CSS Trig, Cypress, and Software Testing Alternatives

Slow page speeds and bad developer experience are huge pain points. If you can get those two things right, the developer community will likely rally behind you. CSS hit the bullseye when it introduced trigonometry functions to boost performance by avoiding Javascript. But Cypress has been a big letdown in DX. Before introducing trig functions, CSS was pretty limited and it relied on Javascript to do all the complex styling. Since Javascript takes a significant amount of time to parse, that’s a big hit to your overall page speed. Now, CSS trig functions allow more flexibility to style pages with angles. Even Chuck, who isn’t a fan of CSS, can admit this is a big win for developers. Cypress, on the other hand, has locked some of their features behind a paywall and some developers are not happy about the change. Chuck and Robbie both find the tool too complicated and expensive compared to its alternatives. In this episode, Robbie and Chuck talk about CSS introducing trigonometry functions to avoid Javascript, why Cypress isn’t living up to their expectations, testing software alternatives, and Chuck’s new sim racing hobby. Key Takeaways [00:28] - A whiskey review: Orphan Barrel: Muckety Muck 26 Year [09:28] - CSS adds trigonometry functions. [17:05] - What makes a good testing tool. [33:19] - Chuck and Robbie talk about their upbringing and food. [40:45] - Chuck’s sim racing experiences. [50:46] - Robbie talks about selling his house. Quotes [27:32] - “I tried to use Cypress, and I just gave up because it took me more than an hour to figure out, and I was just like, that's not worth my time.” ~ Robbie Wagner [28:43] - “Playwright looks like a pretty nice play in the space.” ~ Chuck Carpenter [30:00] - “As a professional developer, if a tool is helping me every day, and you say it’s going to cost me $10 a day, okay. As long as I don't have 400 tools that I need to pay $10 a month for.” ~ Robbie Wagner Links Orphan Barrel: Muckety Muck 26 Year UGG SoBe The Macallan Distillary Total Wine & More De Wine Spot Tailwind CSS YAML iMac iPhone Windows Cypress Prisma MySQL SQLite GitHub Playwright Mock Service Worker Jira Astro Ember Jest Selenium Webdriver Vitest Porsche Experience GeForce Now EA iRacing Steam PlayStation Assetto Corsa Logitech Porsche Tesla Ford Mustang Mach E Porsche Macan Porsche Cayenne Rivian Range Rover Sport Rolls Royce Connect with our hosts Robbie Wagner Chuck Carpenter Ship Shape Subscribe and stay in touch Apple Podcasts Spotify Google Podcasts Whiskey Web and Whatnot Top-Tier, Full-Stack Software Consultants This show is brought to you by Ship Shape. Ship Shape’s software consultants solve complex software and app development problems with top-tier coding expertise, superior service, and speed. In a sea of choices, our senior-level development crew rises above the rest by delivering the best solutions for fintech, cybersecurity, and other fast-growing industries. Check us out at shipshape.io.