React is winning by default and slowing innovation • Hacker News Board

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#211

Post by paulhebert » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:07 PM UTC

solarkraft wrote: post #170

wk_end wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think (at least part of) the reason why React has been so successful is that is scales so well: it's actually a relatively simple tool that works well for small problems. Pair it with a Vite template or something and you can be up-and-running in minutes. But it continues working pretty well as your app gets bigger, too. But where React fails is actually in more complex scenarios. Prop drilling becomes tedious or in…

The amazing thing about React to me is that millions of dollars keep flowing into improving its DX further. They have spent a lot of time building React Compiler ( https://react.dev/learn/react-compiler/introduction ) which does all the memoization for you! This severely lightens the performance concerns.

Sure, but Svelte and Vue have had these compilation features built-in for ages without all that money flowing in.

The react team resisted these features because they went against their “it’s just a library” philosophy. They’re only copying them now because of how obviously useful they are in the other frameworks.

useEffect, useMemo, useCallback etc. add a ton of complexity and make it easy to write buggy code. I used to work at an agency so I’ve done projects with React/Svelte/Vue/Lit/Stencil/Angular/etc. I found the React projects had lots more performance issues, confusing bugs, etc. than Vue or Svelte.

I agree with the article. React is popular because it was groundbreaking and now is the default, but it’s far from the best

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#212

Post by scrollaway » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:17 PM UTC

ricardobeat wrote: post #180

827a wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it would be, but I would also make a significant bet that the web would be noticeably less sophisticated without React. React is complicated, and builds complicated apps, and has its performance pitfalls, but it is also a driving force for how the web has been able to achieve native-class user experiences. Its the right programming model for building complicated things.

Websites were much more varied and creative in the jQuery era, and even more so in the Flash era that came before. Different interaction paradigms, wild animations, full-screen effects, etc etc. Not necessarily "better", but React didn't really enable anything we couldn't have before - even today when real performance is required you will resort to canvas/webgl, alternative rendering approaches and skipping react's r…

I wrote websites in the jquery era. I wrote web apps back then. Gaming tools, databases, tons of dynamic stuff.

When I used react for the first time I cried with “where has this been all my life? It would have saved me years of work”.

Whenever I see claims like yours I always have hardcore doubts. React may not have “enabled” new things just like ai coding doesn’t “enable” new things … as long as you consider time to be in infinite supply. If you care about getting shit done, there is no comparison.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#213

Post by presentation » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:21 PM UTC

koakuma-chan wrote: post #147

jjordan wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really recommend isomorphic environments, but if it's your cup of tea, Tanstack Start is making a lot of progress. It removes all of the magic and misdirection of Nextjs and just provides a good light alternative.

AFAIK "TanStack" doesn't support RSCs? That's a deal breaker for me. Also the guy named his framework after himself, it can't be good.

They built a half baked version of it and then haven’t finished it for a while but maybe they’ll get back to it sometime.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#214

Post by LAC-Tech » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:21 PM UTC

827a wrote: post #102

React is winning because its really good. Even if the cost is an extra few milliseconds of render time and few extra hours of dev time figuring out things like hook dependencies. If React starts taking a backseat, it'll be because its no longer really good. And, to be fair: I've started to see this happen. Next & Vercel have totally taken over the React world, and they've proven to make quite poor architectural decis…

A front end web framework with global state management should be a last resort for a website. Coming out of the gate with it is just ridiculous IMO. Most peoples websites are just not that complex.

There's like an escalation ladder in my mind:

- just write HTML

- statically generate the HTML

- dynamically generate the HTML

- dynamically generate the HTML at a smaller granularity (HTMX et all)

- augment your HTML with custom web components that have client side behaviour.

Only if you've exhausted that should you bother with something like React. And even then SolidJS does a much better job of it than react itself does.

So yeah, I am just not seeing it. Former (and perhaps future!) React.JS dev btw.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#215

Post by Supermancho » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:22 PM UTC

scotty79 wrote: post #50

skrebbel wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN has a button exactly for that!

Which one? Maybe there should be "reply later" button that would keep the spot for your future comment so you don't lose track of it?

> Which one?

Everyone should have the "close browser" button.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#216

Post by Tubelord » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:23 PM UTC

MiiMe19 wrote: post #201

scuff3d wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly it's incredible what any of these frameworks have been able to accomplish given the bonkers platform they have to work on. HTML, CSS, and JS made sense back when the web was primarily text with some simple forms. It's a dog shit foundation to build highly interactive apps on. The whole thing needs to be thrown out and rebuilt.

Webapps were a mistake :(

Almost all phone apps could be a web app

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#217

Post by alexfromapex » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:25 PM UTC

Yes but it's also a good declarative abstraction and should make the code more portable to other future declarative frameworks.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#218

Post by phendrenad2 » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:27 PM UTC

The author calls for using the right tool for the job, the lists some speedup features of other frameworks, as though "fast at doing X" is all that could possibly matter. I think this obsession with speed above all else (even forgetting that any other concern could exist) is a case of a really common dysfunction in software development, one that leads to ruin and bankruptcy, and one that successful companies built their empires on their ability to avoid.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#219

Post by the_gipsy » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:32 PM UTC

ForHackernews wrote: post #146

827a wrote: post #102

React is winning because its really good. Even if the cost is an extra few milliseconds of render time and few extra hours of dev time figuring out things like hook dependencies. If React starts taking a backseat, it'll be because its no longer really good. And, to be fair: I've started to see this happen. Next & Vercel have totally taken over the React world, and they've proven to make quite poor architectural decis…

How is it good? I've only had the misfortune of working on two React apps, but they were both a nightmare. It seems like React is great if you have multiple teams that hate each other all working on the same giant frontend app. https://medium.com/@fulalas/web-crap-has-taken-control-71c45...

It's good because it's popular, which doesn't really mean it's good. See Java. It works and rakes in billions, but it still may be utter shit from an engineering viewpoint.

Re: React is winning by default and slowing innovation

#220

Post by dylan604 » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 11:36 PM UTC

giveita wrote: post #140

827a wrote: post #102

React is winning because its really good. Even if the cost is an extra few milliseconds of render time and few extra hours of dev time figuring out things like hook dependencies. If React starts taking a backseat, it'll be because its no longer really good. And, to be fair: I've started to see this happen. Next & Vercel have totally taken over the React world, and they've proven to make quite poor architectural decis…

Maybe us backenders help. If I need to do front end I learn as little as possible. React does the job. It could have been Angular that ended up being in the boring throne, and I would have said just use Angular. Just use what the world uses!

I'm a backender that writes UI PoCs to test the backend where the PoC gets pushed to prod. I just write custom JS updating HTML/CSS elements directly. No frameworks. I've been told it's a nightmare to deal with later, but it makes perfect sense to me. Not once have I ever claimed to be a UI person. That's just way too close to the user for my liking.