TWIL May 15th 2026

• Sometimes validating everything just adds complexity & restrictions for no benefit
  • e.g. do we really need extensive validation that stuff is saved in a certain format when we write/test the code that saves it?
• I actually remembered to use next not return in Ruby!
• Saving a JSON string to a JSONB column in Rails does not lead to it being auto-parsed as JSON on read
  • It's actually parsed as just a regular string, to have it read as JSON you need to persist a hash or array to the column
  • So if you're getting JSON from a request, you need to parse it before serializing it to the DB
• JS does not have a built-in YAML parser
• You can enforce a minimum release age for JS packages through various (very differently named) options in the latest versions of every package manager
  • And/or through Dependabot's cooldown option
• Designing greenfield stuff is fun
• Reaffirmed not to trust frontend validations on discovering a ticket to implement a backend 255 character email length limit for one of our projects

Links

• Browsers Treat Big Sites Differently - Den Odell

Pretty crazy, I had no idea we're technically back in the bad old IE quirks mode days but Chrome. Big props to Firefox & Safari devs for doing the work needed to keep the web running. Nothing for Moneytree but Rakuten has one!

• Better Browser Caching with No-Vary-Search - Harry Roberts

No-Vary-Search seems incredibly useful for caching static sites and certain SPAs which just load evrything as one big chunk anyway. Also very handy that it's so customisable between whitelists, blacklists, ignoring everything in the query string and even combinations thereof.

• Soon We Can Finally Banish JavaScript to the ShadowRealm - Mat Marquis

What a fantastic name for an API if nothing else.