> Yes, the syntax isn’t the prettiest, but is it really that hard?

Explain float: clear?

Does that have anything to do with display: flow-root?

And white-space is not actually whitespace?

And when does vertical-align work vs not?

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^ That is all CSS (and not particularly edgy CSS, except for flow-root).

So....yes, CSS is really that hard. Unless you use the subset of CSS that you have decided to learn + use. Not unlike C++.

Who would have thought UI layout and rich formatting would be the hard problem that destroyed personal computing.

Modern CSS is indeed great. I'm using modern CSS, htmx, and Haskell to develop apps and am loving it.

i will say that though i am predisposed to appreciate and agree with an article like this, any sort of value proposition around "some users don't want javascript" just doesn't... hit for me. and, mind you: i am a card-carrying arch user and have spent more time messing with browser scripting and web crawling, and am more of a True Believer than most. it's just such a niche user preference that i think it should largely be simply ignored. yes, i would love the world to be better for the "noscript" universe, no, i don't think that any individual "grassroots" effort should stake itself on "no javascript" being any part of its utility. i think there are a million other reasons why CSS should win out that are more compelling than an appeal to what feels, extremely ironically, like a callback to the "but 10% of your users use IE6" days... all in all, yes: this is somewhat of a minor point wrt. to the article (which btw i think is great), but i am just calling the "trend", such as it is / has been, for what (i think) it is.

How can one learn modern CSS and is there an online reference that is up to date?