The Dev Times #30

Halfway through each month, our newsletter for developers: The Dev Times, brings three reads that our own developers found interesting on the web, and two Transloadit updates that may interest you.

A must-have BEM cheat sheet for CSS developers

Whether you just discovered BEM or you are a weathered veteran, chances are you’d probably appreciate this cheat sheet for BEM. BEM is a nice methodology for writing CSS. It helps you make your stylesheets scalable and reusable, thus increasing productivity and facilitating teamwork. This cheat sheet aims to help you not get lost in the BEM cosmos by giving you suggestions for some of the most common web components around. Learn more. ›

Want to ditch Zoom? You can start using an open source alternative by Jitsi

These days, we are spending more time on video conferences than ever. Whether we're attending meetings or enjoying time with friends and family online, we need a way to communicate with each other. Many people around the world have now chosen Zoom as their primary video conferencing software, but with growing concerns about Zoom's privacy issues, the question comes to mind whether this is the right software to use. Jitsi, created by Emil Ivov, is an open source video conferencing tool with many useful features, such as password-protected meetings and the ability to kick people off a conference. What sets Jitsi apart from the competition is that it's free and can run entirely on your hardware. And because it's open source, you can inspect the code to make sure there's no back door. Check it out. ›

Life-changing! Node.js version 14 is available now

We couldn't be more excited about Node.js 14! This release includes improved diagnostics, an upgrade of V8, local storage API, hardening of the streams APIs, removal of the Experimental Modules warning, and the removal of some long-deprecated APIs. What we feel is most exciting, though: V8 is upgraded to V8 8.1, bringing performance new features like optional chaining, like: assembly?.jobs?.results ?? 'No results'. The optional chaining operator provides a way to simplify accessing values through connected objects where it is possible that intermediate references may be undefined or null. Read more. ›

Transloadit now free for educators with the GitHub Teacher Toolbox

Students from all over the world have been using our Startup Plan, free of charge, while at school since August 2019. We are excited to announce that we are now offering the same benefits to teachers! Students created some phenomenal projects using Transloadit, and we can’t wait to see all the great projects educators can come up with. Transloadit is the perfect tool for teachers that can be used to manage file uploads, crop and watermark images, make GIFs, extract thumbnails, process documents, leverage AI to make media searchable, digitize and distribute course materials, and much more. Apply now! ›

Uppy 1.11 — 1.13: dark mode, custom meta fields and Google Docs

Breaking news! Uppy releases versions 1.11 through 1.13, introducing a wealth of new features and bugfixes. The main highlights of these releases include dark mode for the Dashboard, Google Docs support in Companion, AWS S3, new locales, exifr in Thumbnail Generator, and more. The biggest, however, of these new features is custom meta fields! We want to give a special thank you to @galli-leo, who brought us the ability to add custom fields to the Dashboard meta editor. Check it out! ›