Look — I’m old enough to remember when the “web standards movement” was controversial. I had to argue with my boss about using CSS vs tables. And I remember when you <i>did</i> need javascript to do a lot of things that HTML now does natively. JS frameworks had to exist to push the state of the art, because the state of the art got stuck. The standards bodies and browser vendors got their shit together, and now you can do things you used to need frameworks for in plain HTML. That’s great! But let’s not re-write history, here.<p>Software is in a constant state of revolution and counter-revolution. It’s one of the things that keeps this job interesting.
Somehow this site is both plain HTML yet also blocks the Firefox reader button, rendering it unreadable.<p>( Edit: Browsing to <a href="https://justfuckingusehtml.com/index.html" rel="nofollow">https://justfuckingusehtml.com/index.html</a> shows the reader button, I guess Firefox has a really dumb heuristic for when it shows. )
We made tirreno website [1] with only HTML 4.01 and 1 transparent pixel, no CSS or JS. Works well on any device. Easy to update. Highly recommended.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.tirreno.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.tirreno.com/</a>
Sponsored content via a justfucking website. Bold move<p>Anyway, I am firmly in the "self-hosting modern Sentry is crazypants" camp, but <a href="https://telebugs.com/alternatives/glitchtip" rel="nofollow">https://telebugs.com/alternatives/glitchtip</a> reads like a hit piece, and not a serious "but, why?"<p>I'll keep my Rails commentary to myself
Cleaning out the wordy, "oh so edgy" embellishment (probably authored by AI, ironically), here's a ChatGPT summary:<p><i>HTML is simpler, faster, and more reliable</i>
The author rails against “bloated, over-engineered” JavaScript frameworks and build tools, pointing out that plain HTML loads instantly and “just fucking works” without constant updates or breaking changes<p><i>Frameworks add needless complexity and cost</i>
You don’t need to manage hundreds of dependencies, CI/CD pipelines, hydration errors or “tree-shaking” when all you really want is a button or a bit of text. HTML has done this flawlessly for decades<p><i>Native browser features handle interactivity</i>
Modern HTML alone supports expandable sections (<details>/<summary>), native dialogs, form controls of every kind (date pickers, sliders, color inputs, file uploads), and even creates global JS variables from element IDs—no framework required<p><i>Deployment is trivial</i>
“Just drag, drop, and you’re done.” No container orchestration, no multi-step build process, no DevOps magic - HTML is ready to serve straight from any web server<p><i>Universality and longevity</i>
Everyone “knows HTML” - from your grandparents’ wartime hand-coded tables to your dog’s Fiverr gig. It’s been powering the web since the beginning and will outlast any trendy framework<p><i>A call to rethink our tooling addiction</i>
With AI able to spit out pixel-perfect HTML in seconds, clinging to heavy frameworks is framed as an outdated habit. The author challenges readers: stop overengineering and embrace the elegance of raw HTML
I would have added a section about tab index.<p>Tab indices is lost sacred knowledge.<p>Places like GitHub, GitLab and even Zed homepage break Vimium by adding "shortcuts" without even thinking to implement proper tab indices.
"AI's out here, a gift from the heavens (or at least from Sam Altman's nerd fortress) ready to write your shitty little to-do app in five seconds flat. It can churn out pixel-perfect HTML, debug your fuck-ups, and probably even wipe your ass if you ask nicely. But no, you're still humping your frameworks like they're the last lifeboat on the Titanic."<p>Personal opinion is that AI will reduce the need for higher abstraction software libraries. ORMs for instance could go away. We will see wildly different software paradigms as the need for human understanding drops
TIL (from "Choose a week to question all your life choices") about:<p><pre><code> <input type="week">
</code></pre>
<a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Reference/Elements/input/week" rel="nofollow">https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Reference/...</a><p>Weird that it's supported by mobile
Safari but not desktop Safari (according to the support table). And not in Firefox yet.
Even in a humorous context, cursing and insults land much better if they're used more sparingly. At some point in the essay they became distracting, and by the end I found them tiring.
We have great base tech on the web because people loved it when it was part of a trendy js framework, and wanted it in the base platform.<p>If the web wasn’t so amenable to frameworks & polyfills HTML wouldn’t have gained all the nice things in HTML5. We can be grateful for the explosion of ideas & the standards process that (mostly) keeps the best ones.
Ha, nice! I created a little static site generator inspired by this "brutalist" style, in order to learn some Swift: <a href="https://github.com/saghul/brutalist-blog-generator">https://github.com/saghul/brutalist-blog-generator</a>
I would like this if it actually stuck to its own philosophy but for some crazy reason just HTML needs googletag manager and telebugs to look after it. Webdevs just can't leave shit alone can they?
I love it. A million thumbs ups.<p>I am a data engineer and coming from scientific background.<p>And guess what works most of the time, the simplest (not naive or buggy) solution to your problem that takes into account the human factor, the consumer of your solution. That poor being currently being ousted from the binary garden of Eden by AI cops.
Wow, I had no idea elements with an id attribute are directly accessible in JS.<p>Combine this with Pico CSS or one of those minimal stylesheets (Water.css) to get better typography and spacing and you‘re set.<p>I guess htmx is the extreme version of this no-framework philosophy… kinda.
What if instead of just using html, instead we use 20 JavaScript frameworks that talk to an electron server to call a series of microservices to determine which sql lite docker instance to call.<p>Then, sql lite returns a connection string to aws to pull XML containers of html that are converted to JSON and sent back to the front end to convert to html and render the page.<p>Maybe we can use lazy loading and some sliding panels on the page that slide in with fully rendered bmp images that are 20MB each despite only appearing in a 16x16 icon.<p>Oh darn this is just the standard webdev JavaScript bro tech flow? Guess I need to keep memorizing leetcode until I get my next genius JavaScript main idea to add another layer to this.
That's a good reset.<p>With Web UI's bloated with frameworks, large CSS, crazy javascript, etc...<p>Go back to basics the way HTML is intended, simple and fast!
Unfortunately there is a lot of stuff that can’t match accessibility standards without javascript (e.g. combobox).<p>If you use a framework it’s much easier to implement these components.
Fuck I hate this moronic regressionist mindset. If your project is too insignificant to benefit from a framework, then just don't use it? It has nothing to do with the technology, but everything to do with your piece of shit usecase.
While there are some valid points hiding deep in the sewage flowing across the page, it also misses a core point: The web (HTML/CSS/JS) is by now good enough to make actually decent UI that doesn't look like it's escaped from the 90s and is holding Geocities hostage.<p>As is, the page mostly screams "I don't want to learn anything new".
I’m not entirely sure this form of satire lands the same way it used to now that screaming and insults are considered a normal form of discourse, especially in TV politics.
this is the best version of any of these I've seen over the years.<p>and if anyones lame fucking corpo filter guard catches this, then let them catch these archived hands: <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250512141449/https://justfuckingusehtml.com/" rel="nofollow">https://web.archive.org/web/20250512141449/https://justfucki...</a>