Aaron Parecki
this is a joke right? are people actually doing this?
Chris succinctly describes the multiple-iframe
s-with-multiple-codebases approach to web development, AKA “micro frontends”:
The idea really is that you might build a React app and I build a Vue app and we’ll slap ‘em together on the same page. I definitely come from an era where we laughed-then-winced when we found sites that used multiple versions of jQuery on the same page, plus one thing that loaded all of MooTools and Prototype thrown on there seemingly by accident. We winced because that was a bucket full of JavaScript, mostly duplicated for no reason, causing bugs and slowing down the page. This doesn’t seem all that much different.
this is a joke right? are people actually doing this?
React is no longer winning by technical merit. Today it is winning by default. That default is now slowing innovation across the frontend ecosystem.
Put the kettle on. This is a long one!
Matt takes a trip down memory lane and looks at all the frontend tools, technologies, and techniques that have come and gone over the years.
But this isn’t about nostalgia (although it does make you appreciate how far we’ve come). He’s looking at whether anything from the past is worth keeping today.
Studying past best practices and legacy systems is crucial for understanding the evolution of technology and making informed decisions today.
There’s only one technique that makes the cut:
After discussing countless legacy approaches and techniques best left in the past, you’ve finally arrived at a truly timeless and Incredibly important methodology.
SPAs were a clever solution to a temporary limitation. But that limitation no longer exists.
Use modern server rendering. Use actual pages. Animate with CSS. Preload with intent. Ship less JavaScript.
Semantic HTML? Optional. Server-side rendering? Rebuilt from scratch. Accessibility? Maybe, if there’s time. Performance? Who cares, when you can save costs by putting loading burdens onto the user’s device, instead of your server?
So gradually, the web became something you had to compile before you could publish. Not because users needed it. But because developers wanted it to feel modern.
Everything’s optimised for developers – and hostile to everyone else.
This isn’t accidental. It’s cultural. We’ve created an industry where complexity is celebrated. Where cleverness is rewarded. Where engineering sophistication is valued more than clarity, usability, or commercial effectiveness.
“We’ve stripped React out of our highest-traffic user flows and replaced it with vanilla JavaScript using small, focused libraries for specific needs,” said the CTO of a streaming service. “Our page load times dropped by 60% and our conversion rates improved by 14%.”
The enshittification of React …which was already pretty shitty for users.
Don’t replace. Augment.
A question via email…
Inside me there are two wolves. They’re both JavaScript.
Responses to my thoughts on why developers would trust third-party code more than a native browser feature.