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If not React, then what?

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Re: If not React, then what?

#232

You can build a good website in React and you can build a bad website in React. It's easier to build a bad website in React than it is to build a bad website with just plain HTML/CSS.

> It's easier to build a bad website in React than it is to build a bad website with just plain HTML/CSS. I think many people would argue that it is easier to build a good web app in React than plain HTML/CSS/JS.

Sure, but most people think they’re building a webapp when they’re really building a website.

Re: If not React, then what?

#233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you try something for a decade and it doesn't work, maybe a change in style is necessary! An article exceeding 20 pages doesn't sound like the best persuasion strategy.

I’m not a front end engineer and I read most of this, at first for sheer morbid curiosity about the drama, then I kept reading because it looked like deep knowledge and detailed exposition of a complex subject, then I kept reading because I was wondering who listens to a guy like this and why? In my experience, regardless of your skill at communication, coworkers or bosses that are actually interested in getting to d…

This is a very underrated comment.

My only quibble is that it’s certainly possible to choose React (or any popular solution to a problem) without considering other options too much, and still care about craft.

Re: If not React, then what?

#234
post #222

> It's the rewarding side of real engineering, trying out new materials under well-understood constraints to improve user outcomes. Good thing we’re mostly keeping the attitude to hobby projects. Can’t imagine hundreds of artisans™ bikeshedding over what the hell this even means. And I can’t read with a straight face an article talking about complexity of React while suggesting Vue (sic!) as an alternative. Lol!

what is wrong with vuejs?

Nothing is wrong with Vue.js, but saying that it is less complex than React is just false.

Re: If not React, then what?

#235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In case I was unclear, I consider Angular dead and obsolete.

> In case I was unclear, I consider Angular dead and obsolete. maybe you would expand on this? I have no intention to challenge you, just genuinely curios if and why I should consider vue over agnular for new project (I use angular already).

Maybe Angular is still used a lot, in legacy projects. I just mean for starting a new project, imo most people will choose React or Vue in 2024, right? I never used Angular myself, but have used both React and Vue a lot.

Re: If not React, then what?

#236
post #168

Reading over the authors primary reasons to not use React, they strike me as fundamentally misguided - mostly solving problems that most people don’t have. One reason it says that React is a poor choice is performance issues. But front end performance issues are almost never the most pressing issue to deal with. React performance concerns in the real world are typically measured in, at worst, hundreds of milliseconds…

> React performance concerns in the real world are typically measured in, at worst, hundreds of milliseconds. I disagree. Try loading up a library heavy site (i.e. React plus a half dozen associated helpers for state, UI and whatever, which is pretty common) on an old or cheap Android device. It can take multiple seconds before the page is fully loaded. Even once the libraries are loaded, React sites often involve pa…

With React Server Components, you can have your cake and eat it too, by sending only the necessary HTML to the browser (thereby having good performance and SEO) but also hydrating with more interactivity if necessary. And I'm not sure where you think CSS in JS means you don't learn CSS, I'm not sure how you'd use it otherwise... Either way, there are CSS in JS (TypeScript) libraries that compile down to regular CSS classes, like PandaCSS, so again, you can have your cake and eat it too.

Re: If not React, then what?

#237

I never liked React. I'm primarily a backend developer, and preferred server generated HTML with a sprinkling of Javascript. It may sound ridiculous to some, but I miss the JQuery days. For newer projects I'm looking at Elixir / Phoenix / LiveView and HTMX.

No need to miss jquery days. If you want jquery you can use it now. I know at least some companies use it even for greenfield projects.

I'm fine with using it for personal projects. For anything with a larger team, they'd probably look at me like I was crazy if I suggest anything that didn't involve React, at least in these parts.

Re: If not React, then what?

#238

I never liked React. I'm primarily a backend developer, and preferred server generated HTML with a sprinkling of Javascript. It may sound ridiculous to some, but I miss the JQuery days. For newer projects I'm looking at Elixir / Phoenix / LiveView and HTMX.

Look at Imba. If you are strong enough to avoid cargo culting and try things which aren't popular, they are some of the best ways to build frontend apps out there: https://imba.io/

Thanks. It looks interesting and I will check it out.

Re: If not React, then what?

#239

I'll continue using vanilla React, for the same reason I use Java: it's reached the coveted "boring technology" status where it's mature, stable, fast enough, and has a huge community, resources, and ecosystem. I won't let go of that easily. However, this is a pretty epic rant nonetheless.

You're going to love Vue. Took me about half an hour to switch and be productive and never looked back. I've switched multiple teams/devs to it as well. If not just for the devtools experience. I switched right before all the messy React stuff started getting released.

I started with Vue and switched to React, because of better library and TypeScript support. Every other framework pales in comparison to React due to its ecosystem, and I'm not gonna spend time building new packages to bridge that gap when I have my own work I need to get done, so I'll just use React and npm install what I need.

Re: If not React, then what?

#240
post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're going to love Vue. Took me about half an hour to switch and be productive and never looked back. I've switched multiple teams/devs to it as well. If not just for the devtools experience. I switched right before all the messy React stuff started getting released.

I'm having trouble forgiving Vue for the backwards compatibility issues and short support period from Vue 2.x => Vue 3.x. I'm now faced with unnecessary cost to upgrade line of business apps built with Vue that in full maintenance mode but now have critical security vulnerabilities popping up in scanners with no way to fix them other than large scale code migration. I saw they are now dropping support for Vue 2 even…

What I like about React is that generally speaking, it has rock solid backwards compatibility support (class components are still supported for example), presumably due to Meta using it at scale such that they cannot scrap everything immediately. Vue, being not used in any large company, does not have the same sense of responsibility to preserve backwards compatibility, it seems. This has its pros and cons though but for many people, backwards compatibility is a big deal.
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