HTMX Sucks

https://htmx.org/essays/htmx-sucks/

If you are comfortable building web apps like the early adopters did in 1999 that later got mainstreamed with Ruby-on-Rails and related frameworks, HTMX adds a wonderful bit of extra interactivity with great ease.

Want to make a dropdown that updates a enumerated field on a record? Easy.

Want to make a modal dialog when users create a new content item? Easy.

Want a search box with autocomplete? Easy.

As I see it the basic problem of RIA front ends is that a piece of data changed and you have to update the front end accordingly. The complexity of this problem ranges from:

(1) One piece of information is updated on the page (Easy)

(2) Multiple pieces of information are updated but it's a static situation where the back end knows what has to be updated (Easy, HTMX can update more than one element at a time)

(3) Multiple pieces of information but it's dynamic (think of a productivity or decision support application which has lots of panes which may or may not be visible, property sheets, etc -- hard)

You do need some adaptations on the back end to really enjoy HTMX, particularly you have to have some answer to the problem that a partial might be drawn as part of a full page or drawn individually [1] and while you're there you might as well have something that makes it easy to update N partials together.

[1] ... I guess you could have HTMX suck them all down when the page loads but I'd be worried about speed and people seeing incomplete states

Damn, Unpoly looks great! Never tried HTMX but have been a fan of it, it solves a UX problem that frameworks like Django and Rails suffer from, without needing to bring in something heavy like React.

I'm currently working on a side project in Rails using Stimulus but sometimes I wonder if Stimulus is overkill with all of the controllers and stuff as well. Do you have an opinion on when you should reach for something like Inertia or Stimulus over htmx?

fwiw I'm the CEO of htmx, and I am a huge fan of these types of hyperbolic articles.

I love Unploy, the documentation as well, but I find it a bit too complex. For even simpler usecases I often use Alpine AJAX [1], which is an Alpine.js plugin giving your links and forms -- only, because progressive enhancement -- basic AJAX capabilities.

[1] https://alpine-ajax.js.org/

How does Unpoly and htmx differ?

Htmx is pleasant to use, but I lost a little respect for you after this prudish comment.

> Still prefer a chill vibe for htmx though.

Said the horse with laser eyes (¬_¬)

I didn't find it too hyperbolic, I think they were very clear on where htmx can help, eg. the section "you're not building Google docs".

https://unpoly.com touts "progressive enhancement."

Third link on the page ("read the long story") points to https://triskweline.de/unpoly-rugb/, which renders as a blank page with NoScript enabled.

Sigh.

I haven't really tried htmx yet, but I used to love intercooler, and your essays are always a fun read. When I saw the title I thought it was some kind of joke from you, because it's like the opposite of your normal style.

here is the long-promised frontal assault on Big State: dataos.software

I'm curious if the author of the article is an HN reader, and if yes, how this comment is received.

You really need to shut this down dude. If HTMX becomes famous for having overbearing advocates that's a really bad look. Look at what happened with Rust.