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Brainless: Shadcn components that look like Claude Code, Codex and Grok

brainless.swerdlow.dev

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Re: Brainless: Shadcn components that look like Claude Code, Codex and Grok

#3

Post by benswerd »

dprkh wrote: post #2

Why did you choose to use shadcn registry?

Generally, when using these components I ended up wanting to customize a lot. I switched around the options, coloring, the words in the loading, I mix and matched the components from different CLIs, etc.

I think these are more useful as baselines than as final destinations, and I expect production users to customize them far more than options in components.

I also separately don't really believe in traditional components anymore, code is cheap. The value in these components is that I took the time to pixel match a bunch of the CLIs, not the specific interface used to integrate them.

Re: Brainless: Shadcn components that look like Claude Code, Codex and Grok

#5

Post by tipiirai »

benswerd wrote: post #3
dprkh wrote: post #2

Why did you choose to use shadcn registry?

Generally, when using these components I ended up wanting to customize a lot. I switched around the options, coloring, the words in the loading, I mix and matched the components from different CLIs, etc. I think these are more useful as baselines than as final destinations, and I expect production users to customize them far more than options in components. I also separately don't really believe in traditional compon…

What are traditional components? How are untraditional better?

Re: Brainless: Shadcn components that look like Claude Code, Codex and Grok

#6

Post by benswerd »

tipiirai wrote: post #5
benswerd wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generally, when using these components I ended up wanting to customize a lot. I switched around the options, coloring, the words in the loading, I mix and matched the components from different CLIs, etc. I think these are more useful as baselines than as final destinations, and I expect production users to customize them far more than options in components. I also separately don't really believe in traditional compon…

What are traditional components? How are untraditional better?

Think MUI, heroUI, traditional components have you install their package, import the component and configure it through arguments.

ShadCN components have you copy the component code into your codebase, you own it. They come with the ability to configure arguments, but also because the code is yours its expected that you change the internal logic/styling/structure of the component.

I believe in the era of AI code the ladder just makes more sense.

Re: Brainless: Shadcn components that look like Claude Code, Codex and Grok

#7

Post by crab_galaxy »

benswerd wrote: post #6
tipiirai wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are traditional components? How are untraditional better?

Think MUI, heroUI, traditional components have you install their package, import the component and configure it through arguments. ShadCN components have you copy the component code into your codebase, you own it. They come with the ability to configure arguments, but also because the code is yours its expected that you change the internal logic/styling/structure of the component. I believe in the era of AI code the…

If you are using shadCN as building blocks for a centralized component library I think it makes more sense, but personally I don’t think the component registry pattern scales well across multiple teams/UIs. ShadCN and tailwind really encourage design drift.

I think shadCN has its place for sure but I’d always advocate for Mantine and css modules anywhere early enough to use premade UI solutions.

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