July 31, 2026
Click here for latency drama
Let's make the worst Htmx
Coder tries to build a bargain-bin htmx, and the comments instantly go feral
TLDR: A coder showed that a stripped-down version of htmx — a tool for making pages interactive by talking to the server — can be built with surprisingly little code. Readers split fast: some loved the simplicity, while others slammed it as slow, awkward, and somehow still too dependent on browser scripting.
A developer set out to make a deliberately tiny, "worst" version of htmx — a tool that lets websites do interactive things without writing much browser code — and accidentally launched a full-on comment-section variety show. The post walks through how a few lines of code can make a button send a request to a server and swap in new page content, which left some readers genuinely impressed. One fan basically clapped from the back row: wow, it’s that simple? For people who’ve heard the hype around htmx but never peeked under the hood, this was a satisfying “ohhh, so that’s what it does” moment.
But not everyone was ready to join the love-in. One of the loudest reactions was basically: wait, every click has to phone home to the server? That sparked the biggest hot take in the thread, with skeptics calling it a possible “worst of all worlds” setup: you still need browser scripting, but now you’re also waiting on the network for every interactive move. In plain English, critics worried it could feel slower while still not being truly code-free.
And because no internet discussion can remain normal for long, the side drama stole some scenes too. One commenter nitpicked a stray comma in a GitHub link. Another mod-style warning accused someone of posting AI-generated comments, which instantly added a whiff of scandal. Then came the punchline: a cheeky user dropped “htmxxx”, joking that the "naughtiest" version already exists. So yes: the article was about code, but the real entertainment was the crowd alternating between curious, cranky, and gloriously unserious.
Key Points
- •The article is part of a series about building small clones of popular web frameworks and focuses here on htmx.
- •It explains htmx through declarative attributes that connect browser events, HTTP requests, target elements, and swap behavior.
- •A minimal clone is demonstrated with a custom `x-get` attribute, a click listener, `fetch()`, and replacement of the element’s HTML with the response.
- •The implementation is expanded to support configurable targets and multiple swap modes such as replace, append, prepend, delete, and no-op.
- •A generic request handler and scanner add support for multiple HTTP methods, form serialization, a custom request header, and default triggers based on element type.