Dear Client, Here’s Why That Change Took So Long

Re:Dear Client, Here’s Why That Change Took So Long by stickfigure on Tuesday May 07, 2019 @02:31PM (#19852145)

While all platforms have some measure of this phenomenon, the update treadmill problem does seem to be especially acute in the javascript ecosystem.

I update Java dependencies maybe once a year; it's usually painless and incompatibilities are highlighted by the type system. If you let your JS dependences get stale by a few months, you're looking at hours or days of work. And that doesn't count the massive shifts in build systems and frameworks that seem to happen annually.

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Re:Dear Client, Here’s Why That Change Took So Long by novaleaf on Tuesday May 07, 2019 @03:24PM (#19852599)

I've spent the last 5 years on Node, and honestly most modules are fine. The only ones I've had serious problems with are those created by Google. They keep taking huge complex dependencies on things like Grpc that break between Node versions, and keep churning their other library signatures (or deprecating entire modules).

Maybe in the last year they've settled down, maybe not. I learned my lesson and don't take dependencies on them anymore. Much easier.

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Re:Dear Client, Here’s Why That Change Took So Long by tracker1 on Wednesday May 08, 2019 @03:29AM (#19856636)

I just spend maybe half a day a month updating everything to the latest and testing. There are the occasional gotchas, but it's not so bad... When you leave a codebase to rot for a few years, it doesn't surprise me that it's more painful.

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