Chrome 61: JavaScript Modules, WebUSB, WebShare and more

Key Takeaways

chrome 61 now supports JavaScript modules natively unifying the way that modular JavaScript can be written you can now use navigator dot share to trigger the native Android shared dialogue and the web USB API has landed allowing web apps to access user permitted USB devices I'm Pete LePage let's dive in and see what's new for developers and chrome 61 chrome 61 adds native support for JavaScript modules via the script type equals module element that makes it possible for Chrome to fetch granular dependencies in parallel taking advantage of caching avoiding duplication across pages and ensuring that the script executes in the correct order this standardized module system unifies the way that modular JavaScript can be written and shipped to the web browser in the future the same system will be available in node making it easier for you to write and deploy isomorphic JavaScript you can learn more about modules and the aspects of JavaScript that are affected by modules from the links below if you want users to easily be able to share your content on their favorite network you need to be able to integrate sharing buttons on your site for each of those social networks it adds bloat to your page doesn't always fit nicely within your UI and means that you need to include code from a third-party site the web share API available today on Chrome for Android allows you to invoke the native sharing capabilities of the user's device allowing the user to easily share text or links with any of their installed native apps in a future release this API will also be able to share two installed web apps to use it simply call navigator share with the details of the page that you want to share and the system will handle the rest check out Paul's update link below for full details and some of the best practices that you should be following most hardware peripherals such as keyboards mice printers game pads are all supported by high level web platform api's but using some specialized educational scientific or other USB devices in the browser has been hard often requiring specialized drivers chrome now supports the web usb API allowing web app to communicate with USB devices after the user has provided their consent to learn more about the security and privacy considerations and how they're addressed have a peek at the Web USB spec when you're ready to dive in take a look at France Waze post on updates both are linked in the description these are just a few of the changes in chrome 61 for developers of course there's plenty more you can now specify scrolling smoothness with the scroll behavior CSS property CSS hex color values can now specify an alpha transparency by adding digits to the end of the string you can access the relative position of the screen content with the visual viewport API exposing complex functionality like pinch and zoom and a more direct way all the details including links to more detailed changes Docs specs are in the description below and be sure to check out the new in chrome dev tools video for all the new stuff and dev tools then click subscribe and you'll get an email notification whenever we launch a new video I'm Pete LePage and as soon as chrome 62 is released I'll be right here to tell you what's new in Chrome