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Less Htmx Is More

(unplannedobsolescence.com)
169 points fanf2 | 4 comments | 08 Apr 25 08:42 UTC | HN request time: 0.969s | source
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throw10920 ◴[08 Apr 25 11:18 UTC] No.43620387[source]▶
While I get the emotional appeal, I still don't understand the use-case for htmx. If you're making a completely static page, you just use HTML. If you're making a dynamic page, then you want to push as much logic to the client as possible because far more users are latency-limited than compute-limited (compare [1] vs [2]), so you use normal frontend technologies. Mixing htmx and traditional frontend tech seems like it'd result in extra unnecessary complexity. What's the target audience?

Edit: "Normal/traditional frontend" here means both vanilla (HTML+JS+CSS) and the most popular frameworks (React, Angular, Vue, Next).

[1] https://danluu.com/slow-device/

[2] https://danluu.com/web-bloat/

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1. fulafel ◴[08 Apr 25 11:55 UTC] No.43620624[source]▶
> If you're making a dynamic page, then you want to push as much logic to the client as possible because far more users are latency-limited than compute-limited

This implies you value optimization over other concerns, will do ssr & rehydration, etc.

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2. mamcx ◴[08 Apr 25 12:52 UTC] No.43621176[source]▶
I work with user in far location, bad internet signal, and terrible low-end androids.

Htmx has been the best performant of all my tries before.

HTML is fast. (also, I use svg everywhere I can)

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3. skydhash ◴[08 Apr 25 13:13 UTC] No.43621435[source]▶
Also, you can have a whole book with half of MB of html. So loading 2+ MB of JS, then a good amount of json, especially with high latency connection is not better than just loading the html with all the data baked in.
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4. mamcx ◴[08 Apr 25 13:34 UTC] No.43621613{3}[source]▶
Correct. Also, because I output all the formatting and do the processing/filtering/joining on the server, a lot of data is removed before get into the client.

This is the most beneficial thing related to perf.

I don't yet render fragments (only return full pages) so Is there a lot of potential for a speed up untaped...