It still needs JS to work though

Look up nontrivial examples on their own docs.

“Simple” form validation is a clusterfuck and that’s what they’re leading with.

Why HTMX advocates say 'augments the hypermedia capabilities of HTML' instead of 'another implementation of HTML-over-the-wire approach'? Placing hidden meaning into common words sounds very cult-ish.

we say this, because, more than other HTML-over-the-wire libraries, htmx focuses on generalizing the two core hypermedia controls, anchors and forms

i discuss this extensively in chapter 4 of our book:

https://hypermedia.systems/extending-html-as-hypermedia/

the tldr is that htmx generalizes:

- the event that triggers an HTTP request

- the element that triggers an HTTP request

- the type of the HTTP request

- the placement of the hypermedia response to that HTTP request

In this sense, htmx adds functionality to (or, more dramatically, "completes") HTML.

This is in contrast with, for example, https://unpoly.com, which also uses HTML-over-the-wire, but provides higher level concepts (e.g. layers) and isn't as focused on generalizing hypermedia controls. This has advantages, unpoly gives you more functionality out of the box, but puts it further way from being a pure conceptual HTML extension.