Kutty 0.0.1 Release I’m pleased to announce the 0.0.1 release (https://unpkg.com/browse/kutty.org@0.0.1/) of kutty, the successor to intercooler.js (http://intercoolerjs.org)!

Like intercooler, kutty brings features of modern browsers that normally require javascript (AJAX, CSS transitions, etc.) directly into HTML.

Why the rename? I chose to rename the project for a few reasons:

• I wanted the freedom to clean up mistakes and remove ideas that hadn’t worked out as cleanly as I wanted

• The JS in intercooler.js implied a javascript-orientation. The more I developed intercooler the more I realized that it was really about enhancing (completing?) HTML, not javascript. This project doesn’t really compete with tools like angular, vue or react, it’s something different, so I wanted a different name.

• kutty is short and memorable, kutty.org was available, and it has consonance with “cuttlefish” which is the official cephalopod of kutty development.

So what’s new & different about kutty vs. intercooler?

• First and foremost, kutty has no external dependencies ! No more dragging in jQuery just to do HTML-oriented web development. It has been tested with IE11.

• It follows conventional naming and behavior standards more closely than intercooler does (e.g. innerHTML and outerHTML)

• Kutty isn’t the kitchen-sink-of-features that intercooler is. Kutty is more focused on the features that are amenable to a declarative approache and less on replacing javascript entirely.

• Kutty has a better swapping mechanism which introduces a settling step, which allows for nice CSS transitions with minimal complexity. Check out the progress bar (https://htmx.org/examples/progress-bar/) to see how this works: by returning HTML in the old web 1.0 style, you can get nice, smooth CSS-based transitions. Fun!

Beyond that, basic kutty and intercooler code will look a lot a like:

This will issue an AJAX post to /clicked, in a manner familiar to anyone who has used intercooler.

What will happen to intercooler? I’m planning on maintaining both projects. Intercooler is a slow moving project anyway, and the code is stable and works fine for people who want to go the jQuery route. I have a large application written with it and I’m not planning on moving that to kutty any time soon.

How hard will a port to kutty from intercooler be? Depends a lot on how into the weeds you got with intercooler. The core attributes are pretty close to one another but if you were using ic-action or event handlers extensively it will be a project.

OK, so what should I do? The usual:

• read the docs (https://htmx.org/docs/)

• star the repo (https://github.com/bigskysoftware/kutty)

• tell your friends

• enjoy fully functional HTML, the way Roy Fielding (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representational_State_Transfer) intended it

Cheers!