Aiden Bai discusses Million.js, a library that makes React components 70% faster. They explore how Million.js optimizes the reconciliation process and its trade-offs. They also discuss benchmarking, website rendering, and personal website design.
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Quick takeaways
Million.js is a virtual DOM replacement for React that optimizes the reconciliation process, making rendering faster.
Aidan Bai faced challenges integrating Million.js with certain contexts like router context and third-party libraries, but continues to work on resolving the issues.
Deep dives
Overview of the Interview
The podcast episode features an interview with Aidan Bai, the creator of Million.js, a framework that claims to make React 70% faster. Scott Tolinsky and Wes Bos have a conversation with Aidan about his journey in JavaScript development, the concept of Million.js, and its impact on React's rendering engine. They discuss the optimization of the reconciliation process, the benefits of the virtual DOM replacement, and the use of a compiler to improve performance. Aidan also mentions the challenges and limitations of Million.js, including its compatibility with certain components and libraries. Overall, the episode explores the technological advancements that Million.js offers and its potential impact on web development.
Aidan's Background and Unique Journey
Aidan Bai shares his journey into programming, which started in fifth grade when he wanted to play online games but faced restrictions due to a firewall. He talks about his introduction to coding through online courses, including Wes Bos's beginner JavaScript course. Despite his young age, Aidan quickly embraced programming and personal projects, leading to his notable contributions and achievements at a young age, such as interning at Wyze and developing Million.js.
The Concept and Benefits of Million.js
In this segment, Aidan explains Million.js as a virtual DOM replacement for React that optimizes the reconciliation process, making rendering faster. Million.js acts as a compiler, identifying where data connects with JSX in components. It reduces the need to diff the entire virtual DOM, saving performance by directly updating specific data values. Aidan describes the two modes of Million.js: manual and automatic. The manual mode offers granular optimization for specific components, while the automatic mode makes optimization decisions for the developer. Overall, Million.js aims to make React applications faster and improve user experience.
Challenges and Future Prospects
Aidan discusses the challenges of integrating Million.js with certain contexts, such as router context and third-party libraries like styled-components. He also talks about the ongoing effort to resolve issues and improve compatibility. Aidan mentions his excitement about the upcoming RFC for signals, a potential performance-boosting feature. He expresses his interest in developer experience and user experience, focusing on preventing performance issues and finding reasonable performance defaults for developers.
In this supper club episode of Syntax, Wes and Scott talk with Aiden Bai about his work on Million.js that aims to make React a lot faster. How does Million.js make React faster? And most importantly: has Aiden ever used a VCR?