A World Without Builds

Talk

CascadiaJS 2025 talk:

In the early days of modern web applications, we wrote JavaScript that ran more or less directly in the browser. As the web grew in popularity and complexity, tools like bundlers and transpilers gave us tremendous flexibility and power—but also introduced a widening gap between the code we write and the code the browser actually executes.

In this talk, we'll examine how modern browsers have evolved to allow us to narrow that gap with features such as ECMAScript modules (ESM) and import maps, enabling applications to ship without traditional build steps. We'll cover the fundamentals of ESM in the browser, address common challenges (including dependency management and React's ESM quirks), and explore how far you can take build-free applications—even into production. Finally, we'll look ahead to emerging browser capabilities and experimental libraries that promise a simpler, more understandable, web development experience—while preserving the power and flexibility of today's ecosystem.