React Server Components made our site a lot faster • Hacker News Board

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#21

Post by nwienert » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:46 PM UTC

Unbelievable, deceptive levels of clickbait at play - they moved from a client app to a server app, so of course the initial render is faster.

This has nothing to do with RSC, and @dang /moderators should probably change the headline.

"Moving from a client-side app to a server app (using React Server Components) made our site faster" is very unsurprising, not very interesting (what would be interesting is comparison from another server rendering technique), and wouldn't have made the HN homepage likely, but they've already cheesed their way here.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#22

Post by afavour » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:47 PM UTC

React Server Components drive me kind of crazy.

"We made a UI framework that slows down web sites unnecessarily... but don't worry! We've now made a massive addition to the framework to mitigate the problem of our own creation! Isn't it wonderful?"

Feels somehow akin to standing in a hole and being given a shovel to dig your way out.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#23

Post by throwaway10965 » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:50 PM UTC

nwienert wrote: post #21

Unbelievable, deceptive levels of clickbait at play - they moved from a client app to a server app, so of course the initial render is faster. This has nothing to do with RSC, and @dang /moderators should probably change the headline. "Moving from a client-side app to a server app (using React Server Components) made our site faster" is very unsurprising, not very interesting (what would be interesting is comparison…

I don't see the difference between their and your headline.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#24

Post by throwaway10965 » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:53 PM UTC

afavour wrote: post #22

React Server Components drive me kind of crazy. "We made a UI framework that slows down web sites unnecessarily... but don't worry! We've now made a massive addition to the framework to mitigate the problem of our own creation! Isn't it wonderful?" Feels somehow akin to standing in a hole and being given a shovel to dig your way out.

It's more like "we made a UI framework that speeds up development and runtime of complex apps considerably, though it also slows down initial load of web sites... but don't worry, we have a fix".

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#25

Post by nwienert » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:56 PM UTC

throwaway10965 wrote: post #23

nwienert wrote: post #21

Unbelievable, deceptive levels of clickbait at play - they moved from a client app to a server app, so of course the initial render is faster. This has nothing to do with RSC, and @dang /moderators should probably change the headline. "Moving from a client-side app to a server app (using React Server Components) made our site faster" is very unsurprising, not very interesting (what would be interesting is comparison…

I don't see the difference between their and your headline.

Because they could have moved to a server based app not using RSC and seen similar gains, so the deception is they are trying to make it seem like RSC caused the gain (and riding on the back of a hyped new technology) whereas it's not really the case.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#26

Post by afavour » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 8:59 PM UTC

throwaway10965 wrote: post #24

afavour wrote: post #22

React Server Components drive me kind of crazy. "We made a UI framework that slows down web sites unnecessarily... but don't worry! We've now made a massive addition to the framework to mitigate the problem of our own creation! Isn't it wonderful?" Feels somehow akin to standing in a hole and being given a shovel to dig your way out.

It's more like "we made a UI framework that speeds up development and runtime of complex apps considerably, though it also slows down initial load of web sites... but don't worry, we have a fix".

Development? Yes. Runtime? Highly debatable. At a bare minimum there are other frameworks with a significantly better runtime performance story than React.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#27

Post by madjam002 » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 9:26 PM UTC

nwienert wrote: post #25

throwaway10965 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the difference between their and your headline.

Because they could have moved to a server based app not using RSC and seen similar gains, so the deception is they are trying to make it seem like RSC caused the gain (and riding on the back of a hyped new technology) whereas it's not really the case.

But RSC is how you do server based apps with React, and they’re clearly sticking with React.

Sure you can render to static markup without RSC but then you have to do a lot of work to mix server/interactive client components, RSC makes it a lot easier to achieve “server based apps”.

It’s not a deceptive headline at all.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#28

Post by ricardobeat » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 9:46 PM UTC

nwienert wrote: post #25

throwaway10965 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the difference between their and your headline.

Because they could have moved to a server based app not using RSC and seen similar gains, so the deception is they are trying to make it seem like RSC caused the gain (and riding on the back of a hyped new technology) whereas it's not really the case.

RSC is how React figured out partial hydration. Before this, you would simply not move to a server-rendered app, as it was not worth it - the client bundle would stay the same and you're just increasing overhead.

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#29

Post by askonomm » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 9:46 PM UTC

pancomplex wrote: post #2

Hey HN! I wanted to share an experiment I ran that tests the performance of RSC vs traditional client-side React on one of our product websites (productonboarding.com). I know RSC is a bit of a controversial topic since server-side rendering used to be an ancient paradigm with the shift to modern JS frameworks. As such, I went into the experiment with a healthy dose of skepticism. To test this out, I conducted an exp…

> ancient paradigm

I'm assuming Gen Z? You are aware that your index.html of your React app is also server-side rendered, right? And you are aware that all the API's that your SPA talks to are also server-side rendered, right?

Re: React Server Components made our site a lot faster

#30

Post by nwienert » Thu, Sep 21, 2023, 10:27 PM UTC

madjam002 wrote: post #27

nwienert wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they could have moved to a server based app not using RSC and seen similar gains, so the deception is they are trying to make it seem like RSC caused the gain (and riding on the back of a hyped new technology) whereas it's not really the case.

But RSC is how you do server based apps with React, and they’re clearly sticking with React. Sure you can render to static markup without RSC but then you have to do a lot of work to mix server/interactive client components, RSC makes it a lot easier to achieve “server based apps”. It’s not a deceptive headline at all.

I think it’s less work to just use static content in places and avoid having to learn a whole new model of rendering, routing, data fetching and a lot of rules than it is to have a traditional ssr app that compiles a few static pieces of content.