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React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

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Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#61

Post by sunaurus »

throwaway220033 wrote: post #18

The goal behind "hooks" was to make React simpler for beginners. I build client-side apps since 2007, and React is getting too magical and complex for even for me. The NextJS influence is really making things worse, "use server" "use client" tags do not scale at all. The project clearly lacks mission, goal, leadership and direction. I'll use Preact in the next projects.

I've seen this criticism several times on HN, but have never been able to relate to it.

I've been using hooks since they were introduced, in several teams (at several different companies), and I've never experienced them being complicated to understand, either for myself, or for team mates - even juniors who are new to React. In my experience, it takes very little time (I wonder if it's the case that many people on HN are just used to some completely different libraries and thus are coming in to React with a completely different mental model? And that's the cause of this sentiment being so common here.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#62

Post by gardnr »

lairv wrote: post #59
throwaway220033 wrote: post #18

The goal behind "hooks" was to make React simpler for beginners. I build client-side apps since 2007, and React is getting too magical and complex for even for me. The NextJS influence is really making things worse, "use server" "use client" tags do not scale at all. The project clearly lacks mission, goal, leadership and direction. I'll use Preact in the next projects.

I agree but a major selling point of React is its ecosystem, and libraries are not compatible with Preact by default

Which libraries have you had trouble using? The official preact/compat library works great for me https://preactjs.com/guide/v10/switching-to-preact/

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#63

Post by Already__Taken »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #23

I don't think React is approachable. It is just the most popular framework and has the biggest ecosystem, that is why it is used. Otherwise it is just not good in my view compares to others. Also I don't think useMemo or useCallback were a reasonable compromise ever.

at the time Vue is had it right but the people wanted TS and that wasn't a good UX for too long in Vue.

now it seems the magic Vue had has gotten better, and was copied over but worse to react.

if react can fix it by compiling it away, cool. but fixing computer bugs is even less approachable than webpack.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#64

Post by CharlieDigital »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #23

I don't think React is approachable. It is just the most popular framework and has the biggest ecosystem, that is why it is used. Otherwise it is just not good in my view compares to others. Also I don't think useMemo or useCallback were a reasonable compromise ever.

My initial reaction to a Tweet from Andrew Clark on the upcoming compiler motivated me to write[0]:

    React is the new IBM: you should learn it, you should understand its faults, you should probably still deploy it. You’ll never get fired for picking it, but it’s going to be expensive, bloated, difficult to get right, and it’s going to be joyless implementing it every step of the way. React is “the status quo mindset — the biggest enemy of pure innovation”.
I think the project has completely gone off of the rails and is now going through these cycles of self-inflicted complexity only to be solved several releases later with additional complexity. All the while, not really addressing the core issues that affect DX and ergonomics.

React is the new IBM.

[0] https://chrlschn.dev/blog/2023/02/react-is-the-new-ibm/

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#65

Post by argentinian »

I like about Vue that everything feels straightforward and if fits in my head. In other words I think it's powerful and at the same time simple. It had only once a big change, and even then it was very easy to understand. If you knew the options api, the composition api was very easy to understand.

Maybe Svelte is also like Vue, I haven't tried it. I've heard many react horror stories but I've never used it, so I don't know how true they are.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#66

Post by lakpan »

slmjkdbtl wrote: post #29
throwaway220033 wrote: post #18

The goal behind "hooks" was to make React simpler for beginners. I build client-side apps since 2007, and React is getting too magical and complex for even for me. The NextJS influence is really making things worse, "use server" "use client" tags do not scale at all. The project clearly lacks mission, goal, leadership and direction. I'll use Preact in the next projects.

I feel embarrassed when some of the great back end / system programmers I work with have to go in the front end code base and write React. They can submit patches to linux source like it's nothing but understanding React is just too hard for them.

React is fine, but what is going on with RTK? So. Much. Boilerplate.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#67

Post by baobabKoodaa »

sunaurus wrote: post #61
throwaway220033 wrote: post #18

The goal behind "hooks" was to make React simpler for beginners. I build client-side apps since 2007, and React is getting too magical and complex for even for me. The NextJS influence is really making things worse, "use server" "use client" tags do not scale at all. The project clearly lacks mission, goal, leadership and direction. I'll use Preact in the next projects.

I've seen this criticism several times on HN, but have never been able to relate to it. I've been using hooks since they were introduced, in several teams (at several different companies), and I've never experienced them being complicated to understand, either for myself, or for team mates - even juniors who are new to React. In my experience, it takes very little time ( I wonder if it's the case that many people on…

> I wonder if it's the case that many people on HN are just used to some completely different libraries and thus are coming in to React with a completely different mental model? And that's the cause of this sentiment being so common here.

Nope. For me React was the first frontend framework I learned. The mental model of Class components was really easy to understand. I have since "learned" hooks, but they are a constant source of mental exertion for me, and it's very easy to make mistakes. Kind of like all the other "improvements" that they brought to React since Class components.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#68

Post by ActionHank »

sunaurus wrote: post #61
throwaway220033 wrote: post #18

The goal behind "hooks" was to make React simpler for beginners. I build client-side apps since 2007, and React is getting too magical and complex for even for me. The NextJS influence is really making things worse, "use server" "use client" tags do not scale at all. The project clearly lacks mission, goal, leadership and direction. I'll use Preact in the next projects.

I've seen this criticism several times on HN, but have never been able to relate to it. I've been using hooks since they were introduced, in several teams (at several different companies), and I've never experienced them being complicated to understand, either for myself, or for team mates - even juniors who are new to React. In my experience, it takes very little time ( I wonder if it's the case that many people on…

I've worked on some pretty complex client side code and frankly react hooks are meh at best.

There is a very strong implication in the docs and even the overall solution of hooks to ignore the details and just "go with it".

Just do it™ our way™ because reasons™

Generally not healthy for building the level of understanding it takes to debug complex react code.

Also I deeply on a spiritual level detest the way that it very strongly incentivizes pushing business logic to the view layer.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#69

Post by colonelpopcorn »

_heimdall wrote: post #34
technion wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you look at their incentives differently, i would argue they doing well with their goals. Every "use server" is another vercel customer. Every preact user finds it harder to claim they are using react when apis showing up in react canary and being documented for nextjs don't exist for them.

React isn't a Vercel product though, and server components are a react feature rather than a NextJS feature. With regards to incentives, these newer react features only meet their goals if the goal is to use react the open source project as a funnel for Vercel, the for profit hosting company.

Most of the core React devs are employees at Vercel. As much as you may not like it, core parts of React are driven by Vercel 's business model.

Re: React Labs: What We've Been Working On – February 2024

#70

Post by gardnr »

martpie wrote: post #56

Lots of valid points about the increase in complexity for React over the years, and that one should pick another more modern tech stack (Svelte, Solid, html, whatever), and I used to be thinking like that But since maybe 1-2 years, I am back and betting on React for most of my serious projects (for the ecosystem, the ease of hiring, etc), but the most important point is the following: React backwards compatibility is…

So, your team upgraded to React 18 without having to rewrite anything?
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