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Help the adoption of Going Buildless by frontend developers, regardless of frameworks or libraries they use.
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Make the most valuable tools related to Going Buildless easy to discover, use and contribute to.
@open-wc has become an umbrella project which consists of lots of parts mixed in the same repo and docs site:
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tools:
es-dev-server
karma-esm
@mdjs/core
storybook-prebuilt
(separate repo)mdjs-viewer
(separate repo)
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utilities:
building-utils
polyfills-loader
import-maps-generate
import-maps-resolve
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plugins:
rollup-plugin-html
rollup-plugin-polyfills-loader
storybook-addon-web-components-knob
storybook-addon-markdown-docs
webpack-index-html-plugin
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presets:
building-rollup
building-webpack
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testing helpers:
chai-a11y-axe
semantic-dom-diff
testing-helpers
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WC helpers:
dedupe-mixin
lit-helpers
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configs:
eslint-config
prettier-config
testing-karma-bs
testing-karma
testing
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recommendations:
testing-wallaby
deploying
- IDE (VSCode)
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onboarding:
- create
- codelabs
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experiments:
scoped-elements
IMHO, the current situation has the following problems, that affect developer experience:
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navigation. I always struggle to find a link to ES dev server docs, due to complex navigation structure. And I'm already an experienced user familiar with the site. What about newbies who just discovered open-wc?
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piling up content. Things like ESLint, Prettier, VSCode or Wallaby are definitely useful for those who never tried them. However, these are also matter of personal preference and probably should be downplayed.
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contributing. The monorepo itself is kinda scary for certain users. It might be easier to maintain, but less clear how to contribute - find an issue, setup the environment locally, submit a PR, deal with CI.
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versioning. Because of Lerna, there are many releases that are version bumps only. That forces me as a user to look through CHANGELOG entries figuring out if there are valid reasons for me to upgrade.
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branding. The joke about WC has been so much repeatedly happening, and honestly now it's too annoying. When you reach out to external developers, their first impression really matters, and now it's a bit weird.
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positioning. Many tools are not specific to web components, and could be used by frameworks users. Unfortunately, there is a somewhat negative feeling about Web Components in certain communitites.
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walled garden. Despite the fact that developing with ES modules is becoming popular (e.g. Snowpack), the tools and libraries by open-wc are mostly used by web components (former Polymer) community.
Let me make a suggestion that might tackle some of the problems and help to achieve goals:
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introduce Buildless as a separate brand and GitHub org.
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suggested slogans:
- "build less, do more"
- "start with
index.html
" - "you might not need build tools"
- "forget about JS fatigue"
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move the following packages to separate repos under new org:
- tools
- utilities
- plugins (except
storybook-addon-web-components-knob
) - presets
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create a new website (consider 11ty). These domains are free:
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keep configs, recommendations, codelabs, WC helpers under Open WC
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refer to Buildless as a "sibling" project from https://open-wc.org
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invite other tools authors (Vue.js / Vite, Snowpack) to collaborate
Thoughts?
OK, funny story should do the trick.
I have to work constantly at not over-explaining things to the point of getting eye rolls - just a personal problem - and being elderly doesn't help. So I put together a 5 minute video on how to do something - instead of a 30 minute - to compensate for over-explaining. It was good enough. Who would watch a 30 minute video? Nobody, for this.
So my boss goes over it and then begins to rake me over the coals because I didn't tell him about how to use nvm when he had the wrong version of node to run the process. So now Mr Over-explainer is called out for under-explaining - yeesh.
So to him, I was too contextually immersed. I already knew how to work within this context and wasn't going to predict how inadequate his skills were, to the task. This happens so often to me, here in Austin - and believe me I'm not advanced.
I spend hours every week for years reading every ridiculous detailed post that Benny or Lars might make, only to have to research "WTF? What is a CSS variable? Oh, that."
You were correct, Pascal. Sometimes "I also think the JS community could grow up a little bit" too. But at times you guys have no idea how ignorant some of us are, on this channel. You have all picked up so much over the years (contextually immersed). My boss takes one look at a WC and asks "how do I import bootstrap and jquery?" It's a different world.