Oh React is not a bad thing, but it’s not special either. I’ve got a book here on React that I’ve read cover-to-cover, but I’ve still never been able to create anything meaningful with it. Every time I’ve thought “I know exactly how I’ll approach this problem” when I actually sit down to write the code, I just draw a blank.
But if you think Xojo’s API 1 vs API 2 situation is a mess… oh boy wait until you see what React has done. You can use functional components or class components. Class components are better organized, but can’t do everything functional components can. One used to be the recommended technique, now the other is - I can never remember which - and so you’ll almost always find tutorials for whichever style you’re not using.
And the naming… so unintuitive. Want to update the component after it has been drawn on screen? Is that a post-render function? Should you put that in componentDidLoad? No, you want something called an effect. Why did they name it effect? Fuck if I know.
As you can tell, I don’t like React. I know lots of people do, but from what I’ve seen, it’s JavaScript taken to the extremes. It’s nonsense on top of nonsense on top of nonsense. I like that everything is just a bunch of self-contained reusable components stacked on top of each other. In the Xojo world, imagine having a container control that only contains a button. Then another that contains two of those containers for ok and cancel. Everything is its own separate little piece. That’s about the only thing I like about it.
So yeah, React isn’t really a bad thing because I know React is popular. But to me, it’s a real turn off.