> React performance concerns in the real world are typically measured in, at worst, hundreds of milliseconds.
This is not my experience on real react sites. Loading the pages on mobile (say 4G) takes seconds to load with a partially rendered page which is slowly constructed. Loading the equivalent pages in HTML rendered server side would reliably be under 100ms (excluding assets). This is somewhat disguised by better connections and large images taking up, but all that js and json does have a cost.
You're probably trying to talk about the overhead of the framework, but what is the true overhead of a framework which encourages you to introduce bloat and create a separate component file and sometimes a separate network connection for every single component on your web page?
>The second reason the author says is that it’s based on a legacy eventing system which supports IE.
There are lots of horrible bits of react which are based on solving problems which aren't really a problem on the web any more - from manipulating the dom (pretty easy without react) to dealing with IE polyfills, and lots of bits that you really don't need the client to concern itself with (i.e. routing code). You may not care about that code but you are importing it and forcing your users to download it. It all adds to overhead.
There are also a ton of other points in the article which you've elided, which go into the multiple failings of React as a tool, and primary among them is that it encourages you to use react and only react, the ultimate in lock-in.
> Finally, the author doesn’t actually give a prescription as to what to use instead of React.
You want them to choose one framework instead of react, they're explicitly rejecting that choice and saying you don't have to become a follower of react or any other religion, instead they're advocating choosing tools based on the evidence they have presented, so they are IMO presenting a clear choice:
Server side rendering with a bit of js as required to load dynamic data
React or similar frameworks which try to push everything to the client
This is not my experience on real react sites. Loading the pages on mobile (say 4G) takes seconds to load with a partially rendered page which is slowly constructed. Loading the equivalent pages in HTML rendered server side would reliably be under 100ms (excluding assets). This is somewhat disguised by better connections and large images taking up, but all that js and json does have a cost.
You're probably trying to talk about the overhead of the framework, but what is the true overhead of a framework which encourages you to introduce bloat and create a separate component file and sometimes a separate network connection for every single component on your web page?
Here is a real case study with comparison of approaches from this author: https://infrequently.org/2024/08/object-lesson/
>The second reason the author says is that it’s based on a legacy eventing system which supports IE.
There are lots of horrible bits of react which are based on solving problems which aren't really a problem on the web any more - from manipulating the dom (pretty easy without react) to dealing with IE polyfills, and lots of bits that you really don't need the client to concern itself with (i.e. routing code). You may not care about that code but you are importing it and forcing your users to download it. It all adds to overhead.
There are also a ton of other points in the article which you've elided, which go into the multiple failings of React as a tool, and primary among them is that it encourages you to use react and only react, the ultimate in lock-in.
> Finally, the author doesn’t actually give a prescription as to what to use instead of React.
You want them to choose one framework instead of react, they're explicitly rejecting that choice and saying you don't have to become a follower of react or any other religion, instead they're advocating choosing tools based on the evidence they have presented, so they are IMO presenting a clear choice:
Server side rendering with a bit of js as required to load dynamic data
React or similar frameworks which try to push everything to the client