Exactly. Stuff like this is extremely simple to write in vanilla js, with a pointer to each of the dom objects you need to interact with. There's no point in using a framework (but of course you can encapsulate your vanilla js in a component to interface with whatever framework you're using).
Isn't the benefit of React/Vue the shadowDOM and not needing to do full page prints with every change? Honest question, I'm just going off what I hear everyone else saying so the vanilla JS, while the code may be more efficient, sounds less efficient since you'll need to re-print the entire page with every change.
> sounds less efficient since you'll need to re-print the entire page with every change.
Huh? No, not at all. As far as I understand, React has algorithms that replace only the html that changed in a dom subtree (and that is called virtual dom, not shadow dom, which is a different concept).
But if you already know exactly what has changed and where to change it in the page, there is no need for more complex algorithms to kick in. Just take the pointer to your div or cell and change the content.
Bottom line: React is written in vanilla Javascript. Can't do better than it.
> React is using Virtual DOM, which is not free. It is fast, but it is not free.
Of course, that's what I meant- maybe it wasn't clear. React can't be faster than vanilla js, it's written in vanilla js after all.
The whole virtual dom's purpose is to calculate the smallest possible update when you don't know (and don't care) what exactly has changed in your view. But that calculation of course has a cost. And if you know very well what changed and where, like in the case of the GP, nothing can be faster than changing it directly.
I am surprised how many people I interview say the same thing - pure JS has to re-render the page and React doesn't, including people who have a lot of JS experience.
Changing the DOM doesn't cause a full re-render, the browser will optimize the repaints to only the parts that have changed.
People don't understand how the DOM works, and its become a great way to filter out people.
"People don't understand how the DOM works" x 1000. Many front end devs I have worked with are not aware that the DOM IS A TREE (and implications of this)!
I wrote a couple of hundred lines of vanilla JS. It works fine.