This is a fun proof of concept, but it isn't what CSS is used for. There's no conceivable reason you'd do this in practice.

Those you know it well can abuse it in a fun way. Probably not useful in practice. Nevertheless this proves talent of the one who wrote it.

A better test for someone using CSS would be activities that CSS is typically used for. Have them make a complex layout that is responsive at multiple display sizes, or have them architect a set of reusable classes for a design library or something. You may think that this sort of cleverness is generalizable: that someone who would come up with this solution would also be good at laying out web components. But there is no relationship between this (very neat) trick and CSS skills, so it would be a terrible test to give people.

Fair enough.

> This is scary good. Well done. If your product have any frontend and you have the power to decide ensure at least one of your hires can write CSS at this level.

I'm having trouble determening as written if this is a joke or not.

If anyone looked at this and thought something along the lines of "wow, think of the possibilities", I would would ask only that they don't put more thought into it. Other thoughts could bring pain ... to the browser that has to run it, the user staring at the page as the fans spin up, and the developer who has the pleasure to work with it next.

This was clearly one of those interesting-yet-useless things that was worth a read.

This wasn't a joke; I was being serious. However, this incident highlights how much I do not know. Anyway, thank you all for providing alternative viewpoints. I am willing to look like an idiot if it means I can gain knowledge from various people.

When you get an idea like "I'm going to X with Y, where Y is not designed to do X", it probably takes several hours or a couple of days to implement it. Are you going to let your hire take that much time? And more importantly, are you going to pay the hire for that time, regardless of whether they succeed in doing it?

If someone asked me to write CSS at this level for an interview I'd probably question the job, because if you have to write CSS at this level for work something is horribly wrong.

Despite the pressure to constantly hustle, it’s still ok to take a job just because it sounds fun*.

*Obviously, abusing CSS isn’t everyone’s idea of fun.

Fair enough, however it is better to hire few frontend specalists rather than depending on fullstack/backend people to do the frontend.

I think it would be a waste of time if they could because it is both extremely inefficient and has nothing to do with actual frontend skills.