Every now and then, unique and incredible websites introduce a new generation of web developers to existing tools they were not aware of; such is the case of Histography, a project that is essentially a visualization of recorded history for the web. Histography is hosted on the .io top domain level, and it has been lovingly made with the framework known as PixiJS.
Don't bother looking up this project on your smartphone; chances are that it will not work, but it will certainly amaze you on a workstation or laptop. When you break down the main elements of the project, they are mostly HTML5 with lots of JavaScript, but the heavy lifting is done by PixiJS, a framework that has been around since 2014.
At the heart of PixiJS is a rendering engine that translates into HTML5; it is highly ideal for making interactive websites, particularly games, and it features tutorials written in English and Chinese languages. The target of the graphics rendering engine is WebGL, but you should not expect three-dimensional graphics because PixiJS is for 2D projects. In other words, the elements are sprites, but they look gorgeous nonetheless. Companies such as Diesel and Bose have made good use of PixiJS.
If you are a young web developer who has not heard about PixiJS before, there is a reason: the API utilizes an approach that is very similar to Adobe Flash, which as we all know has been not only deeply deprecated but also largely forgotten. If you are familiar with the SpriteKit developed by Apple, you will probably like PixiJS even more. One of the neat aspects of PixiJS is that it is not geared towards game developers; it is actually developed for web designers as well as mobile app programmers.
The two ways you can learn PixiJS is by following the online tutorial on GitHub; however, you should have a strong understanding of how to work with JavaScript and HTML5 in order to complete interactive projects. Using PixiJS starts with setting up a web server with the Node.JS framework or installing a Mongoose server. The current release is version 5.2.4, and it is available on GitHub now. For more information click here https://www.reddit.com/r/web_design/comments/gv31pj/how_was_this_website_made_httphistographyio/.