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As the old man screaming at the cloud, about the insane complexity of modern JavaScript frameworks, who hasn't done much with them and kind hates the experience

As the old man screaming at the cloud, about the insane complexity of modern JavaScript frameworks, who hasn't done much with them and kind hates the experience of dealing with them at all, I hope you are right. Can I still use my basic HTML knowledge and be productive? I've instead just given up doing any frontend work because I don't want to spend my time in React. Give me something simple, concrete, and understandable like an advanced algorithms textbook, and I'll go to town. Reading user guides or documentation of Typescript/Javascript frameworks feels impossibly hard in comparison.

ecshafer 2y ago
Working with Turbo and Stimulus with Rails is such a breath of fresh air for me for this reason. Sure its not just writing HTML, but its such a vastly simpler framework for creating a responsive web page than React, Vue, Angular, etc. I don't know how React and the like became the de jour of Web development, its quite a complicated beast. I am partial to DHH's interpretation it was off of zero interest rates and free money.
- dzonga 2y ago
  this is key, working with rails and stimulus - you get to escape the nonsense. but we also have to admit reality - it's easier to pay *rent with react and friends than with other full-stack frameworks. well it used to be and still is till interest rates went up.
hnthrow90348765 2y ago
I can't think of any job postings I've seen recently that only wanted straight-forward web development. Everything was asking for a major framework + other supporting libraries for the front end. I'm only 40 and also screaming at the clouds, but I simply don't have the luxury of ignoring some of the larger things like React that gave me a job today. This is the market pressure which is driving things towards more abstraction. Another iteration will add more abstraction on top of that. I'm fairly certain it can't be stopped now. Doing so would mean convincing tech leadership to start actively managing what technologies go into their products and striving for a "less is more" or minimalism approach.
- epistasis 2y ago
  I'm in the fortunate position of not needing to care much what people are hiring for. Instead I'm more interested in what can I create, and to a lesser extent what sort of team could be scaled on the technology. One of the projects I'm currently contributing to is a massive web app that's nearing 30 years old, all written with a C core and served over CGI in Apache, from an age when C was necessary to process the amount of data that was getting processed per request... I do think there are somewhat perverse incentives in the job market to be up to date on the latest trend in order to maximize the ability to hop onto the most in demand platform. Which makes sense from the developer perspective! But then it also means that devs and even management feel pressure to churn the tech stack on existing working code continuously, to keep abreast of the changes. There's a lot of devs that don't want to be considered stuck on an "old", e.g. PHP, stack, and sometimes management wants to be hiring the devs that are trying the hardest. So to me it feels like a lot of change for changes sake, or in other words the design space of web languages are being fully explored at a great pace, using real world projects. I don't think it's technically incorrect or wrong, but it is probably just a "not for me" part of the ever expanding tech world.
  - fragmede 2y ago
    PHP just released version 8.4.2 today, so if that's your ball of wax, and you're working on your own projects, have at it. I wrote some PHP earlier this year for this one project. React pulls together a bunch of language features so that writing full blown apps in html, css, and JavaScript is less of a multi-level, multi-language templated nightmare for the developer who's writing it. Facebook was built on PHP so it's possible to build a fully featured web app using PHP and JavaScript, but that's also that's where React came from. React isn't just change for changes sake. PHP and hand rolled JavaScript can take you where you want to go, but getting there with React is just a bit more comfortable because it isn't a pile of templates with two languages you have to keep in your head simultaneously, and you can more easily debug it. For the cost of learning new ways of doing things, there's inheritance and composability. it's far from perfect, but, imo, it got popular because of how much easier it is to wrap your head around a pile of react components than it is a pile of php templates and its attached pile of JavaScript.
MatejKafka 2y ago
Yes, if looking at the right places. :) https://help.kagi.com/kagi/company/hiring-kagi.html https://help.kagi.com/kagi/company/hiring-kagi.html """ Core Front-end Team (we are currently full, check back later) - Passion for creating delightful and swift user interfaces. - Proficiency in HTML, CSS, and an understanding that JavaScript can be used sparingly to enhance, not create, product experiences. - You are comfortable not using any FE frameworks, and rather like to be in full control of the DOM and as close to browser as possible. Fun fact: At Kagi, we prioritize speed, to the point where all functionalities of Kagi Search (except Stripe checkout and Maps) work perfectly without JavaScript. We see JavaScript as a tool to enhance the UX, not create it. """
- nunez 2y ago
  Damn; another reason Kagi rocks. No JS needed!
  - no_wizard 2y ago
    Unless you use maps or stripe checkout

ecshafer 2y ago

Working with Turbo and Stimulus with Rails is such a breath of fresh air for me for this reason. Sure its not just writing HTML, but its such a vastly simpler framework for creating a responsive web page than React, Vue, Angular, etc. I don't know how React and the like became the de jour of Web development, its quite a complicated beast. I am partial to DHH's interpretation it was off of zero interest rates and free money.

dzonga 2y ago
this is key, working with rails and stimulus - you get to escape the nonsense. but we also have to admit reality - it's easier to pay *rent with react and friends than with other full-stack frameworks. well it used to be and still is till interest rates went up.

hnthrow90348765 2y ago

I can't think of any job postings I've seen recently that only wanted straight-forward web development. Everything was asking for a major framework + other supporting libraries for the front end. I'm only 40 and also screaming at the clouds, but I simply don't have the luxury of ignoring some of the larger things like React that gave me a job today. This is the market pressure which is driving things towards more abstraction. Another iteration will add more abstraction on top of that. I'm fairly certain it can't be stopped now. Doing so would mean convincing tech leadership to start actively managing what technologies go into their products and striving for a "less is more" or minimalism approach.

epistasis 2y ago
I'm in the fortunate position of not needing to care much what people are hiring for. Instead I'm more interested in what can I create, and to a lesser extent what sort of team could be scaled on the technology. One of the projects I'm currently contributing to is a massive web app that's nearing 30 years old, all written with a C core and served over CGI in Apache, from an age when C was necessary to process the amount of data that was getting processed per request... I do think there are somewhat perverse incentives in the job market to be up to date on the latest trend in order to maximize the ability to hop onto the most in demand platform. Which makes sense from the developer perspective! But then it also means that devs and even management feel pressure to churn the tech stack on existing working code continuously, to keep abreast of the changes. There's a lot of devs that don't want to be considered stuck on an "old", e.g. PHP, stack, and sometimes management wants to be hiring the devs that are trying the hardest. So to me it feels like a lot of change for changes sake, or in other words the design space of web languages are being fully explored at a great pace, using real world projects. I don't think it's technically incorrect or wrong, but it is probably just a "not for me" part of the ever expanding tech world.
- fragmede 2y ago
  PHP just released version 8.4.2 today, so if that's your ball of wax, and you're working on your own projects, have at it. I wrote some PHP earlier this year for this one project. React pulls together a bunch of language features so that writing full blown apps in html, css, and JavaScript is less of a multi-level, multi-language templated nightmare for the developer who's writing it. Facebook was built on PHP so it's possible to build a fully featured web app using PHP and JavaScript, but that's also that's where React came from. React isn't just change for changes sake. PHP and hand rolled JavaScript can take you where you want to go, but getting there with React is just a bit more comfortable because it isn't a pile of templates with two languages you have to keep in your head simultaneously, and you can more easily debug it. For the cost of learning new ways of doing things, there's inheritance and composability. it's far from perfect, but, imo, it got popular because of how much easier it is to wrap your head around a pile of react components than it is a pile of php templates and its attached pile of JavaScript.

MatejKafka 2y ago

Yes, if looking at the right places. :) https://help.kagi.com/kagi/company/hiring-kagi.html https://help.kagi.com/kagi/company/hiring-kagi.html """ Core Front-end Team (we are currently full, check back later) - Passion for creating delightful and swift user interfaces. - Proficiency in HTML, CSS, and an understanding that JavaScript can be used sparingly to enhance, not create, product experiences. - You are comfortable not using any FE frameworks, and rather like to be in full control of the DOM and as close to browser as possible. Fun fact: At Kagi, we prioritize speed, to the point where all functionalities of Kagi Search (except Stripe checkout and Maps) work perfectly without JavaScript. We see JavaScript as a tool to enhance the UX, not create it. """

nunez 2y ago
Damn; another reason Kagi rocks. No JS needed!
- no_wizard 2y ago
  Unless you use maps or stripe checkout