Front Ends (SPAs)

[alterationx10]

Would we want to rally around a Scala solution like Laminar? Or build upon something that wraps React, for example?

[threeseed]

I would choose:

• Shoelace for the UI component framework.
• Slinky for the React JS framework.
• Build a ZIO version of Diode.

Shoelace is supported by a now full-time Microsoft employee, has excellent accessibility support and is fast and modern. Slinky is a dream to use and allows you to easily port code from JS-React into Scala. Diode's message-passing approach works well for the front end.

You can see all of the above in use at: harana

[alterationx10]

Slinky looks really nice! scalajs-react does as well! I think all of the ScalaJS resources out there (and the exception state they are in) is a hidden gem in Scala.

Shoelace also looks to be in great shape. I do wonder about being overly pushy on UI choice. I would imagine a best case would be some good setup around the SPA part, and leave the UI as pluggable as possible.

And I's say the same thing for anything that's a ZIO version. I think it's important the the tools we make here support all 3: Future/Cats Effect/ZIO (if async applicable) and abstract away the plumbing of those things, so that a newcomer doesn't get overwhelmed, but has the options to keep using the tools if/when they want to dig further.

[julian-a-avar-c]

There is a history of abandonware when it comes to UI component frameworks, so I don't think it would be a good idea to standardize that.

Slinky looks excellent. I would say that encouraging its use should make easier the transition to Scala.js from JavaScript or TypeScript. I'm mostly a web dev, and the reason I have stayed away from Scala in front end is because I've only found Laminar & scalajs-react, both of which have incredibly strange ergonomics in my honest opinion. Slinky feels closer to what I would want to type.

[AlexITC]

Having tried many tools for the frontend, my default choice is Slinky, I commonly work with devs with no Scala experience and getting them into Slinky is far easier than the alternatives (I even presented the approach at Functional Scala 2022; https://youtu.be/9ePQwMA_g_w).

While Slinky has its downsizes, I don't know any better alternative for non Scala devs.

[AlexITC]

Oh, we can't miss https://scalablytyped.org, it has support for mui 5:

• Slinky version: https://github.com/wiringbits/st-material-ui-demo-slinky
• scalajs-react version: https://github.com/oyvindberg/st-material-ui-demo

Taking advantage from the existing js ecosystem is one of the scalajs advantages.