Dynamic Datalist: Autocomplete from an API :: Aaron Gustafson
Great minds think alike! I have a very similar HTML web component on the front page of The Session called input-autosuggest.
Futuristic Progressive Enhancement - Jim Nielsen’s Blog
We’re all tired of: write some code, come back to it in six months, try to make it do more, and find the whole project is broken until you upgrade everything.
Progressive enhancement allows you to do the opposite: write some code, come back to it in six months, and it’s doing more than the day you wrote it!
Related links
Custom Asidenotes – Eric’s Archived Thoughts
An excellent example of an HTML web component from Eric:
Extend HTML to do things automatically!
He layers on the functionality and styling, considering potential gotchas at every stage. This is resilient web design in action.
Software can be finished - Ross Wintle
There’s quite a crossover between resilience and longevity:
- Understand the requirements
- Keep scope small and fixed
- Reduce dependencies
- Produce static output
- Increase Quality Assurance
The present and potential future of progressive image rendering - JakeArchibald.com
When I set about writing this article, I intended it to be a strong argument for progressive rendering. But after digging into it, my feelings are less certain.
I’m more proud of these 128 kilobytes than anything I’ve built since | by Mike Hall | Jul, 2025 | Medium
I don’t normally link to articles on Medium—I respect you too much—and I do wish this were written on Mike Hall’s own site, but this is just too good not to share.
And don’t dismiss this as a nostalgiac case study from the past:
At no point did the constraints make the product feel compromised. Users on modern devices got a smooth experience and instant feedback, while those on older devices got fast, reliable functionality. Users on feature phones got the same core experience without the bells and whistles.
The constraints forced us to solve problems in ways we wouldn’t have considered otherwise. Without those constraints, we could have just thrown bytes at the problem, but with them every feature had to justify itself. Core functionality had to work everywhere, and without JavaScript crutches proper markup became essential.
This experience changed how I approach design problems. Constraints aren’t a straitjacket, keeping us from doing our best work; they are the foundation that makes innovation possible. When you have to work within severe limitations, you find elegant solutions that scale beyond those limitations.
Related posts
Streamlining HTML web components
Some handy tips courtesy of Chris Ferdinandi.
Progressively enhancing maps
How I switched to high-resolution maps on The Session without degrading performance.
Making the website for Research By The Sea
Having fun with view transitions and scroll-driven animations.
Web App install API
It’s kind of ridiculous that this functionality doesn’t exist yet.
Applying the four principles of accessibility
Here’s how I interpret the top-level guidance in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.