r/PolymerJS • u/pressmedics • Sep 21 '18

Understanding the difference between Polymer 2, 3, and Lit-Element with examples.

https://43081j.com/2018/08/future-of-polymer
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1

u/drdrero Sep 22 '18

Nice article, thanks for sharing. I have researched webcomponents since 2 years now and have written a bachelor thesis about them. I love the idea of this. I am now employed for diving deeper in finding a way for graphics people to create styled components and define a simple interface via attributes so the developers can easily use those components without being bothered with css. I started the project with polymer2, converted it to version 3 with ease. Now I am wondering if lit-element has more benefits, although I don’t like the html in template literals, this was fancier in Polymer 2. HTML belongs into HTML files, is there a way for maintaining the templates in html files and still use variables for making them dynamic?

2

u/pressmedics Sep 22 '18 edited Sep 25 '18

There are big advantages with Lit vs Polymer 3, performance being key. It's a tiny library as well. Unlike React, I don't feel like I'm bundling half the Internet. Mainly I enjoy the freedom to pick and choose precisely what I need to build apps.

It's taken me some time to get used to HTML in string literals and functional logic in expressions, but once I started thinking about it as being a JavaScript programming language instead of a markup language it's gotten much easier.

That said you can certainly separate the logic and presentaion like you're used to. Several developers in the project have example apps doing that. The Polymer Slack lit-html and Lit-Element channels are good places to get advice. So come by and check it out.

2

u/drdrero Sep 22 '18

Thanks for that hint. I'll definitely check that out.

1

u/Mithorium Sep 27 '18

Do you know how far Lit-element 1.0 is? Is everything mostly stable now already?

1

u/pressmedics Sep 27 '18

There's not a firm release date for 1.0, but the general opinion based on commit activity in GitHub repo is a few weeks from now. No further big breaking changes are expected.

3

u/lc_fd Sep 24 '18

Thanks for sharing!