Frontend terms
Building interfaces that humans actually enjoy using
Frontend development sits at the intersection of design, performance, and user psychology. This category covers browser rendering, component architecture, state management, accessibility, web APIs, and the frameworks and build tools that modern frontend teams rely on. What users see and interact with is ultimately what your software is — these terms help you build it well.
Shadow DOM
A browser feature that attaches a scoped, encapsulated DOM subtree to an element — styles and IDs inside the shadow tree do not leak in or out, enabling true component isolation on the web.
3w ago
frontend intermediate
Canonical URL (rel=canonical)
A <link rel='canonical'> tag that tells search engines which URL is the authoritative version of a page — preventing duplicate content from splitting ranking signals across multiple URLs.
1mo ago
frontend intermediate
Script Loading (defer, async, type=module)
How and when browser downloads and executes JavaScript — defer, async, and type=module control whether scripts block HTML parsing and in what order they run.
1mo ago
frontend intermediate
Structured Data — JSON-LD
Machine-readable schema markup embedded in a <script type='application/ld+json'> block, enabling Google rich results — star ratings, FAQs, breadcrumbs, events, and recipes in search.
1mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Cascade Layers (@layer)
CSS @layer lets you explicitly define the order in which style groups are applied in the cascade — styles in a later layer always win over earlier ones regardless of specificity, eliminating specificity wars in large codebases.
1mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS :has() Selector
CSS :has() is a parent selector — .card:has(.badge) matches a .card that contains a .badge — enabling styles that depend on children or siblings, which previously required JavaScript.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Logical Properties CSS4
CSS properties that map to physical directions based on writing mode — margin-inline instead of margin-left/right, padding-block instead of padding-top/bottom — enabling RTL support automatically.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Subgrid CSS4
Subgrid (grid-template-columns: subgrid) allows a nested grid element to participate in its parent's grid tracks — aligning children across the parent's columns without duplicating track definitions.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Progressive Enhancement
Building web experiences in layers — semantic HTML baseline, CSS styling, JavaScript enhancement — ensuring core functionality works without JavaScript.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Responsive Images HTML5
Serving different image sizes to different devices using srcset and sizes — preventing mobile devices from downloading desktop-sized images.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Service Workers & Offline Caching ES2015
A JavaScript worker that intercepts network requests and serves responses from cache — enabling offline access, faster loads, and background sync.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Web Font Loading Strategy CSS3
Controlling how custom fonts load to avoid FOIT (invisible text), FOUT (flash of unstyled text), and layout shift — using font-display, preloading, and system font stacks.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
ARIA Roles & Attributes HTML5 Accessible Rich Internet Applications attributes add semantic meaning to HTML elements for screen readers — supplementing native HTML semantics for custom widgets.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Core Web Vitals ES2015
Google's set of performance metrics — LCP, INP, and CLS — that measure loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability, used as a direct search ranking signal.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
Core Web Vitals & Page Performance
Google's Core Web Vitals — LCP, INP, CLS — measure real user experience and directly influence search ranking.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Animations & Transitions CSS3 CSS transitions animate property changes smoothly; keyframe animations define multi-step sequences — both should use GPU-composited properties (transform, opacity) for smooth 60fps.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Cascade, Specificity & Inheritance CSS3 How browsers decide which CSS rule wins — cascade layers, origin, specificity score, and source order all play a role.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Container Queries CSS4
A CSS feature that lets elements adapt their styles based on their parent container's size rather than the viewport — enabling truly reusable responsive components.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Flexbox & Grid CSS3
Flexbox handles one-dimensional layouts (row or column); Grid handles two-dimensional layouts — together they replace float and table hacks.
2mo ago
frontend intermediate
CSS Specificity CSS3
The algorithm browsers use to determine which CSS rule wins when multiple rules target the same element — calculated as a three-part score (ID, class, element).
2mo ago
frontend intermediate