pipeline^(1/0)

Javascript build tooling is a mess

It’s refreshing to read Julia’s article about esbuild. I’ve found the JavaScript build tooling to be an obtuse, obscure mess ever since I first began to use it years ago. When that’s all a person knows, like many front-end developers I’ve met, then it’s taken for granted that this is a necessary evil. But when you’ve used clean, simple back-end CLI’s like dotnet or scaffolded your project’s pipeline with a Makefile, the wreckage that is JavaScript bundling and transpiling feels gross.…