React (React.js) vs. Salesforce Agentforce Commerce

React is a JavaScript user interface construction library that works well for:

• Developing web apps with dynamic and complicated user interfaces.
• creating reusable UI elements that may be used in other applications.
• creating single-page applications with dynamic content updates that don't require a page reload.
• The Virtual DOM's effective updating mechanism allows it to handle large volumes of data updates.

React, on the other hand, might be less suitable for:

• Websites that are simple, stagnant, and have no interaction. Other libraries or simple HTML, CSS, and JavaScript may be a better fit in such circumstances.
• Web sockets may be a better choice for applications that need real-time updates, such as chat or gaming apps.
• When creating mobile apps, React Native is a better option.
• Server side rendering only, as React is designed to run on the client side.

Global Sites; larger commerce organizations but not too large where the % rev-share would affect its feasibility in a feature comparison. Salesforce is rock solid in infrastructure and rarely has outages or issues; it scaled appropriately for holiday peak and was able to accomplish anything we put our minds to as long as we staffed development appropriately. The latter, however, is not to be overlooked. Developers are necessary and expensive.

Incentivized

• React is fantastic for building performant user interfaces. Our web app is snappy and great for our customers.
• React has the philosophy of doing one thing and doing it well which is the view layer of the application. This makes it incredibly intuitive and flexible for developers to use.
• React has lead the way in being able to write modular and structured code. It is a drastic improvement since the days of spaghetti jQuery code.
• React has an unmatched community. The amount of tools and libraries available is fantastic, and there plenty of solutions available online for common problems.

Incentivized

• Traffic - When we have sales, our traffic will increase exponentially and their cloud can handle the huge uptick in traffic we receive without overloading our servers.
• Site updates - it continually monitors in the background for any upgrades or updates needed so we don't have to go in and do it ourselves. A real time saver!
• Integration - outside plugins and add-ons are easy to install with Salesforce commerce cloud as it allows a seamless integration of extra plug ins onto our site.

Incentivized

• Debugging React is challenging. Bugs in react code generate stack traces internal to React and it is often totally unclear how it relates to the code you actually wrote.
• Relating your React elements to corresponding DOM elements is difficult. The intentional separation of virtual and actual DOM also makes it difficult to map the elements to the structures in the DOM. This is partially ameliorated by the use of the React dev tool, which provides a DOM-like view of the React elements, but the tool still does not provide a direct correspondence with the DOM that is often necessary to figure out why something isn't right.
• Because JSX is React-specific and not a language feature, a special compilation process is necessary to convert JSX code to normal JS. Coming from a C++ background, compiling things doesn't bother me, but many JS developers are used to a less structured development.

Incentivized

• The UX within the Business Manager portion of Demandware, the primary interface for marketers, is generally a confusing, inconsistent mess. Particularly infuriating are the lack of consistency for search and sort behavior within the tool.
• A number of useful features, such as the ability to set schedules or tie features to unique customer segments, have seemingly arbitrary limitations imposed.
• Demandware's idea of leveraging the community to be a learning resource and a sounding board for new ideas and features is a nice theory, but in practice it doesn't work for businesses with a lot of customization. I'm left with the impression that individual support is not a priority.

Incentivized

A huge factor influencing our decision to remain on the Demandware platform is that our new parent company is standardizing all its luxury brands in the US on it. We are fortunate. However, even if we had remained an independent company, I believe we would continue on the Demandware platform for all the reasons outlined in this review. I appreciate the stability the platform has provided to our eCommerce site in the last three years as well as the continuous improvements and technological advances being rolled out that will allow us to keep the site fresh, engaging, modern and stable. I've heard many horror stories from colleagues on other platforms who struggle with the expense and complexity involved with making what should be minor and simple changes and updates to their sites.

React is just a bit of a different animal. I was avoiding it for the longest time. I thought for sure I would land on Vue or something else with a more approachable and familiar appearance. But after taking an online course in React, I started realize what people were raving about (and complaining about) and decided to implement it at our office for one of our products.

Incentivized

The overall ease of using the system. Consolidation in location for our team members. Mobile application for on the go research, as many of our team members are constantly traveling to job sites or to meet clients. No more duplicate calls to current customers, since we have 12 different divisions that span the company. Mostly the ability to look at the database when our team members begin cultivating a new
lead/prospect with a potential customer to see if anyone within the team has a
relationship with that person or the company they work for.

Incentivized

We have only had one instance where the platform went down in the time we have been using it.

Since it's open-source and very popular, the community support for React and related tools and libraries is excellent. There are a lot of people using the same tools, and so issues tend to get fixed quickly and "recipes" are easy to come by. And since it's backed by Facebook, they have a dedicated engineering team working on the progression of React.

Incentivized

They are very responsive and a support technician will be assigned quickly. Even if there is further clarification needed for the ticket, or a solution is not immediately available, you feel that someone is there and staying on top of the issue. Most common issues are resolved quickly and satisfactorily.

Incentivized

The in-person training was thorough. Trainer was pretty dry, but covered everything really well.

Implementation went fairly smoothly.

While this is a widely contested debate with various blog posts and benchmarks all over the place, its really a personal choice to determine what works for the team. Coming from a Angular 1.x background, I decided to try a new framework when Angular 2.x was announced and at that time React is gaining popularity and Vue hasn't taken off yet. Compared to Angular 1.x and Vue (hybrid of React and Angular) that split the logic from the html templates, I loved the way React breaks code into components using the jsx syntax. In my mind, this allows for cleaner components and easier maintenance

Incentivized

When I think of Salesforce products, I sometimes think of them interchangeably as one big lump. It's hard not to be incredibly immersed in the ecosystem day in and day out and taking advantage of resources like Trailhead. While Microsoft Dynamics compares in quality and offerings, it doesn't offer the same engagement and resources as Salesforce in its communications, social, and marketing, which makes a difference in terms of relevance and help. Commerce Cloud comes with the support you need to succeed and the tools you need to grow. In a high demand consumer world, we need products like this to keep up and get ahead. The minute we catch up, we're behind. Salesforce helps you stay on pace and create the unique and personalized experiences customers everywhere expect.

Incentivized

• Our web applications now run much faster because the whole page doesn't reload
• We spend less time developing UI components because a lot of them are readily available on NPM
• We don't have to optimize apps for multiple browsers since React natively supports it.

Incentivized

• In my experience I see most of the retailers see better sales after moving to Demandware.
• Site performance is really good if the application built with best practices suggested by Demandware.
• Service integrations have some limitations in terms of quota etc but still all are inside manageable grounds.

Incentivized