And Then Everyone Started Moving to React …
Throughout 2017, the WordPress team has been building key new features using React, a Javascript framework developed by Facebook.
However, React has suffered from licensing complications. In mid-September, Matt Mullenweg announced that the WordPress team, and Automattic, were dropping the React framework:
the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks, and may push the release into next year
This was big news, and a notable set-back for WordPress’s development.
Then everything changed again.
A timeline of recent developments around React
- Mid-September: Magento announces that it will turn itself into a Progressive Web Application platform, using React.
- September 23: Facebook reverses their licensing decision, leaving WordPress free to use React again (whether they will or not is still undecided).
- October 2: Dries announces that Drupal will start adopting React, after a 2 year decision-making process.
Are these projects making a good decision to standardize on React? That’s much a topic for a much longer blog post.
But it’s clear that a new technical consensus has emerged, rapidly and surprisingly. In the space of less than a month, the open source community has rapidly coalesced around a single Javascript platform.
Things could still change again, but it looks likely that three of the web’s biggest platforms, WordPress, Drupal, and Magento, are all going to standardize on React.
Does it mean that Drupal is going to drop jquery ? Are we able to use jquery in the near future ? So familiar with one and soon got to learn another new one, tough to catching up … Just notice there’s another “Proposal to use Vue.js for building Drupal’s administrative UIs” https://www.drupal.org/node/2913628
No, jQuery is unlikely to go away any time soon. Most of these React use cases are likely to be for front-end theme development.
And, yes, WordPress had the same pushback. People love Vue.
jQuery is already DEAD. Only less educated people will still use this useless library
Great article! I was following the WordPress/React back-and-forth and was glad to see that Facebook decided to go w/ a license more agreeable to the open source community. I’ve enjoyed studying React and look forward to advancing my skills with it. I’d like to be integrating it into WP themes.
I didn’t know that Magento and Drupal were also looking at using React. Exciting news. Thanks for the article!
They are wrong and they do very bad not adopting the platform (eg Web Components). The new jQuery is here, say hello to React
Having put out an app in React (w/ Redux), I hightly doubt it will be the next “jQuery”. Learning React (w/ JSX), learning to use it w/ Reax (think Reducer.js HELL), going through all this takes probably 5 times more will power and mental stamina than learning the easy to use Javascript Library that is jQuery. Also, let’s not forget Vue.js and Angular 2/4 framework – no JSX required (Redux obviously not typically necessary with Angular, though oddly enough I have actually seen Angular paired with Redux, i.e. http://blog.rangle.io/managing-state-redux-angular/); I do, however, think “One Way Data Flow” will be the new “jQuery” in modern website and web applicatoin development, be it in the React Library (as in the “view” in MVC w/ Redux – NOT to be confused with Vue.js) – or via whatever other framework (i.e. Angular, etc.). It IS, in my “view” (pun intended), about time Drupal did more to incorporate React, bravo Dries! React.js – next jQuery? Well, there is that nasty learning curve and licensing serving as just a few detractors… :-/