Chrome 38

Enabled (10) | Origin Trial (0) | Behind a flag (0) | Deprecated (0) | Removed (1)

Enabled by default in 38

This release of Chrome had 10 new features.

Element

Enable a responsive images solution by declaring multiple resources for an image using CSS media queries. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: http://docs.webplatform.org/wiki/html/elements/picturehttp://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/05/14/responsive-images-done-right-guide-picture-srcset/http://ericportis.com/posts/2014/srcset-sizes/https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/picture

Samples: http://scottjehl.github.io/picturefill/https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/picture-element

Encoding API

Script API to allow encoding/decoding of strings from binary data. Common scenario: decoding a binary data file fetched via XHR into an ArrayBuffer that contains strings encoded as UTF-8. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: http://updates.html5rocks.com/2014/08/Easier-ArrayBuffer---String-conversion-with-the-Encoding-APIhttps://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Encoding_API

Samples: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/encoding-api

File constructor

A programmatic method of constructing File objects, very similar to how Blob objects are built. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/File

Samples: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/file-constructor

JS iterators (i.e. the for-of feature) (ES6)

Iterates over iterable objects (including arrays, array-like objects, iterators and generators), invoking a custom iteration hook with statements to be executed for the value of each distinct property. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Statements/for...ofhttp://updates.html5rocks.com/2014/08/Collecting-and-Iterating-the-ES6-Way

Samples: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/collections-iterators-es6

Map (ES6)

Map objects are simple key/value maps. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Maphttp://updates.html5rocks.com/2014/08/Collecting-and-Iterating-the-ES6-Way

Samples: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/collections-iterators-es6

Math functions (ES6)

Math related functions - sign, trunc, sinh, cosh, tanh, asinh, acosh, atanh, log10, log2, hypot, fround, clz32, cbrt, log1p, expm1 (as Math.sign(...), Math.trunc(...) and so on). #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math#Methods

No linked samples

Screen Orientation API

Gives ability to read the screen orientation and lock it. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Screen/orientation

No linked samples

Set (ES6)

Set objects let you store unique values of any type, whether primitive values or object references. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Sethttp://updates.html5rocks.com/2014/08/Collecting-and-Iterating-the-ES6-Way

Samples: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/samples/tree/gh-pages/collections-iterators-es6

Symbols (ES6)

Allows properties to be added to existing objects without the possibility of interference with the existing properties, unintended visibility, or with other uncoordinated additions by any other code. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Resources

Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Symbol

No linked samples

Unscopables (ES6)

Unscopables allows properties to be hidden to with statement lookup rules. This is important for adding new properties to existing objects both in JavaScript and in DOM. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.

Origin Trials in-progress in 38

This release of Chrome had 0 new origin trials.

Flagged features in 38

This release of Chrome had 0 are available behind a flag.

Deprecations and Removals

Deprecation policy

To keep the platform healthy, we sometimes remove APIs from the Web Platform which have run their course. There can be many reasons why we would remove an API, such as:

• They are superseded by newer APIs.
• They are updated to reflect changes to specifications to bring alignment and consistency with other browsers.
• They are early experiments that never came to fruition in other browsers and thus can increase the burden of support for web developers.

Some of these changes will have an effect on a very small number of sites. To mitigate issues ahead of time, we try to give developers advanced notice so they can make the required changes to keep their sites running.

Chrome currently has a process for deprecations and removals of API's, essentially:

• Announce on the blink-dev mailing list.
• Set warnings and give time scales in the Chrome DevTools Console when usage is detected on the page.
• Wait, monitor, and then remove the feature as usage drops.

You can find a list of all deprecated features on chromestatus.com using the deprecated filter and removed features by applying the removed filter. We will also try to summarize some of the changes, reasoning, and migration paths in these posts.

Deprecated features in 38

This release of Chrome had 0 features deprecated.

Removed features in 38

This release of Chrome had 1 features removed.

SVG (1.1) Fonts

Use the SVG based font format (that non WebKit based browsers never implemented) as a @font-face web font. #

This feature was specified in this Spec.