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The Business Case for Vanilla JavaScript

https://lewiscampbell.tech/blog/250430.html
6•LAC-Tech•6mo ago

Comments

copypaper•6mo ago
I would personally never touch a frontend not written with a framework. Sounds like a terrible developer experience--especially with a team. But from reading your article, it sounds like your issue is with React itself. I would recommend you try Svelte, it sounds like what you're looking for. It's as close to vanilla js as you can get with all the benefits of a framework.
LAC-Tech•6mo ago
What benefits of a framework?

I think that's why I wrote this - I almost completely fail to see them.

proc0•6mo ago
I think React caved in to wider adoption pressure to introduce abstractions that are intuitive on the surface level but are costly in terms of large scale complexity.

> It's "declarative" right up until you're debugging stateful hooks, or resorting to useRef, or trying to reason about when a "component" re-renders

Maybe they should have modularized the core library more and have these things be separate, because the core idea of a uniflow pattern with reactivity is good.

I think what happened, at least in frontend, is that the industry pushed away from having engineers do any design or architecting on the frontend. All of these high level patterns have been "outsourced" to frameworks, and the result usually is something that has trouble scaling and adjusting to whatever domain it's in.

LAC-Tech•6mo ago
Maybe they should have modularized the core library more and have these things be separate, because the core idea of a uniflow pattern with reactivity is good.

That's what SolidJS does. IE the signal implementation is completely stand alone. I feel like it's better at doing what react purports to do then react is.

* think what happened, at least in frontend, is that the industry pushed away from having engineers do any design or architecting on the frontend. All of these high level patterns have been "outsourced" to frameworks*

I don't think react patterns are particularly high level, or do they save you from architecture. Whether it's vanilla JS or react, you still have to design.

proc0•6mo ago
Oh I haven't looked at Solidjs yet, interesting will take a look. And yeah you may still need to design your application, but having hooks be something that is out-of-the-box pushes you into certain patterns and needs to be actively ignored to avoid its design influence. I've worked in large codebases where they make almost everything into hooks, and they start getting ridiculous, breaking composability but at the same time giving the illusion that you are making your code more modular.
GianFabien•6mo ago
I write web front-ends for industrial embedded systems. So my experience might differ from business WebApps.

In my experience it requires a longer learning curve for the various frameworks than to simply learn the relevant Web API. My learning is very much JIT and over time I have built up a robust class library that gets my stuff done. When I get stuck ChatGPT suggests fixes that sometimes work and spare me from losing more hair.

LAC-Tech•6mo ago
My experience too - part of what I found is how much about how react worked I'd forgotten. But the browser itself was easier to pick up.

Show HN: SynthonGPT – Drug Discovery LLM with 0% Hallucinations

https://synthongpt.mireklzicar.com/
1•mireklzicar•28s ago•0 comments

Most of the Dark Web is Fake [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KzObeom88Y
1•fortran77•2m ago•0 comments

Donald Trump privately invested in companies that benefit from his policies [pdf]

https://extapps2.oge.gov/201/Presiden.nsf/PAS+Index/4EC9A8E6DD078F2985258CA9002C9377/$FILE/Trump%...
3•doener•4m ago•1 comments

6 years after too much crypto

https://bfswa.substack.com/p/6-years-after-too-much-crypto
1•oconnor663•4m ago•0 comments

Apple Unveils iOS 26.2 Beta 3 with Enhanced Features

https://techlife.blog/posts/apple-releases-ios-26-2-beta-3-for-iphone/
1•clarkmaxwell•5m ago•0 comments

Global internet freedom declined for the 15th consecutive year

https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/2025/uncertain-future-global-internet
1•pseudolus•8m ago•0 comments

China proposes 5-second 0-100 km/h acceleration limit on vehicles

https://carnewschina.com/2025/11/13/china-proposes-5-second-0-100-km-h-acceleration-limit-on-vehi...
2•doener•8m ago•0 comments

Bangladesh's ousted PM Sheikh Hasina sentenced to death for protest crackdown

https://www.npr.org/2025/11/17/g-s1-98112/bangladesh-sheikh-hasina-verdict
2•donsupreme•9m ago•0 comments

Jeff Bezos takes co-CEO role at secretive AI startup Project Prometheus

https://www.geekwire.com/2025/jeff-bezos-takes-co-ceo-role-at-secretive-ai-startup-project-promet...
2•johanam•10m ago•1 comments

Building Startups

1•Zachabdelilah•11m ago•0 comments

Private Markets Are the New Securities Fraud

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/newsletters/2025-11-17/private-markets-are-the-new-securities-f...
3•ioblomov•13m ago•1 comments

Ask HN: What part of your work do you present?

1•benry1•16m ago•1 comments

Paywall as a Service

1•gethly•17m ago•0 comments

AI Use in 'Call of Duty: Black Ops 7' Draws Fire from US Lawmaker

https://www.pcmag.com/news/ai-use-in-call-of-duty-black-ops-7-draws-fire-from-us-lawmaker
1•pseudolus•17m ago•0 comments

Embedding Model Leaderboard

https://agentset.ai/embeddings
1•tifa2up•18m ago•0 comments

Ioema: Germany to be reconnected via subsea cable

https://www.heise.de/en/news/IOEMA-Germany-to-be-reconnected-via-subsea-cable-11080868.html
4•i-con•18m ago•0 comments

A Chinese AI model taught itself basic physics – what discoveries could it make?

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03659-4
1•eagleislandsong•19m ago•0 comments

Engineers Must Become Multipliers in the AI-Era

https://newsletter.eng-leadership.com/p/why-engineers-must-become-multipliers
1•rbanffy•19m ago•0 comments

The DIY FOSS Cyborg

https://dustycloud.org/blog/the-diy-foss-cyborg/
1•mghackerlady•19m ago•0 comments

IRA Velinsky, industrial designer for Commodore and Atari

https://dfarq.homeip.net/ira-velinsky-industrial-designer-of-the-commodore-64/
1•rbanffy•19m ago•0 comments

Implementing Rust newtype for errors in axum

https://rup12.net/posts/learning-rust-custom-errors/
1•ruptwelve•20m ago•0 comments

Amazon driver may soon deliver with these smart glasses on

https://www.zdnet.com/article/your-amazon-driver-may-soon-deliver-with-these-smart-glasses-on-why...
2•fcpguru•22m ago•2 comments

Strengthening KernelCI: New architecture, storage, and integrations

https://www.collabora.com/news-and-blog/blog/2025/11/17/strengthening-kernelci-new-architecture-s...
2•losgehts•23m ago•0 comments

FMC gets FERAM cash to kill Optane's ghost

https://blocksandfiles.com/2025/11/14/fmc-gets-feram-cash-to-kill-optanes-ghost/
3•rbanffy•26m ago•0 comments

Sun-dried and sustainable, Japan's persimmon dye lives on

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2025/11/01/style-design/persimmon-dyeing-textiles-shiga-crafts/
1•PaulHoule•26m ago•0 comments

An Anti-License Manifesto (2021)

https://www.boringcactus.com/2021/09/29/anti-license-manifesto.html
1•cprecioso•27m ago•1 comments

Developer made one wrong click and sent his AWS bill into the stratosphere

https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/17/who_me/
4•fcpguru•28m ago•2 comments

How might a leveraged perpetual-style model impact prediction market efficiency?

1•prophex•29m ago•0 comments

TSA PreCheck Touchless ID

https://www.tsa.gov/touchless-id
2•toomuchtodo•29m ago•0 comments

Remote MCP Catalog

https://mcp-catalog.com/
2•ronkrasn•29m ago•0 comments