The latest wrinkle for AI coding assistant tools like Cursor and Windsurf is known as the Model Context Protocol (MCP). MCP is an open protocol that allows users to provide custom tools and services to agentic LLMs like calling a third party weather service.

In further AI news, OpenAI has introduced a new deep research agent designed to conduct multi-step research on the internet for complex tasks. Just give it a prompt requiring research, like which model of washing machine to buy, and ChatGPT will find, analyze, and synthesize hundreds of online sources to create a comprehensive report at the level of a research analyst.

And as it turns out, the upgrade to React 19 broke React’s own Create React App (CRA) starter repo and the community wants it fixed and deprecated, as it’s no longer the recommended way to build a new React project in the docs. Mark Erikson, of Redux fame, opens a GitHub issue in the repo suggesting updates and solutions and the official acquiesces to fix the repo for now, and deprecate it in the docs.

News:

• Paige - OpenAI introduces deep research agent
• Jack - Model Context Protocol (MCP) on Cursor and Windsurf
• TJ - Create React App and React 19 (and here’s the issue to add Astro to the React docs)

Bonus News:

• Dan Abramov leaves Bluesky
• Oracle v. Deno trademark update
• GitHub Copilot introduces agents with Copilot Edits

Fire Starters:

• CSS position sticky

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Handheld compressed air duster
• Jack - Finishing LED movie poster RPi project
• TJ - Cannondale Topstone bike

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

A new challenger to rival OpenAI’s best ChatGPT model has arisen from China named DeepSeek R1. The reason it’s causing even more of a stir is because the creators claim DeepSeek R1 was trained for under $5M - a mere fraction of the cost of comparable models to date - and they’ve open sourced the code, the models, all of it.

In the same vein, both TJ and Paige had the chance to try out AI coding assistant Devin.ai firsthand last week. Devin is best described as an energetic junior programmer, and while it offers unique ways of interacting with it: Slack threads, PR comments, and has oversight over multiple repos so it can be asked to do things like compare documentation in one repo to SDK endpoints in another repo, its end value is still questionable.

TypeScript validation libraries have been catching on in recent years, and the creators of some of the most popular ones (Zod, ArkType, and Valibot) have gotten together to promote a common interface for libraries called Standard Schema.

News:

• Paige - Standard Schema promotes a common interface for TypeScript validation libraries
• Jack - DeepSeek R1
• TJ - Our firsthand experiences with Devin.ai and jokes about AI trained coding assistants

Bonus News:

• Matt Biilman coins the next big term in web dev experience: AX (“agent experience”)
• Vercel acquires dashboard and chart library Tremor
• Has the “Rust wave” crested?

Fire Starters:

• toReversed, toSorted, and toSpliced

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - The Recruit TV series
• Jack - The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck
• TJ - Onyx Storm

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

This week, the team behind JavaScript runtime Bun drops some major updates into Bun 1.2. Bun introduces a built-in S3 storage API, a built-in Postgres client (with MySQL coming soon), 90% compatibility with Node.js, and it’s faster than ever before.

Tailwind CSS v4 is out as well, and it boasts a new higher performance engine for 5x faster full builds, support for cutting edge CSS features like cascade layers, custom properties, and container queries, a simplified initial install and config to get going, and a first-party Vite plugin.

And React Scan, built by Aiden Bai who also built Million.js, is also out this week with v0.1. Install React Scan into any React app and it will auto detect performance issues due to excessive re-rendering, and highlight the components causing the issues.

News:

• Paige - Tailwind CSS v4.0
• Jack - React Scan 0.1 (aka Million.js)
• TJ - Bun 1.2

Bonus News:

• Stargate
• OpenAI’s new Operator AI agent can do things on the web for you

Fire Starters:

• Link to text fragments with #:~:text=

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Puzzles (like the ones from Buffalo Games)
• Jack - Klipsch G-17 air wireless speaker
• TJ - Not So Super, Apple

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

The first topic of conversation this week is an unexpected new area the Expo team is tackling: Expo Application Service Hosting. EAS Hosting is a new service for quickly deploying web projects built using Expo and React Native apps. It makes it easy to compile and sign apps with custom native code, upload apps to the Play Store or App Store, and push live app updates directly to users.

The Interop project, which aims to improve interoperability between major browser engines, released its accomplishments from 2024 this week. The browsers took on 17 areas of focus in 2024, and went from 46% of tests passing in January, all the way to 95% of tests passing by the end of December.

WordPress makes headlines once more, as Autommatic, the WordPress hosting company owned by WP creator Matt Mullenweg cuts its contributions back on the WP open-source project from 4,000 hours per week to 45 hours per week.

News:

• Paige - Interop 2024 highlights
• Jack - Expo APIs (EAS Hosting)
• TJ - Automattic cuts WordPress contribution hours (WordPress Drama Timeline)

Bonus News:

• Vitest 3.0 is out
• The iPhone Air could be coming later this year

Fire Starters:

• WebXR Device API

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Shrinking TV show and browser-based SwaggerEditor
• Jack - fzf command-line fuzzy finder
• TJ - Switch 2

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

This episode begins with a cautionary tale to double check your browser extensions. Popular coupon browser extension Honey’s been caught replacing affiliate links with its own tracking codes right before checkout, as well as applying pre-selected discount codes from its business partners that aren’t always the best deals.

A few weeks ago we reported Deno is petitioning Oracle to release the JavaScript trademark as Oracle’s never used it since acquiring it when it bought Sun Microsystems. This week Oracle has informed Deno they won’t voluntarily withdraw their trademark on JavaScript, and are lawyering up.

And the creator of HashiCorp has built a new terminal emulator called Ghostty that’s getting a lot of buzz lately. Ghostty is written in Zig and uses platform native UI and GPU acceleration for an ultra fast terminal experience. It’s got all the expected features like split screen, key commands, and support for programs like Neovim, and is worth a shot if you’re interested in trying a new terminal competitor.

News:

• Paige - Ghostty terminal emulator and app settings GUI
• Jack - Honey browser extension scandal
• TJ - Oracle plans to fight Deno’s petition for them to release the JavaScript trademark

Bonus News:

• Node’s experimental type stripping is now enabled by default

Fire Starters:

• Broadcast Channel API

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - The Lies of Locke Lamora novel
• Jack - Home automation and the Hue lighting API
• TJ - CES! Featuring things like Swippitt

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

To start us off, the State of JS 2024 survey results were recently released, and there’s lots of interesting stats to share. Vite continues to be the most loved framework and build tool amongst all JS devs, React continues to be the most used framework amongst JS devs at work, and SvelteKit and Astro are the two meta frameworks JS devs are most interested in trying out. Fun fact: 67% of respondents say they use ChatGPT to help them write code, but estimate only 12 - 20% of their code in a project is AI-assisted.

In keeping with the AI trend, VS Code announced a fee plan for GitHub Copilot: no trial, no subscription, no credit card required. Limits apply, but it’s a great opportunity for devs who aren’t sure if Copilot is worth the cost to try it out.

Shadcn has also released its new resource site Awesome Shadcn UI. The site contains 13 categories, 200 resources, and lots of useful links to templates, UI libraries, components, color customizations, animations, and more. 

News:

• Paige - State of JS 2024 survey results
• Jack - Shadcn UI design system resources
• TJ - Announcing a free GitHub Copilot for VS Code

Bonus News:

• Matt Mullenweg imposes a “holiday break” on WordPress and asks Redditors what other drama he should create in 2025

Fire Starters:

• Clipboard API

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Tulsa King TV series
• Jack - Hue Play HDMI sync box 8K
• TJ - Updating my blog

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

We wrap up the podcast with an end of year holiday spectacular episode! Instead of the usual news, the hosts share the biggest front end stories of 2024, the most fascinating developments, and the moments that made us happiest.

Thank you, Front-End Fire listeners! We couldn’t have done this without you. Wishing you a wonderful holiday season, and we can’t wait to bring you more frontend goodness in 2025.

Biggest Story of the Year for Frontend Devs:

• Paige - Vite and void(0)
• Jack - React 19 drama and delays
• TJ - The rise in AI tooling, and how we move forward with it

Most Interesting Story of 2024:

• Paige - Apple’s not-so-great year: Apple Vision Pro, EU legal issues, Apple Intelligence 
• Jack - AI app builders: v0, bolt.new, etc.
• TJ - Wordpress Drama

What Made You Happy in 2024:

• Paige - Consistent practice of hobbies
• Jack - Growing this podcast and quality time with friends and family
• TJ - Getting back into reading

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

In our last news episode of the year, we share that React 19 is declared stable, just in time for the holidays. It’s been a long road from release candidate in April to stability now, but it was well worth the wait. React 19 is packing a lot of features, including: Actions, hooks, form actions, the new use API, and of course, React Server Components and Server Actions.

OpenAI’s been busy as well, introducing ChatGPT Pro, its $200 a month subscription for unlimited access to OpenAI o1 (the “reasoning model), GPT-4o, and Advanced Voice mode. Additionally, the startup announced the ChatGPT desktop app for macOS can now read code in a handful of developer-focused coding apps, like VS Code, XCode, Terminal, and iTerm2.

There’s a new challenger to Figma for styling React-based code bases called Onlook. Onlook is a browser-based product studio that lets you design React code with Tailwind CSS using an easy-to-use interface just like you would in Figma.

News:

• Paige - Onlook, the power Figma in your React app
• Jack - React 19 is stable
• TJ - OpenAI announcements: ChatGPT Pro and Work With Apps

Bonus News:

• Quantum Computing Inches Closer to Reality
• iOS 18.2 and Apple Intelligence

Fire Starters:

• Customizable Selects (Wes Bos video)

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Black Doves TV series and The Midnight Feast book
• Jack - Seestar-S50 All-in-one smart telescope
• TJ - Christmas Village in Grand Rapids, MI

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

The new JavaScript package manager and serverless registry vlt debuted recently, promising to be a drop-in replacement for existing package managers like npm with additional offerings like a dependency query syntax selector and GUI experience for dependency graphs.

Vite 6.0 released this week, and its biggest improvement is the new experimental Environment API. The Environment API is designed so that framework authors can create as many environments as they need within a single Vite server so they can map the way their apps work in production. 

Astro 5.0 also enters primetime with Astro Content Layers that loads content from any source, Server Islands to combine cached, static content with dynamic content, simplified prerendering, and Vite 6 support (using the new Environment API, mentioned in the last paragraph).

News:

• Paige - Vite 6.0 is out
• Jack - Astro 5.0 release
• TJ - vlt Client and Serverless Registry

Bonus News:

• Deno v. Oracle: Canceling the JavaScript Trademark
• GenAIScript

Fire Starters:

• Details disclosure HTML element

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - The Diplomat TV series
• Jack - Retaining your thumbs thanks to SawStop
• TJ - Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone and StoryGraph book tracker

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com

Co-host Jack Herrington is just back from the React Summit conference in New York and he shares some of the highlights of the conf, including the announcement that TanStack Start is now in beta status and Tanner Linsely (the creator of the TanStack products) will be working on it full time.

Additionally, React-based animation library Framer Motion announces it has spun off into open source library Motion. Going forward, Motion will provide vanilla JS APIs so every JavaScript project can take advantage of the smooth, easy-to-use animations that were previously only available to React applications. 

The US government’s taken aim at Google, asking Google’s antitrust trial judge to force the company to sell off its Chrome browser after the judge ruled Google’s maintained an illegal search monopoly. These are the dramatic opening shots that will, most likely, become much less contentious than Google actually divesting itself of Chrome when a deal with the DOJ is reached, but it’s definitely a warning to other large tech companies to watch their market share.

As a final note, we won’t be recording a show next week due to the Thanksgiving holiday in the US, but will be back after that with all the latest news.

News:

• Paige - Framer Motion becomes just Motion
• Jack - TanStack Start is in beta status
• TJ - US proposes breakup of Google to fix search monopoly

Bonus News:

• The State of JS survey 2024 is now open
• AI tool calling is the next big thing

Fire Starters:

• scrollIntoView()

What Makes Us Happy this Week:

• Paige - Stubby car drying nozzle leaf blower attachment
• Jack - Air tag-enabled water bottle lid
• TJ - Silver Bells in Lansing

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

• Front-end Fire website
• Blue Collar Coder on YouTube
• Blue Collar Coder on Discord
• Reach out via email
• Tweet at us on X @front_end_fire
• Follow us on Bluesky @front-end-fire.com