News: Figma’s Code Connect, Next.js 14.2, and New APIs in Chrome 124

Front-End Fire

The episode starts off with news about Figma’s new Code Connect feature. Code Connect is the bridge between a design system’s component code and Figma, so when viewing components in Figma’s Dev Mode, they’ll have the same real world code that the design system relies on, and Code Connect can also map properties from code to Figma, enabling dynamic and correct snippets. The catch? This sweet new feature is only available to users who are on Figma’s Organization and Enterprise plans.

We continue the news with the release of Next.js 14.2, which has moved Next’s Turbopack (the speedier successor to Webpack) into the release candidate stage with 99.8% of integration tests passing, and all Next.js examples working with it. Other improvements include tree-shaking, optimized CSS, better caching, and improved readability of error messages and stack traces in local development.

The Google Chrome team is back with new updates packed into Chrome v124. There’s two new APIs for handling HTML when a declarative shadow DOM is included in the(primarily used for encapsulation and component-based development). A new websocket stream API designed to make it easier for web sockets to handle a large volume of incoming messages without getting overwhelmed. And the view transitions API gets two new helper functions as well: view transition momentum and document render blocking. After its breakout year last year, the view transitions API seems to have some unstoppable forward momentum.

And to wrap it up, we have another newcomer to the JavaScript package management games: VLT. There’s not a lot to share about VLT so far (there’s a waitlist sign up now for early access), but it’s helmed by some folks who played key roles in the creation of npm, Node.js and the GitHub CLI, and backed by some very big names in the JS world. It’s early days yet, but we’ll keep you posted as more details around VLT emerge.

News:

• Paige - Chrome 124 updates
• Jack - Figma releases Code Connect
• TJ - Next.js 14.2

Bonus News:

• VLT enters the JS package management fray

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Hamilton Beach crock pot
• Jack - Civil War movie and Fallout TV series
• TJ - Spring weather and Blues Starnote

Thanks as always to our sponsor, the Blue Collar Coder channel on YouTube. You can join us in our Discord channel, reach out to us via email or Tweet us on X @front_end_fire.

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