Server rendering isn't a performance checkbox — it collapses the wall between frontend and backend into one framework. Here's what SSR really buys you, why the client/server line stops being where you think it is, and where TanStack Start fits next to Next.js.
You don't have to write the server. But the shape of the contract between your React app and the backend — REST, tRPC, or a BFF — decides how much of your frontend is real work versus glue code. Here's the part of the backend that's actually yours.
Auth looks like a login form and turns out to be an architecture decision. Where do tokens live, who guards a route, what happens when the session dies mid-request? Here's why I buy auth instead of building it, and the parts that stay yours no matter what you buy.
Append-only markdown memory works great — until it doesn't. After watching the system degrade in production, our team redesigned it from scratch with strict principles: small, high-signal, controlled, and self-maintaining.
"Just use a chart library" hides a real decision. Do you want charts handed to you, or do you want to control every pixel? That choice — and your data size — decides between Recharts, visx, and raw D3. Here's how I pick, and where charts actually get hard.
Forms are where clean React apps quietly fall apart. Conditional fields, async validation, a submit button that has to know about everything — it adds up fast. Here's why I reach for TanStack Form, where it beats Formik and React Hook Form, and where a form library still can't save you.
Picking a component library feels like picking buttons and modals. It isn't. You're deciding who controls your styling — you or the library — and that single choice shapes how much you'll fight it for years. Here's how I weigh MUI, Ant Design, Radix, and shadcn/ui.
Styling is the most argued-about, least reasoned-about decision in a React app. The real question isn't which library looks nicest in a demo — it's which one survives a growing codebase. Here's how I weigh Tailwind, CSS Modules, CSS-in-JS, and zero-runtime options, and where each one earns its place.
A module I was told not to over-engineer grew into an entire application. Most of what let it survive was boring — and one of the most boring rules was never mutating state in place. Here's how immutability actually works in React, when I reach for Immer, and why I skip Immutable.js.
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