anything visually, but rather, create a ramp between values. These values can then be displayed or assigned to something else, like CSS properties.

Both functions can interpolate numbers, dates, arrays, and objects. You can also provide a different function for interpolating values.

tweened

Let's initialize a new Svelte app to see how it works.

npm init vite

✔ Project name: · svelte-animations
✔ Select a framework: · svelte
✔ Select a variant: · svelte-ts

cd svelte-web-components
pnpm install //use the package manager you prefer
pnpm run dev

// remove default Counter component
rm src/lib/Counter.svelte

Clear the App.svelte component to contain only what we need now.

<script>
	// add imports here
</script>

<main>
</main>

<style>
  :root {
    font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Roboto, Oxygen,
      Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif;
  }

  main {
    text-align: center;
    padding: 1em;
    margin: 0 auto;
  }

  :global(main > * + *)  {
    margin-top: 24px;
  }
</style>

I'll create a new component named Tasks.svelte inside the lib folder.

<script lang="ts">
  import { tweened } from 'svelte/motion';
  export let tasks: { id; title; date }[] = [];

  let selected;
  tasks = tasks.sort((a, b) => {
    if (a.date > b.date) {
      return 1;
    } else if (a.date === b.date) {
      return 0;
    } else {
      return -1;
    }
  });

  function pad(num) {
    if (num < 10) {
      return `0${num}`;
    }
    return num;
  }

  function getDate(date) {
    return date
      ? `${date.getFullYear()}/${pad(date.getMonth() + 1)}/${pad(
          date.getDate(),
        )}`
      : '';
  }

  function getTime(date) {
    return date ? `${pad(date.getHours())}:${pad(date.getMinutes())}` : '';
  }

  let now = new Date();
  let date = tweened(now, { duration: 500 });

  function selectTask(task) {
    selected = task.id;
    date.set(task.date);
  }
</script>

<div class="task-view">
  <div class="task-list">
    <h2>Next tasks</h2>
    <ul>
      {#each tasks as task}
        <li
          class={selected === task.id ? 'selected' : ''}
          on:click={() => selectTask(task)}
        >
          {task.title}
        </li>
      {/each}
    </ul>
  </div>
  <div class="task-details">
    <h2>When?</h2>
    {#if selected}
      <p>{getDate($date)}</p>
      <p>{getTime($date)}</p>
    {/if}
  </div>
</div>

<style>
  .task-view {
    display: flex;
    flex-direction: row;
    justify-content: space-between;
    width: 300px;
    border: 2px solid #4f4f4f;
    border-radius: 8px;
    padding: 16px;
  }
  li {
    padding: 4px 8px;
  }
  li.selected {
    background-color: lightcyan;
  }
  li:hover {
    background-color: lightgray;
  }
</style>

The component will receive a list of tasks with a title and date, and then we'll create a transition between these dates when clicking any of them. (Look at how we auto-subscribe to the reactive value, prepending the variable name with $)

Let's update the App to use this component.

<script lang="ts">
  import Tasks from './lib/Tasks.svelte';

  let tasks = [
    { id: 1, title: 'Meeting', date: new Date('2021-12-17T03:24:00') },
    { id: 2, title: 'Gym', date: new Date('2021-08-22T09:12:00') },
    { id: 3, title: 'Movie', date: new Date('2021-09-01T22:07:00') },
  ];
</script>

<main>
  <Tasks {tasks} />
</main>
<!-- ... -->

And the result looks like this: anim01

In this example we are animating the value, but we can also apply these changes to CSS properties.

Let's create another example that achieves this. (Tweened.svelte).

<script>
  import { tweened } from 'svelte/motion';
  import { cubicOut } from 'svelte/easing';

  const toColor = tweened([255, 0, 0], {
    duration: 2000,
    easing: cubicOut,
  });

  let loop = () =>
    toColor
      .set([255, 0, 0])
      .then(() => toColor.set([0, 255, 0]))
      .then(() => toColor.set([0, 0, 255]))
      .then(() => loop());
  loop();
</script>

<div style={'background-color:rgb(' + $toColor.join(',') + ')'} />

<style>
  div {
    display: block;
    width: 100px;
    height: 100px;
  }
</style>

Here, we created a single div, and use tweened to interpolate values of an array.

When we set the value using the set function, it will return a promise that resolves when the final value is reached (for our purposes, the animation has ended). Then, we trigger a new value using set again. We can see in action how we can interpolate array values.

We must remember to update our application

<script lang="ts">
// ...
  import Tweened from './lib/Tweened.svelte';
// ...
</script>

<main>
  <!-- ... -->
  <Tweened />
</main>

The possible parameters for tweened are: delay (time before starting), duration (in milliseconds), easing (one of the easing functions shown before), interpolate (a (from, to) => t => value) function

Spring

Spring works differently to transition a variable from one value to another. We can set three parameters: stiffness, damping, which will set how the spring behaves while settling in the final value, and precision, which will determine when the value is considered settled.

Let's create a new component named Spring.svelte

<script>
	import { spring } from 'svelte/motion';

	const number = spring(0,{
	stiffness: 0.1,
	damping: 0.08
});

function changeValueTo(newValue) {
	number.set(newValue)
}

function resetValue() {
	number.set(0, {hard:true})
}

</script>

<div>
	<span>{$number.toFixed(1)}</span>
	<button on:click={() => changeValueTo(10)}>To 10</button>
	<button on:click={() => changeValueTo(100)}>To 100</button>
	<button on:click={() => changeValueTo(1000)}>To 1000</button>
	<button	 on:click={() => resetValue()}>Reset</button>
</div>

<style>
	div {
		display: flex;
		flex-direction:column;
		max-width:300px;
	}
</style>

Our component has a number reactive value that will bounce when changed until finally settling in the desired result. The larger the distance to the target value, the more it will bounce.

We need to update our app to import the component.

<script lang="ts">
// ...
  import Spring from './lib/Spring.svelte';
// ...
</script>

<main>
  <!-- ... -->
  <Spring />
</main>

This is what the final result looks like. anim03

svelte/transition

A transition is a function with the following signature:

(node: HTMLElement, params: any) => {
	delay?: number,
	duration?: number,
	easing?: (t: number) => number,
	css?: (t: number, u: number) => string,
	tick?: (t: number, u: number) => void
}

The svelte/transition module includes a series of functions that will let us animate our DOM: blur, draw, fade, fly, scale, slide and crossfade(this last function returns two transition functions)

They are used with the transition, in, or out directives. Transition is executed when the element enters or leaves the DOM. Four events are available with this directive introstart, introend, outrostart, outroend they are triggered whenever the initial or final animations start and end.

The in and out directives work like transition, but they only act when either the element is added or removed.

Create a new component named Transition.svelte.

<script lang="ts">
  import { onDestroy, onMount } from 'svelte';
  import {
    blur,
    crossfade,
    draw,
    fade,
    fly,
    scale,
    slide,
  } from 'svelte/transition';

  let show = false;
  let interval;

  let [from, to] = crossfade({
    fallback: () => {
      return { css: (t, u) => 'color:red' };
    },
  });

  onMount(() => {
    interval = setInterval(() => {
      show = !show;
    }, 2000);
  })

  onDestroy(() => {
	if (interval) {
	  clearInterval(interval);
    }  
  });
</script>

<div class="playground">
  <div class="transition-item">
    <svg
      fill="#ffffff"
      width="32"
      height="32"
      viewBox="0 0 16 16"
      xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"
    >
      {#if show}
        <path
          in:draw={{ duration: 1500 }}
          d="M1.414213562373095 0 16 14.585786437626904 L14.585786437626904 16 L0 1.414213562373095"
        />
        <path
          in:draw={{ duration: 1500 }}
          d="M14.585786437626904 0 L16 1.414213562373095 L1.414213562373095 16 L0 14.585786437626904"
        />
      {/if}
    </svg>
  </div>
  <div class="transition-item teleport">
    <div>
      {#if show}
        <span in:from={{ key: 'a' }} out:to={{ key: 'a' }}>cross...</span>
      {/if}
    </div>
    <div>
      {#if !show}
        <span in:from={{ key: 'a' }} out:to={{ key: 'a' }}>...fade</span>
      {/if}
    </div>
  </div>

  {#if show}
    <div class="transition-item" transition:blur>
      <span>Blur</span>
    </div>
    <div class="transition-item" transition:fade>
      <span>Fade</span>
    </div>
    <div class="transition-item" transition:fly={{ x: 30 }}>
      <span>Fly</span>
    </div>
    <div class="transition-item" transition:scale={{ start: 10 }}>
      <span>Scale</span>
    </div>
    <div class="transition-item" transition:slide>
      <span>Slide</span>
    </div>
  {/if}
</div>

<style>
  .teleport {
    display: flex;
    flex-direction: row;
    justify-content: center;
    width: 200px;
    margin-left:auto;
    margin-right:auto;
    border: 2px solid #4f4f4f;
    border-radius: 8px;
    padding: 16px;

  }
  .teleport > div {
      width: 100px;
    }

  svg {
    height: 128px;
    width: 128px;
  }

  path {
    stroke: black;
  }

  .transition-item + .transition-item {
    margin-top: 40px;
  }
</style>

I've added all of the provided animations to this example, so you can play around with them. anim07

Custom transitions

We can create custom transitions by creating a function that accepts an HTML element, and a configuration object, and returns an object with the required properties.

We'll create a new function called skew.

export function skew(node: HTMLElement, {delay = 0, duration = 1000, easing = cubicInOut, deg = 45} = {}) {
        const style = getComputedStyle(node);
        const target_opacity = +style.opacity;
        const transform = style.transform === 'none' ? '' : style.transform;
        return {
            delay,
            duration,
            easing,
            css: (_t, u) => `
                transform: ${transform} skew(${deg * u}deg);
                opacity: ${target_opacity * _t}
            `
        };
}

delay, duration, and easing are pretty standard to all shipped functions, so we'll keep them the same for ease of use. The magic happens in our css property. Based on our parameters, we will add the skew transform. u is nothing but 1-_t, so in this case, we will start from deg (skew is applied) to 0 (no skew) when the element is shown. The opposite will happen when removed.

Let's test it by creating a new component. (Skew.svelte)

<script lang="ts">
  import { onDestroy, onMount } from 'svelte';
  import { skew } from './skew';

  export let skewOptions = {};

  let show = false;
  let interval;

  onMount(() => {
    interval = setInterval(() => {
      show = !show;
    }, 2000);
  });

  onDestroy(() => {
    if (interval) {
      clearInterval(interval);
    }
  });
</script>

<div class="playground">
  {#if show}
    <div class="transition-item" transition:skew={skewOptions}>
      <span>Skew</span>
    </div>
  {/if}
</div>

svelte/animate

This package exports a single function: flip. Animations are to be used with the animate directive.

Note that there is a requirement to use this directive. The element that uses the animate directive must be the immediate child of a keyed each block.

Animations are triggered when the elements of an each block are reordered.

The signature of an animation is:

(node: HTMLElement, { from: DOMRect, to: DOMRect } , params: any) => {
	delay?: number,
	duration?: number,
	easing?: (t: number) => number,
	css?: (t: number, u: number) => string,
	tick?: (t: number, u: number) => void
}

As you can see the signature is very similar to those of the transitions. We'll make use of this similarity later.

Create a new component to test what flip and the animate directive do.

<!-- Flip.svelte -->

<script lang="ts">
  import { flip } from 'svelte/animate';
  let things = [
    { id: 1, name: 'foo', ready: true },
    { id: 2, name: 'bar', ready: false },
    { id: 3, name: 'baz', ready: true },
    { id: 4, name: 'fizz', ready: false },
  ];
  let sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'DESC' };

  let sortedThings = things;

  function sortById() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'id' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'id' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.id > b.id) {
          return 1;
        } else if (a.id < b.id) {
          return -1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.id > b.id) {
          return -1;
        } else if (a.id < b.id) {
          return 1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
  function sortByName() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'name' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'name' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.name > b.name) {
          return 1;
        } else if (a.name < b.name) {
          return -1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'name', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.name > b.name) {
          return -1;
        } else if (a.name < b.name) {
          return 1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'name', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
  function sortByReadyState() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'ready' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'ready' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = [
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => x.ready),
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => !x.ready),
      ];
      sortBy = { field: 'ready', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = [
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => !x.ready),
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => x.ready),
      ];
      sortBy = { field: 'ready', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
</script>

<div class="container">
  <table>
    <tr>
      <th on:click={sortById}>id</th>
      <th on:click={sortByName}>name</th>
      <th on:click={sortByReadyState}>ready</th>
    </tr>
    {#each sortedThings as thing (thing.id)}
      <tr animate:flip>
        <td>{thing.id}</td>
        <td>
          {thing.name}
        </td>
        <td><input type="checkbox" bind:checked={thing.ready} /></td>
      </tr>
    {/each}
  </table>
</div>

<style>
  td {
    width: 100px;
  }
  .container {
    width: 100vw;
    display: flex;
    flex-direction: row;
  }
  table,
  tr,
  td,
  th {
    border: 1px solid gray;
    border-collapse: collapse;
  }
  th {
    cursor: pointer;
  }
</style>

We created a table with 4 rows, and the ability to order rows by different properties.

The elements are inside a keyed each block (remember this is a requirement). One of the cool things about the animate directive is that only the items that change will be animated. The rest will remain like they were.

The result looks like this. anim10

extending and reusing animations with transitions

Because transitions and animations are so similar, we can use transitions to extend flip or create new animations.

animations from transitions

If we look at both types of functions, we can see that we are able to create a wrapper function to convert our transition into an animation.

export function toAnimation<T>(
  fn: (node: HTMLElement, params) => T,
): (node: HTMLElement, { from, to }, params) => T {
  return (node, _animations, params = {}) => {
    return fn(node, params);
  };
}

Then, we can convert one of our transitions, and apply it with the animate directive.

<!--AnimationFromTransition.svelte -->
<script>
  import { fade } from 'svelte/transition';
  import { toAnimation } from './toAnimation';

  let fadeAnimation = toAnimation(fade);

 // ... same as Flip.svelte
</script>

<div class="container">
  <table>
    <tr>
      <th on:click={sortById}>id</th>
      <th on:click={sortByName}>name</th>
      <th on:click={sortByReadyState}>ready</th>
    </tr>
    {#each sortedThings as thing (thing.id)}
      <tr animate:fadeAnimation={{ duration: 400 }}>
        <td>{thing.id}</td>
        <td>
          {thing.name}
        </td>
        <td><input type="checkbox" bind:checked={thing.ready} /></td>
      </tr>
    {/each}
  </table>
</div>

<style>
  /* same as Flip.svelte*/
</style>

Now, instead of moving, reordered elements fade in/out.

Extending flip

We can also extend the flip animation with transitions. I'll create a wrapper function again.

// extendFlip.ts

import { flip } from 'svelte/animate';
export function extendFlip(fn) {
  return (node, animations, params = {}) => {
    let flipRes = flip(node, animations, params);
    let transitionRes = fn(node, params);

    let getTransform = (str) => {
      let results = str.match(/transform: (.*);/);
      if (results && results.length) {
        return results[results.length - 1];
      }
      return '';
    };

    let mergeTransform = (css1, css2) => {
      return `transform: ${getTransform(css1)} ${getTransform(css2)};`;
    };

    return {
      ...flipRes,
      css: (t, u) =>
        `${transitionRes.css(t, u)}; ${mergeTransform(
          flipRes.css(t, u),
          transitionRes.css(t, u),
        )};`,
    };
  };
}

Our function will get the transition function, and merge the transform property it returns with the one from flip.

Now, let's look at a slightly modified version of the previous component:

<script>
  import { scale, blur } from 'svelte/transition';
  import { extendFlip } from './extendFlip';

  let flipAndBlur = extendFlip(blur);
  let flipAndScale = extendFlip(blur);

  let things = [
    { id: 1, name: 'foo', ready: true },
    { id: 2, name: 'bar', ready: false },
    { id: 3, name: 'baz', ready: true },
    { id: 4, name: 'fizz', ready: false },
  ];

  let sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'DESC' };

  let sortedThings = things;

  function sortById() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'id' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'id' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.id > b.id) {
          return 1;
        } else if (a.id < b.id) {
          return -1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.id > b.id) {
          return -1;
        } else if (a.id < b.id) {
          return 1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'id', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
  function sortByName() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'name' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'name' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.name > b.name) {
          return 1;
        } else if (a.name < b.name) {
          return -1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'name', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = things.sort((a, b) => {
        if (a.name > b.name) {
          return -1;
        } else if (a.name < b.name) {
          return 1;
        }
        return 0;
      });
      sortBy = { field: 'name', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
  function sortByReadyState() {
    if (
      sortBy.field !== 'ready' ||
      (sortBy.field === 'ready' && sortBy.order === 'DESC')
    ) {
      sortedThings = [
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => x.ready),
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => !x.ready),
      ];
      sortBy = { field: 'ready', order: 'ASC' };
    } else {
      sortedThings = [
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => !x.ready),
        ...sortedThings.filter((x) => x.ready),
      ];
      sortBy = { field: 'ready', order: 'DESC' };
    }
  }
</script>

<div class="container">
  <table>
    <tr>
      <th on:click={sortById}>id</th>
      <th on:click={sortByName}>name</th>
      <th on:click={sortByReadyState}>ready</th>
    </tr>
    {#each sortedThings as thing (thing.id)}
      <tr animate:flipAndBlur>
        <td>{thing.id}</td>
        <td>
          {thing.name}
        </td>
        <td><input type="checkbox" bind:checked={thing.ready} /></td>
      </tr>
    {/each}
  </table>
</div>

<style>
  td {
    width: 100px;
  }
  .container {
    width: 100vw;
    display: flex;
    flex-direction: row;
  }
  table,
  tr,
  td,
  th {
    border: 1px solid gray;
    border-collapse: collapse;
  }
  th {
    cursor: pointer;
  }
</style>

And the results:

Blur + flip anim12

Scale + flip anim13

Final words

Svelte did a great job making animations and transitions easy with their API. The provided functions work great in many scenarios.

I hope this blog post invites you to explore the API, extend what's already there, and share it with other users. These examples are available in this repo.

This Dot is a consultancy dedicated to guiding companies through their modernization and digital transformation journeys. Specializing in replatforming, modernizing, and launching new initiatives, we stand out by taking true ownership of your engineering projects.

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About the author(s)

Ignacio Falk
I love to learn new things and share what I know. Mentor, Writer, Speaker Member of the local community
@flakolefluk @flakolefluk

The HTML Dialog Element: Enhancing Accessibility and Ease of Use

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This is helpful as it reduces the burden on the developer when making their applications accessible by ensuring that user expectations concerning interaction are met, and it can also potentially simplify the implementation of dialogs in general. Basic usage Adding a dialog using the new tag can be achieved with just a few lines of code. ` However, adding the dialog alone won’t do anything to the page. It will show up only once you call the .showModal() method against it. ` Then if you want to close it you can call the .close() method on the dialog, or press the escape key to close it, just like most other modals work. Also, note how a backdrop appears that darkens the rest of the page and prevents you from interacting with it. Neat! Accessibility and focus management Correctly handling focus is important when making your web applications accessible to all users. Typically you have to move the current focus to the active dialog when showing them, but with the dialog element that’s done for you. By default, the focus will be set on the first focusable element in the dialog. You can optionally change which element receives focus first by setting the autofocus attribute on the element you want the focus to start on, as seen in the previous example where that attribute was added to the close element. Using the .showModal() method to open the dialog also implicitly adds the dialog ARIA role to the dialog element. This helps screen readers understand that a modal has appeared and the screen so it can act accordingly. Adding forms to dialogs Forms can also be added to dialogs, and there’s even a special method value for them. If you add a element with the method set to dialog then the form will have some different behaviors that differ from the standard get and post form methods. First off, no external HTTP request will be made with this new method. What will happen instead is that when the form gets submitted, the returnValue property on the form element will be set to the value of the submit button in the form. So given this example form: ` The form element with the example-form id will have its returnValue set to Submit. In addition to that, the dialog will close immediately after the submit event is done being handled, though not before automatic form validation is done. If this fails then the invalid event will be emitted. You may have already noticed one caveat to all of this. You might not want the form to close automatically when the submit handler is done running. If you perform an asynchronous request with an API or server you may want to wait for a response and show any errors that occur before dismissing the dialog. In this case, you can call event.preventDefault() in the submit event listener like so: ` Once your desired response comes back from the server, you can close it manually by using the .close() method on the dialog. Enhancing the backdrop The backdrop behind the dialog is a mostly translucent gray background by default. However, that backdrop is fully customizable using the ::backdrop pseudo-element. With it, you can set a background-color to any value you want, including gradients, images, etc. You may also want to make clicking the backdrop dismiss the modal, as this is a commonly implemented feature of them. By default, the <dialog> element doesn’t do this for us. There are a couple of changes that we can make to the dialog to get this working. First, an event listener is needed so that we know when the user clicks away from the dialog. ` Alone this event listener looks strange. It appears to dismiss the dialog whenever the dialog is clicked, not the backdrop. That’s the opposite of what we want to do. Unfortunately, you cannot listen for a click event on the backdrop as it is considered to be part of the dialog itself. Adding this event listener by itself will effectively make clicking anywhere on the page dismiss the dialog. To correct for this we need to wrap the contents of the dialog content with another element that will effectively mask the dialog and receive the click instead. A simple element can do! ` Even this isn’t perfect though as the contents of the div may have elements with margins in them that will push the div down, resulting in clicks close to the edges of the dialog to dismiss it. This can be resolved by adding a couple of styles the the wrapping div that will make the margin stay contained within the wrapper element. The dialog element itself also has some default padding that will exacerbate this issue. ` The wrapping div can be made into an inline-block element to contain the margin, and by moving the padding from the parent dialog to the wrapper, clicks made in the padded portions of the dialog will now interact with the wrapper element instead ensuring it won’t be dismissed. Conclusion Using the dialog element offers significant advantages for creating dialogs and modals by simplifying implementation with reasonable default behavior, enhancing accessibility for users that need assistive technologies such as screen readers by using automatic ARIA role assignment, tailored support for form elements, and flexible styling options....

Oct 25, 2024

4 mins

HTMLJavaScript

Fly.io for Easier Cloud Deployment with Annie Sexton

Annie Sexton, Developer Advocate at Fly.io, to discuss Fly.io’s approach to simplifying cloud deployment. Annie shares Fly.io's unique position as a public cloud that offers the flexibility of infrastructure control with a streamlined developer experience. They explore Fly.io’s private networking and distributed app capabilities, allowing developers to deploy applications close to users worldwide with ease. Annie also addresses common challenges in distributed systems, including latency, data replication, and the balance between global reach and simple, single-region projects. Chapters: - 00:00 - 01:32 Introduction to the Modern Web Podcast and Guests - 01:33 - 04:00 Overview of Fly.io and Annie’s Role as Developer Advocate - 04:01 - 06:35 What Makes Fly.io Stand Out Among Cloud Platforms - 06:36 - 08:57 Distributed Applications: Benefits and Use Cases - 08:58 - 11:28 Understanding Distributed Web Servers and Private Networking - 11:29 - 13:49 Challenges in Distributed Data and Replication Techniques - 13:50 - 16:12 Fly.io’s Unique Solutions for Data Consistency - 16:13 - 18:34 When to Consider a Distributed Setup for Your Application - 18:35 - 20:35 Tools and Tips for Evaluating Geographical Distribution Needs - 20:36 - 22:22 Simplifying Global Deployment with Fly.io’s Command Features - 22:23 - 24:18 Considerations for Latency and Performance Optimization - 24:19 - 26:45 Balancing Simplicity with Advanced Control for Developers - 26:46 - 29:04 Easy Deployment for Hobbyists and Smaller Projects - 29:05 - 31:27 Getting Started on Fly.io with Fly Launch - 31:28 - 33:48 Developer Advocacy and Meeting Diverse Needs in the Cloud - 33:49 - 36:15 Catering to Beginners and Experienced Developers Alike - 36:16 - End Closing Remarks and Where to Find Fly.io and the Hosts Follow Annie Sexton on Social Media Linkedin: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/annie-sexton-11472a46/⁠ Github: ⁠https://github.com/anniebabannie⁠ Sponsored by This Dot: thisdot.co...

Nov 6, 2024

2 mins

Software EngineerJavaScript

Exploring Open Props and its Capabilities

Exploring Open Props and its Capabilities With its intuitive approach and versatile features, Open Props empowers you to create stunning designs easily. It has the perfect balance between simplicity and power. Whether you're a seasoned developer or just starting, Open Props makes styling websites a breeze. Let's explore how Open Props can help your web development workflow. What is Open Props Open Props is a CSS library that packs a set of CSS variables for quickly creating consistent components using “Sub-Atomic” Styles. These web design tokens are crafted to help you get great-looking results from the start using consistent naming conventions and providing lots of possibilities out-of-the-box. At the same time, it's customizable and can be gradually adopted. Installing open props There are many ways to get started with open props, each with its advantages. The library can be imported from a CDN or installed using npm. You can import all or specific parts of it, and for greater control of what's bundled or not, you can use PostCSS to include only the variables you used. From Zero to Open Props Let's start with the simplest way to test and use open props. I'll create a simple HTML file with some structure, and we'll start from there. Create an index.html file. ` Edit the content of your HTML file. In this example, we’ll create a landing page containing a few parts: a hero section, a section for describing the features of a service, a section for the different pricing options available and finally a section with a call to action. We’ll start just declaring the document structure. Next we’ll add some styles and finally we’ll switch to using open props variables. ` To serve our page, we could just open the file, but I prefer to use serve, which is much more versatile. To see the contents of our file, let's serve our content. ` This command will start serving our site on port 3000. Our site will look something like this: Open-props core does not contain any CSS reset. After all, it’s just a set of CSS variables. This is a good start regarding the document structure. Adding open props via CDN Let's add open-props to our project. To get started, add: ` This import will make the library's props available for us to use. This is a set of CSS variables. It contains variables for fonts, colors, sizes, and many more. Here is an excerpt of the content of the imported file: ` The :where pseudo-class wraps all the CSS variables declarations, giving them the least specificity. That means you can always override them with ease. This imported file is all you need to start using open props. It will provide a sensible set of variables that give you some constraints in terms of what values you can use, a palette of colors, etc. Because this is just CSS, you can opt-out by not using the variables provided. I like these constraints because they can help with consistency and allow me to focus on other things. At the same time, you can extend this by creating your own CSS variables or just using any value whenever you want to do something different or if the exact value you want is not there. We should include some styles to add a visual hierarchy to our document. Working with CSS variables Let's create a new file to hold our styles. ` And add some styles to it. We will be setting a size hierarchy to headings, using open props font-size variables. Additionally, gaps and margins will use the size variables. ` We can explore these variables further using open-props’ documentation. It's simple to navigate (single page), and consistent naming makes it easy to learn them. Trying different values sometimes involves changing the number at the end of the variable name. For example: font-size-X, where X ranges from 0 to 8 (plus an additional 00 value). Mapped to font-sizes from 0.5rem up to 3.5rem. If you find your font is too small, you can add 1 to it, until you find the right size. Colors range from 0-12: –red-0 is the lightest one (rgb(255, 245, 245)) while –red-12 is the darkest (rgb(125, 26, 26)). There are similar ranges for many properties like font weight, size (useful for padding and margins), line height and shadows, to name a few. Explore and find what best fits your needs. Now, we need to include these styles on our page. ` Our page looks better now. We could keep adding more styles, but we'll take a shortcut and add some defaults with Open Props' built in normalized CSS file. Besides the core of open props (that contains the variables) there’s an optional normalization file that we can use. Let's tweak our recently added styles.css file a bit. Let’s remove the rules for headings. Our resulting css will now look like this. ` And add a new import from open-props. ` Open props provides a normalization file for our CSS, which we have included. This will establish a nice-looking baseline for our styles. Additionally, it will handle light/dark mode based on your preferences. I have dark mode set and the result already looks a lot better. Some font styles and sizes have been set, and much more. More CSS Variables Let's add more styles to our page to explore the variables further. I'd like to give the pricing options a card style. Open Props has a section on borders and shadows that we can use for this purpose. I would also like to add a hover effect to these cards. Also, regarding spacing, I want to add more margins and padding when appropriate. ` With so little CSS added and using many open props variables for sizes, borders, shadows, and easing curves, we can quickly have a better-looking site. Optimizing when using the CDN Open props is a pretty light package; however, using the CDN will add more CSS than you'll probably use. Importing individual parts of these props according to their utility is possible. For example, import just the gradients. ` Or even a subset of colors ` These are some options to reduce the size of your app if using the CDN. Open Props with NPM Open Props is framework agnostic. I want my site to use Vite. Vite is used by many frameworks nowadays and is perfect to show you the next examples and optimizations. ` Let's add a script to our package.json file to start our development server. ` Now, we can start our application on port 5173 (default) by running the following command: ` Your application should be the same as before, but we will change how we import open props. Stop the application and remove the open-props and normalize imports from index.html. Now in your terminal install the open-props package from npm. ` Once installed, import the props and the normalization files at the beginning of your styles.css file. ` Restart your development server, and you should see the same results. Optimizing when using NPM Let's analyze the size of our package. 34.4 kb seems a bit much, but note that this is uncompressed. When compressed with gzip, it's closer to 9 kb. Similar to what we did when using the CDN, we can add individual sections of the package. For example in our CSS file we could import open-props/animations or open-props/sizes. If this concerns you, don't worry; we can do much better. JIT Props To optimize our bundled styles, we can use a PostCSS plugin called posts-jit-props. This package will ensure that we only ship the props that we are using. Vite has support for PostCSS, so setting it up is straightforward. Let's install the plugin: ` After the installation finishes, let's create a configuration file to include it. ` The content of your file should look like this: ` Finally, remove the open-props/style import from styles.css. Remember that this file contains the CSS variables we will add "just in time". Our page should still look the same, but if we analyze the size of our styles.css file again, we can see that it has already been reduced to 13.2kb. If you want to know where this size is coming from, the answer is that Open Props is adding all the variables used in the normalize file + the ones that we require in our file. If we were to remove the normalize import, we would end up with much smaller CSS files, and the number of props added just in time would be minimal. Try removing commenting it out (the open-props/normalize import) from the styles.css file. The page will look different, but it will be useful to show how just the props used are added. 2.4kB uncompressed. That's a lot less for our example. If we take a quick look at our generated file, we can see the small list of CSS variables added from open props at the top of our file (those that we use later on the file). Open props ships with tons of variables for: - Colors - Gradients - Shadows - Aspect Ratios - Typography - Easing - Animations - Sizes - Borders - Z-Index - Media Queries - Masks You probably won't use all of these but it's hard to tell what you'll be using from the beginning of a project. To keep things light, add what you need as you go, or let JIT handle it for you. Conclusion Open props has much to offer and can help speed your project by leveraging some decisions upfront and providing a sensible set of predefined CSS Variables. We've learned how to install it (or not) using different methods and showcased how simple it is to use. Give it a try!...

Jun 7, 2024

9 mins

CSS

Learning Paths for Next.JS Developers with Ankita Kulkarni

In this video, Rob Ocel and co-hosts Tracy Lee, Adam Rackis, and Danny Thompson talk with tech educator Ankita Kulkarni about her journey from engineering leader to full-time educator. Ankita shares insights on teaching Next.js, bridging practical knowledge gaps, and helping developers tackle real-world challenges. They discuss Next.js as a React-based framework, its benefits, and the challenges it presents for beginners. Chapters - Introduction to the Podcast and Guests 00:01 - Meet Ankita Kulkarni, Tech Educator 00:26 - Ankita's Transition to Full-Time Education 01:41 - Teaching Practical Knowledge in Next.js 03:19 - Effective Methods for Teaching Next.js 05:27 - Challenges of Being a Full-Time Educator 07:48 - Balancing Broad and Specific Examples 09:54 - Embracing Mistakes as a Teaching Tool 12:13 - Pair Programming and Mentorship 14:00 - Discussion on Next.js and Framework Adoption 16:48 - Advantages and Challenges of Next.js 18:12 - Choosing the Right Framework for Your Needs 20:35 - Impact of Next.js in React Documentation 22:26 - Learning Paths for New Developers 23:24 - The Rise of Full-Stack Web Development 25:09 - Benefits of Frameworks Abstracting Complexity 26:27 - OpenNext and Deployment Flexibility 28:06 - Ankita's Excitement for New Next.js Features 30:35 - The Future of Next.js Without Vercel 32:16 - Final Thoughts and Where to Find Everyone Online 34:21 Follow Ankita Kulkarni on Social Media Twitter: https://x.com/kulkarniankita9 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@kulkarniankita Sponsored by This Dot: thisdot.co...

Nov 12, 2024

2 mins

NextJSJavaScript

Let's innovate together!

We're ready to be your trusted technical partners in your digital innovation journey.

Whether it's modernization or custom software solutions, our team of experts can guide you through best practices and how to build scalable, performant software that lasts.

Animations in Svelte

Animations in Svelte

Modules

svelte/easing

svelte/motion

tweened

svelte/transition

Custom transitions

svelte/animate

extending and reusing animations with transitions

animations from transitions

Extending flip

Final words

Ignacio Falk

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