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Posted on Dec 1, 2023

When will we stop rewriting frontend?

#webdev #javascript #discuss #tooling

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Top comments (17)

Charles F. Munat • Dec 2 '23

I have already stopped. I gave up on all front-end frameworks, removed all front-end dependencies, and have written my most recent sites/apps in vanilla JS/CSS/HTML. Created my own component library all vanilla bundled with Astro.

None of it will need to be rewritten for many years, if ever. So I focus on adding to it, not rewriting it.

Jacob W Runge • Dec 2 '23

This is the way. I doubted for a long time, but even my beloved Svelte is starting to show some cracks as time goes on.

I was very tempted by htmx, and I do think it's a good option if you're templating server side, or just providing static files. But it isn't terribly difficult to roll your own solution that fits the project and shirks the bloat.

Jan Peterka • Dec 2 '23

I'm really happy that, even without never getting into frontend frameworks, now I'm able to do great interactive frontend using Hotwire/Turbo (similar to htmx). I feel like a missed the hype train and now I can use what comes after :D

Lev Nahar • Dec 2 '23

This guy has it figured out.

Lars-Erik Bruce • Dec 3 '23

Every frontender should do this at least once, if not only to learn actual HTML, the actual DOM API and actual JavaScript, which comes very handy when debugging obscure bugs when using a fancy framework.

Charles F. Munat • Dec 3 '23

Agreed. But I'd skip the fancy framework part.

Peter Vivo • Dec 2 '23 • Edited

I have a side project (soure as wanabee mmorpg) which was started on stackblitz in react used my graphic maded around 2009. I try to find a functional state management with callbag ( long forgotten functional JS library ) and of course 'pipeline operator' which is my favorite JS solution ... never implemented.

I make a small react npm library:react-troll so I am implemented to it.
Then typescript come in to picture, and I reworked from react-js to react-typscript.
Then NextJs come, and I reworked from react to nextjs and of course have some backend functionality with mongoDB
Then I meet with tailwind and implemented too. This CSS framework is really shining on POC state, even great for plain HTML too.
Then opean.ai come and I implemented a Dalle2 image generation and 2 days smoke up my credits.
Then I write a new typescript oriented react state handling library: react-state-factory already this implementation ongoing ....

... meanwhile AI ages come up, so I figure out how can I improve my lone content creation process, but this isint realized in the codbase, just I have lot of experiment with AI image generation, and even how can use ChatGPT as dungeon master which is immeidatley obsolete this progam, but I will continue.

... the next framework which is interested is: qwik maybe I replace nextjs with that. qwik is very promising and I created a small example compared to react, it is really preformant solution with so much lovely details.

Igsem • Dec 3 '23 • Edited

maintaining your own pure JS library is for people who have enough money and time considering how fast the JS world moves, how fast things change in the browser api..hmmm yes its possible but for a very limited use cases only ..or until you need something else than a button :)

Kaamkiya • Dec 1 '23 • Edited

I don't think we'll ever sop rewriting frontend. Too many technologies that keep showing up and being attractive to people. People talk of tutorial hell, but they don't realize that they keep rewriting the same thing in different ways all the time. 🤦

amiceli • Dec 2 '23

Follow Dependency inversion is a good way for me. I split components (web components) and domain (pure TS). My projects with Vue (2 and 3), Svelte or other framework use it without dependencies.
@chasm Astro is really a good option <3 , for me, it allows us to be less dependent to a framework for maintaining a project.

Charles F. Munat • Dec 2 '23

Yes. And Astro lets you use React, Vue, Svelte, Solid, etc. in combination if you like. I have no need for them, but it's nice that the option is there just in case.

Dusan Petkovic • Dec 4 '23

Just pick a framework that's has been maintained by some years and has active community and preferably its backed by a large tech company so, atm:

React, Vue, Angular

Pure JS for a web application I don't think makes sense, as you would need to do a lot of manual labor to do things that have already been done, maybe for some use cases web components make sense, where you don't want dependencies..