[nickjj]

This is why I really really like Hotwire Turbo[0] which is a back-end agnostic way to do fast and partial HTML based page updates over HTTP and it optionally supports broadcasting events with WebSockets (or SSE[1]) only when it makes sense.

So many alternatives to Hotwire want to use WebSockets for everything, even for serving HTML from a page transition that's not broadcast to anyone. I share the same sentiment as the author in that WebSockets have real pitfalls and I'd go even further and say unless used tastefully and sparingly they break the whole ethos of the web.

HTTP is a rock solid protocol and super optimized / well known and easy to scale since it's stateless. I hate the idea of going to a site where after it loads, every little component of the page is updated live under my feet. The web is about giving users control. I think the idea of push based updates like showing notifications and other minor updates are great when used in moderation but SSE can do this. I don't like the direction of some frameworks around wanting to broadcast everything and use WebSockets to serve HTML to 1 client.

I hope in the future Hotwire Turbo alternatives seriously consider using HTTP and SSE as an official transport layer.

[0]: https://hotwired.dev/

[1]: https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1346095619597889536?lang=en