How to use Ext-JS in the wild? Abstract away or not?

Question

I work at a company that uses Ext-JS for our product. The product currently over extends Ext-JS components and overrides parent functionality. This has made upgrade difficult at best. We are keeping Ext-JS but are looking into using it in a non-bastardized way. There seem to be two camps. In one camp the members think we should write an abstraction on top of Ext-JS in case we decide to change frameworks in several years, hopefully that way we are less locked in. I personally think that's a silly goal, so I sit in camp number two. My reasoning is the Ext-JS team has spent their time coming up with a reasonable abstraction for the web--they are in the domain to solve that problem, whereas we are merely trying to implement a cool product. I think if we write an abstraction it will assume Ext-JS. I see us writing inferior abstractions that are less powerful and that won't map to the jQuery world (or any other framework). Opinions on the correct course of action?

Answer 1

I agree with you; I think it's a silly goal. Here's why:

1. In the end (after several years) you may not change frameworks. If you don't, then you spent extra time and resources adding a layer of abstraction that doesn't buy you anything. Not only will it fail to complete the goal you set out to accomplish (diversifying your options), but it will add to the amount of code that you and your teammates need to maintain.

2. You can always modularize your project with other Javascript libraries to suit any needs that ExtJs doesn't fulfill. For instance, if you do not like ExtJs's charting implementation, then you can include jQuery and use a plug-in like jqPlot.

3. It will be difficult to write an abstraction that applies to both current and future libraries. How can you guarantee that your abstraction will withstand changes in either your current library choice (ExtJs, etc.) or any future JS library that you fancy in the future.

Just a couple of points for thought. Overall I think it would be a bear to maintain, so I would pick a diverse library that meets most of your needs and then add in smaller libraries if necessary.

Answer 2

I think option 2 is the better option. If you build a great web app and it works really well, what are the chances of you actually changing to a new framework?

ExtJS is designed to be extended. I would definitely recommending using Ext.extend() vs Ext.override() to do the extensions though. Using this method to do your overriding you really shouldn't have that much of a hard time when you upgrade to newer version of Ext.