frontpage.
newsnewestaskshowjobs

Made with ♥ by @iamnishanth

Open Source @Github

fp.

Open in hackernews

The Business Case for Vanilla JavaScript

https://lewiscampbell.tech/blog/250430.html
6•LAC-Tech•7mo ago

Comments

copypaper•7mo 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•7mo ago
What benefits of a framework?

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

proc0•7mo 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•7mo 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•7mo 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•7mo 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•7mo 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.

Supra Aeon Story with Agda Proof and Provisional Appendix

https://github.com/GoodRoyal/SupraAeonAgdaStory-Patent
2•IndigoBlack•4m ago•0 comments

Auto optimization of Claude.md with prompt learning

https://arize.com/blog/claude-md-best-practices-learned-from-optimizing-claude-code-with-prompt-l...
2•SteveMorin•5m ago•0 comments

It appears Meta may be ready to put the metaverse out of its misery

https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/04/business/meta-metaverse-stock-nightcap
4•methuselah_in•10m ago•1 comments

Thought Experiment: Measuring the Circumference of the Earth from a Bedroom

3•richardjennings•13m ago•1 comments

Nvidia CUDA Tile

https://developer.nvidia.com/cuda/tile
1•apples2apples•13m ago•0 comments

Cloudflare says it has fended off 416B AI bot scrape requests in 5 months

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/big-tech/cloudflare-says-it-has-fended-off-416-billion...
4•ghssds•15m ago•0 comments

Phones might get pricier next year. Thank the AI boom

https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/05/tech/memory-shortage-phone-computer-prices
4•Bender•15m ago•0 comments

SteamOS vs. Windows on dedicated GPUs: It's complicated, but Windows has an edge

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/12/steamos-vs-windows-on-dedicated-gpus-its-complicated-but-...
1•Bender•17m ago•0 comments

The NPU in your phone keeps improving–why isn't that making AI better?

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/12/the-npu-in-your-phone-keeps-improving-why-isnt-that-makin...
2•Bender•17m ago•0 comments

Nonprofits on HCB

https://hackclub.com/fiscal-sponsorship/directory/
1•nullbyte808•20m ago•0 comments

Oldest attestation of Austronesian language: Đông Yên Châu inscription

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%90%C3%B4ng_Y%C3%AAn_Ch%C3%A2u_inscription
1•teleforce•23m ago•0 comments

Please recommend CRM for small hardware startup

2•dmytroKh•23m ago•0 comments

The future of advertising and cinema is under threat, decline feels inevitable

https://thesocialjuice.substack.com/p/the-future-of-advertising-and-cinema
1•lazymentors•24m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Tacocopter – My Custom Flight Controller Programmed in Rust

https://github.com/njfdev/tacocopter
1•njfdev•24m ago•0 comments

Cloudflare Outage: Rust Analysis

https://www.splinter.com.au/2025/12/05/cloudflare-rust-analysis/
1•ank•26m ago•0 comments

LanguageTool browser extension is no longer free

https://languagetool.org/webextension/premium-announcement
1•XCSme•26m ago•1 comments

Corpus of the Inscriptions of Campā (Champa)

https://isaw.nyu.edu/publications/inscriptions/campa/inscriptions/index.html
1•teleforce•30m ago•0 comments

The best predictors of AI use across studies were aversive personality traits

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40977447/
1•ColinWright•30m ago•1 comments

Sword swallowing and its side effects (2006)

https://www.bmj.com/content/333/7582/1285
1•bookofjoe•31m ago•0 comments

Gel (ex EdgeDB) shutting down, team joins Vercel

https://www.geldata.com/blog/gel-joins-vercel
2•divan•34m ago•0 comments

Today is my 40th birthday

https://johnathannader.com/today-my-40th-birthday/
2•nadermx•37m ago•0 comments

You're probably using the wrong dictionary

https://jsomers.net/blog/dictionary
1•ohjeez•38m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Spotify-style Wrapped for Your Claude/ChatGPT History

https://aiwrapped.co/
1•venkatakshay98•38m ago•1 comments

Frank Gehry, the Disrupter, Opened Their Imaginations

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/arts/design/frank-gehry-appraisal-disney-hall-bilbao-los-angel...
1•mitchbob•39m ago•1 comments

Kicking Robots – Humanoids and the Tech­ Industry Hype Machine

https://harpers.org/archive/2025/12/kicking-robots-james-vincent-humanoids/
1•andrewl•40m ago•0 comments

Champa translations shed light on origins (2012)

https://vietnamnet.vn/en/champa-translations-shed-light-on-origins-E54702.html
1•teleforce•42m ago•0 comments

The days are long but the decades are short

https://blog.samaltman.com/the-days-are-long-but-the-decades-are-short
2•bootlegbilly•45m ago•0 comments

Google 'Looking into' Gmail Hack Locking Users Out with No Recovery

https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2025/12/05/google-looking-into-gmail-hack-locking-users-...
9•lawlessone•46m ago•0 comments

The "Agentic AI" Trade Is Stalling

https://riskparody.substack.com/p/the-agentic-ai-trade-is-stalling
4•chrislguo•46m ago•0 comments

The evidence is in: there is no language instinct

https://aeon.co/essays/the-evidence-is-in-there-is-no-language-instinct
4•bookofjoe•54m ago•0 comments