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The Business Case for Vanilla JavaScript

https://lewiscampbell.tech/blog/250430.html
6•LAC-Tech•10mo ago

Comments

copypaper•10mo 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•10mo ago
What benefits of a framework?

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

proc0•10mo 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•10mo 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•10mo 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•10mo 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•10mo 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.

Viruses in the gut may help prevent blood sugar spikes, mouse study hints

https://www.livescience.com/health/immune-system/viruses-in-the-gut-may-help-prevent-blood-sugar-...
1•Brajeshwar•1m ago•0 comments

Little Piggy Went to Trial (and Got Just $200 and No Fees)

https://copyrightlately.com/prepared-food-photos-jaber/
1•speckx•3m ago•0 comments

There are only two paths left for software

https://www.a16z.news/p/there-are-only-two-paths-left-for
1•7777777phil•7m ago•0 comments

Experimenting with Starlette 1.0 with Claude skills

https://simonwillison.net/2026/Mar/22/starlette/
2•TheTaytay•7m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Aerko_ – An offline-first, Vanilla JavaScript fitness PWA with local AI

https://github.com/SrPakura/AERKO_PWA
1•SrPakura•8m ago•1 comments

GrapheneOS won't force users to verify their age

https://twitter.com/GrapheneOS/status/2034957604682621229
1•ianrahman•9m ago•0 comments

UN issues new climate warning as El Niño looms

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c203rdxkezwo
1•blondie9x•10m ago•1 comments

Repairing Programs with AI Agents

https://penberg.org/blog/rp.html
1•penberg•11m ago•0 comments

PostgreSQL 19 will have pg_plan_advice contrib module (query hints)

https://www.depesz.com/2026/03/22/waiting-for-postgresql-19-add-pg_plan_advice-contrib-module/
1•tanelpoder•11m ago•0 comments

If Dspy is so great, why isn't anyone using it?

https://skylarbpayne.com/posts/dspy-engineering-patterns/
3•sbpayne•11m ago•2 comments

VisionClaude – Open-Source AI Vision for iPhone and Meta Ray-Ban Glasses

https://github.com/mrdulasolutions/visionclaude
1•mrdulasolutions•11m ago•0 comments

Meta faces potential billions in fines in trial over children's safety practices

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2026-03-23/meta-faces-potential-billions-in-fines-in-trial...
3•1vuio0pswjnm7•12m ago•1 comments

The Rise of the Ray-Ban Meta Creep

https://www.wired.com/story/the-rise-of-the-ray-ban-meta-creep/
1•sharkweek•12m ago•0 comments

Wizards of Leroy and Wrico Lettering

https://kleinletters.com/Blog/wizards-of-leroy-and-wrico-lettering/
1•speckx•12m ago•0 comments

Show HN: An extension opens any Goodread book on Anna's arc,Z-Lib in one click

https://github.com/NubPlayz/GoodLib-Zlib-Goodreads-extension
1•NubPlayz•14m ago•0 comments

An AI game teaser commented by an AI bot

https://old.reddit.com/r/ArtificialSentience/comments/1ry37s0/im_making_a_game_where_you_play_as_...
1•stared•14m ago•0 comments

Traffic Genius Review: Get 100K+ Traffic Using a Stupidly Simple 7-Minute System

https://websites2know.com/traffic-genius-review/
1•WallaceWalley•14m ago•0 comments

Deliberate Reflection: Meditation to speed up learning and problem-solving

https://www.seanmuirhead.com/blog/deliberate-reflection
1•seany62•14m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Columbo – a CLI that finds forgotten K8s pods using a suspicion score

https://github.com/k-krew/columbo
1•kreicer•17m ago•0 comments

Ask HN: How many of you are profiting with LLM wrapper apps?

1•general_reveal•18m ago•0 comments

The Em Dash Conununundrum

https://skryblans.com/the-em-dash-conununundrum/
1•speckx•19m ago•1 comments

Ask HN: If there has been no prompt injection, is it safe?

1•sayYayToLife•21m ago•0 comments

NASA sets 'impossible' ground rules for relocation of 'flown space vehicle'

https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/23/nasa_rfp_shuttle_relocation/
1•Brajeshwar•21m ago•0 comments

Software engineer who scaled a startup from 10 → 500, seeking early-stage roles

2•vampiregrey•25m ago•0 comments

Agentic AI. Demystified

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQW3vYVqEPk
2•frag•25m ago•0 comments

BIO: The Bao I/O Coprocessor

https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/2026/bio-the-bao-i-o-coprocessor/
1•winkywooster•26m ago•0 comments

FoodPilot – weekly meal planner that pulls in Canada local grocery deals

https://www.foodpilot.ai/index-en.html
1•cedricyul•27m ago•0 comments

Set intersection and difference at the command line

https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2026/03/23/intersection-difference/
1•leephillips•27m ago•0 comments

Study: 'Security Fatigue' May Weaken Digital Defenses

https://www.albany.edu/news-center/news/2026-study-security-fatigue-may-weaken-digital-defenses
2•giuliomagnifico•28m ago•0 comments

RocksDB unit test finds a CPU bug

https://rocksdb.org/blog/2026/02/17/cpu-bug.html
3•shay_ker•28m ago•0 comments