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There is a very intense backlash against technology like React, due to the unbelievable complexity that has crept into building “modern” JS apps. This backlash

There is a very intense backlash against technology like React, due to the unbelievable complexity that has crept into building “modern” JS apps. This backlash is quite understandable. I believe Ember/React/Vue/Angular/etc. were all created with good intentions, but with the ecosystems of bolted-on technologies and now-necessary build tools, they have all become unmanageable monstrosities. So people want to go “back to basics”. Personally, while I loved Ember with CoffeeScript (talking to a Django server via JSON) in 2015-2017, I can’t even revive the app I built without a massive effort to upgrade and ditch all the deprecated, unsupported dependencies (which might take more time than modifying my actual app code). So I’m just going to rewrite the Web client with htmx (with Django rendering the actual templates). No churn and dependency hell, no build tools, no nonsense. Just a single script tag and some HTML attributes. For special cases that can’t be covered by htmx, there’s hyperscript (just add another script tag). Since browsers intend to maintain backward compatibility indefinitely, forced upgrades should be minimal to non-existent. It’s a shame JS ended up being perceived as a villain, because it was meant to enable rich client applications within browsers, which are the most universally-compatible and commodified client you can possibly run such apps in.

toddmorey 3y ago
For those who are primarily javascript developers who want to go back to the basics, Astro.build is very nice. Ships plain HTML pages by default. Easy to progressively enhance with client-side interactivity if and where you'd like. And for the client-side stuff, you get to pick how to tackle it: plain javascript, htmx, web components, react, vue, svelte, qwik... all enjoy first class support.
- ralmidani 3y ago
  Astro needs a better elevator pitch. I spent several minutes on the site, clicking and scrolling, but sample code was minimal and not easy to find. This is not effective marketing in 2023. If a developer has no idea what developing with your tech stack feels like after ~60 seconds, more times than not that developer will leave. Sorry, Astro sounds cool conceptually, but in this case I think brutally honest feedback is warranted. For what it’s worth, I also think Django needs a better elevator pitch, but Django captured me in 2010. I might try pushing for a home page improvement. Django does have tenure and mindshare working in its favor, though.

toddmorey 3y ago

For those who are primarily javascript developers who want to go back to the basics, Astro.build is very nice. Ships plain HTML pages by default. Easy to progressively enhance with client-side interactivity if and where you'd like. And for the client-side stuff, you get to pick how to tackle it: plain javascript, htmx, web components, react, vue, svelte, qwik... all enjoy first class support.

ralmidani 3y ago
Astro needs a better elevator pitch. I spent several minutes on the site, clicking and scrolling, but sample code was minimal and not easy to find. This is not effective marketing in 2023. If a developer has no idea what developing with your tech stack feels like after ~60 seconds, more times than not that developer will leave. Sorry, Astro sounds cool conceptually, but in this case I think brutally honest feedback is warranted. For what it’s worth, I also think Django needs a better elevator pitch, but Django captured me in 2010. I might try pushing for a home page improvement. Django does have tenure and mindshare working in its favor, though.