But you could just write that generation in plain JavaScript, React is really just a syntax.

Because they like the syntax? Because it has a nice way of passing properties? Because you can work with pseudo-DOM elements?

It's all open source. If you want a vanilla js implementation go ahead.

I find it a bit sad that the most upvoted reaction to someone's cool little project they wanted to share is the classic HN misguided and overused response of 'React BAD'

There's a reason for that. The web is roughly 90% static pages with JS sprinkled on top(usually jQuery), and 10% SPAs made in various frameworks.

https://w3techs.com/technologies/overview/javascript_library

React is a small part of the web(in terms of the number of people using it commercially) and thus a library written in React isn't terribly useful for most of the market.

> React is a small part of the web(in terms of the number of people using it commercially) and thus a library written in React isn't terribly useful for most of the market.

And why does that matter? The OP is someone's toy project, not an attempt at starting a SaaS company.

And what percetange of those "static pages with JS sprinkled on top" have a need for automatically generated custom avatars?

Quite a few actually! After all they include static pages with comment sections, forums, image boards etc. - all places where you would want to have user profiles and naturally avatars.

I don't think anyone's saying React is bad, they're saying it's weird that this library depends on it.

"You could just write that routine in plain assembly, C is really just a syntax"

I agree with React being a good bet, but looking at the source code at the link, porting the library over to vanilla javascript or vue seems rather simple given it's mostly using JSX and not using an in-depth React feature like hooks.

So now you’re stuck always including React and always rendering your avatars dynamically on the client, even though it’s really just an SVG that is being generated.