6 ms·

I feel like these problems are endemic to React and the surrounding ecosystem. Since its introduction in late 2016 Angular 2+ has had no major changes on the s

by Tade0 6y ago

I feel like these problems are endemic to React and the surrounding ecosystem. Since its introduction in late 2016 Angular 2+ has had no major changes on the scale of hooks and is unlikely to introduce them, because its target audience - large companies making large-scale applications is fairly conservative. Vue I think had one measurably large syntax shift around v2.5(or 2.6) and will have another one with 3.0, but that's about it. Meanwhile in React every year there's this new convention that isn't explicitly mandatory, but for some reason "cooler" than the previous one. All this won't matter once the next gen compiler-frameworks reach maturity. My take is that hooks are React's swan song.

alharith 6y ago
React is 8 years old. It's went through 3 major shifts: From react.CreateClass({}) style, to Class-based components, to now Hooks. In between, it's always embraced and tried to allow the community to adopt a more functional way of programming (Honestly, my personal take is embracing the classical-OO style is what made a lot of this "churny" feeling). But honestly, that's not really that much in 8 years. I think what we are observing is the sheer popularity of React, and how much content is out there, that it feels like every week someone is picking up from some point in the timeline, and it all gets resurfaced and refreshed in people's minds. But those of us who have been here from the beginning would probably say all the improvements have been positive. Really what has changed rapidly, especially in the past 2-3 years, is the underlying web technologies. I am finding that hard to keep up with.
thanatropism 6y ago
As an outsider, I feel like React both does too much (a virtual DOM? Aren't current web standards enough to make a flower shop website?) and too little -- there's all these terms/technologies/subframeworks that people are using like "create-react-app" and "Redux" and so on. It's neither an overarching architecture that makes normal web technology obsolete but runs on it, like Windows 95, nor a website generator like Wordpress. Web tech confuses me thoroughly, and I read HN all day.
- quxbar 6y ago
  > As an outsider, I feel like the Model-T does too much (an internal combustion engine? Aren't current horses enough to carry our wagons?) If you don't need a virtual DOM, nobody will judge you for not having one. But once you really feel 'behind the wheel' of a framework like react or vue, it's hard to go back. Not only is it easier to hack out something quick over a weekend, it's also more suitable for collaborating large, complex applications.
- MaxBarraclough 6y ago
  > a virtual DOM? Aren't current web standards enough to make a flower shop website? Of today's frameworks, all but Svelte use a virtual DOM.
  - jcbrand 6y ago
    Not true. litElement (used by Polymer) uses tagged template literals and no vdom.
    - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
      You're right, LitElement and Polymer don't use a VDOM. [0][1] I don't think Polymer 3 uses LitElement though. Seems to say they're highly compatible, but that Polymer 3 uses PolymerElement, not LitElement. [2] [0] https://lit-html.polymer-project.org/ https://lit-html.polymer-project.org/ [1] https://www.infoq.com/news/2019/06/polymer-lit-html-element-release/ https://www.infoq.com/news/2019/06/polymer-lit-html-element-... [2] https://github.com/Polymer/polymer https://github.com/Polymer/polymer
      - spankalee 6y ago
        Polymer 3 and LitElement are separate projects by the same team. LitElement is the successor to Polymer 3. It would have been named Polymer 4, but it's quite different. They're highly compatible because they are both web components-based. There's no "framework" that creates component instances, the browser does that when it sees the custom elements. So each component is in control of its own lifecycle and rendering. You can have a Polymer element use LitElements (or Stencil, or Lightening, etc) or vice-versa.
mark_and_sweep 6y ago
> Since its introduction in late 2016 Angular 2+ has had no major changes As someone who has used Angular 2 since beta, I can tell you, it's been a bumpy ride nonetheless. > its target audience - large companies making large-scale applications - is fairly conservative React was built for Facebook, which is a large company building a large-scale application. > All this won't matter once the next gen compiler-frameworks reach maturity. And here I am using HTML and CSS with tiny sprinkles of JS for most websites, and it's working just fine, and has been for many years. Personally, I hope that server-side rendering will be the new ~old~ trend.
- Tade0 6y ago
  > As someone who has used Angular 2 since beta, I can tell you, it's been a bumpy ride nonetheless. Oh yeah. I remember the "let's just apply the good parts of AngularJS here and there" in v4-6. "React was built for Facebook, which is a large company building a large-scale application." One large scale application, which is not enough to create stable conventions that are badly needed in a framework that's supposed to be used in multiple such projects done by very different organisations. Personally, I hope that server-side rendering will be the new ~old~ trend. Users don't tolerate the inherent delays caused by this approach anymore. All those hoops current frameworks are jumping through so that we can eat the cake and have it too are there because of this.
  - yxhuvud 6y ago
    > Users don't tolerate the inherent delays caused by this approach anymore. Well, I certainly also do not tolerate the delays in contemporary React sites either. Take Reddit for example, which used to be lightning fast when it was mostly serverside, which now is painfully slow, especially on mobile.
    - tfleming 6y ago
      Yep, I agree. Was just talking to my wife about Reddit. It's so slow now, especially on mobile. The page constantly crashes on my Android phone and they always recommend the app. No thanks.

by Tade0 6y ago

alharith 6y ago

React is 8 years old. It's went through 3 major shifts: From react.CreateClass({}) style, to Class-based components, to now Hooks. In between, it's always embraced and tried to allow the community to adopt a more functional way of programming (Honestly, my personal take is embracing the classical-OO style is what made a lot of this "churny" feeling). But honestly, that's not really that much in 8 years. I think what we are observing is the sheer popularity of React, and how much content is out there, that it feels like every week someone is picking up from some point in the timeline, and it all gets resurfaced and refreshed in people's minds. But those of us who have been here from the beginning would probably say all the improvements have been positive. Really what has changed rapidly, especially in the past 2-3 years, is the underlying web technologies. I am finding that hard to keep up with.

thanatropism 6y ago

As an outsider, I feel like React both does too much (a virtual DOM? Aren't current web standards enough to make a flower shop website?) and too little -- there's all these terms/technologies/subframeworks that people are using like "create-react-app" and "Redux" and so on. It's neither an overarching architecture that makes normal web technology obsolete but runs on it, like Windows 95, nor a website generator like Wordpress. Web tech confuses me thoroughly, and I read HN all day.

quxbar 6y ago
> As an outsider, I feel like the Model-T does too much (an internal combustion engine? Aren't current horses enough to carry our wagons?) If you don't need a virtual DOM, nobody will judge you for not having one. But once you really feel 'behind the wheel' of a framework like react or vue, it's hard to go back. Not only is it easier to hack out something quick over a weekend, it's also more suitable for collaborating large, complex applications.
MaxBarraclough 6y ago
> a virtual DOM? Aren't current web standards enough to make a flower shop website? Of today's frameworks, all but Svelte use a virtual DOM.
- jcbrand 6y ago
  Not true. litElement (used by Polymer) uses tagged template literals and no vdom.
  - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
    You're right, LitElement and Polymer don't use a VDOM. [0][1] I don't think Polymer 3 uses LitElement though. Seems to say they're highly compatible, but that Polymer 3 uses PolymerElement, not LitElement. [2] [0] https://lit-html.polymer-project.org/ https://lit-html.polymer-project.org/ [1] https://www.infoq.com/news/2019/06/polymer-lit-html-element-release/ https://www.infoq.com/news/2019/06/polymer-lit-html-element-... [2] https://github.com/Polymer/polymer https://github.com/Polymer/polymer
    - spankalee 6y ago
      Polymer 3 and LitElement are separate projects by the same team. LitElement is the successor to Polymer 3. It would have been named Polymer 4, but it's quite different. They're highly compatible because they are both web components-based. There's no "framework" that creates component instances, the browser does that when it sees the custom elements. So each component is in control of its own lifecycle and rendering. You can have a Polymer element use LitElements (or Stencil, or Lightening, etc) or vice-versa.

mark_and_sweep 6y ago

> Since its introduction in late 2016 Angular 2+ has had no major changes As someone who has used Angular 2 since beta, I can tell you, it's been a bumpy ride nonetheless. > its target audience - large companies making large-scale applications - is fairly conservative React was built for Facebook, which is a large company building a large-scale application. > All this won't matter once the next gen compiler-frameworks reach maturity. And here I am using HTML and CSS with tiny sprinkles of JS for most websites, and it's working just fine, and has been for many years. Personally, I hope that server-side rendering will be the new ~old~ trend.

Tade0 6y ago
> As someone who has used Angular 2 since beta, I can tell you, it's been a bumpy ride nonetheless. Oh yeah. I remember the "let's just apply the good parts of AngularJS here and there" in v4-6. "React was built for Facebook, which is a large company building a large-scale application." One large scale application, which is not enough to create stable conventions that are badly needed in a framework that's supposed to be used in multiple such projects done by very different organisations. Personally, I hope that server-side rendering will be the new ~old~ trend. Users don't tolerate the inherent delays caused by this approach anymore. All those hoops current frameworks are jumping through so that we can eat the cake and have it too are there because of this.
- yxhuvud 6y ago
  > Users don't tolerate the inherent delays caused by this approach anymore. Well, I certainly also do not tolerate the delays in contemporary React sites either. Take Reddit for example, which used to be lightning fast when it was mostly serverside, which now is painfully slow, especially on mobile.
  - tfleming 6y ago
    Yep, I agree. Was just talking to my wife about Reddit. It's so slow now, especially on mobile. The page constantly crashes on my Android phone and they always recommend the app. No thanks.