sunil.page

Kangaroo leaves home

Wednesday, 4th November 2020 ◆ Perform again about a court (5)

On a late-night whimsy, I decided to buy kangaroo.games in order to move Kangaroo to its own domain. For starters, "xikka" is difficult to spell and pronounce, and for seconds I think it was a bit weird that Kangaroo appeared like an add-on to what is essentially a personal blog.

I plan to keep adding games, improving Kangaroo as I go. One day I would love Kangaroo to see a large number of players, and this is one step in the right direction!

Rewriting in React

The previous frontend was a custom affair, leaning on jQuery and some gulp tasks. As I went adding features, it became clear this is not an ideal approach. A friend of mine suggested React, so I sceptically gave it a go, fully expecting it to be a modern buzz-word with which I didn't get along at all.

However, my hesitance couldn't have been more unwarranted. React is a beautifully designed and elegant framework. I'm glad I tried it out, and I would recommend it.

I'm hoping the new site will feel a little snappier too. I'm using a single-page React app, meaning the page doesn't refresh when you click a link; instead, React adds and removes elements from the DOM as required.

It took about two days to rewrite, time which I'm sure I will recoup many times over!