Consider RVF as form library instead of conform

[cjoecker]

I understand and agree that conform was the form library of choice a couple of years ago for the Epic Stack. Currently, the library seems not to be actively maintained based on the number of issues and pull requests. It still is missing many utilities like being able to set and validate form field values globally.

Based on that, I would reconsider it RVF is not a better option.

I was using remix-validated-form (the previous version of RVF) in a mature and form's form-heavy web app our team developed. For React Router V7, I needed to migrate to RVF. For that task, I decided to test conform. I find RVF easier to understand and reliable than conform. It can also manage more complicated use cases.

[kentcdodds]

Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I've talked to Edmund, and he is actively working on a new version with a new vision of what Conform can be. I have yet to evaluate the ideas that he has, but I want to give them a solid look before I make any changes. When I chose Conform, I did evaluate Remix Validated Form, and I probably should have taken notes on why it didn't jump out at me (though I did live stream the whole selection process, so it's probably somewhere in there, maybe AI can find it).

I'll come back to this a little bit later once I've had a chance to evaluate what Edmund is planning for Conform.

[cjoecker]

I would love to see that streaming :)

I actively develop two Remix apps that have been in production for around 2 years. In total, they have around 20 forms. The biggest one has around 50 fields and a complex schema.

From what I could test last week of both libraries migrating my current forms to newer versions, here is what I remember of both of them in case it helps for future considerations apart from the basics that a form library offers:

Conform

What I like

1. The library is straightforward to implement

What I think it can be improved

1. The examples in the docs are not always working. E.g. the remix example is missing the form prop of the field which makes the example doesn't work when it is copy pasted
2. I couldn't find a way to set and validate the form fields globally as described here
3. I miss a search field in the docs that lets me find things quickly
4. I miss some JS Docs that tell me what the form functions do
5. There are many open issues, pull requests, and unanswered comments in the repo. That gives me the impression that the library is not actively maintained.

RVF

What I like

1. Comes with a context to manage and access the field values and functions globally
2. The maintainer responds fast to issues, processes PRs quickly, and has the dependencies up to date

What I think it can be improved

1. Before I could access the controlled form values out of the context. That was very helpful for dialogs that are not always inside the context but need the form values.
2. It was confusing for me the different ways to access the form state and values. E.g. to know if the form is dirty, I can do it with form.dirty(), form.transient.dirty(), and form.formState.isDirty. I would like one point of truth
3. I miss a search field in the docs that lets me find things quickly
4. I miss some JS Docs that tell me what the form functions do

@edmundhung and @airjp73 maybe this information is helpful for your future developments :)

[bryantbrock]

I've been using RVF for as long as I've been using the epic-stack. I chose it pretty quickly after running into many issues with Conform (any complex forms). That was pre 1.0, though so it could have easily improved since then. I fell in love with RVF very quick and have had great responses (even a v2.0) from the maintainer of RVF. Just my 2 cents.

[kentcdodds]

This is extremely helpful for me. Thank you so much for preparing the example.

From what I can tell, there doesn't seem to be a significant improvement either way. If I had started with RVF, I wouldn't be convinced that Conform is so much better that it's worth switching, and I feel the same in reverse.

Since we already have Conform and people who are using the Epic Stack are already familiar with that, I don't see such a significant improvement in RVF to justify switching to RVF. Am I missing anything? Or what do you think?

[airjp73]

That's a pretty reasonable take -- I don't think you're missing anything.

It might be worth switching if the forms you're working with got significantly more complex than that notes form?

As an example of what I mean, a form I have at work has:

• multiple screens that you can switch back and forth between (i.e. all the fields aren't present in the dom at the same time)
• nested field arrays that nest arbitrarily deeply
• autosaving that keeps track of what answers changed and only submits changed answers
• and probably some other stuff I'm missing.

I'd guess that conform would start to break down by that point, but I'll admit I've never tried haha.

[cjoecker]

@kentcdodds I agree that both libraries are technically as good as the other. The only thing where I notice a difference is in the amount of Github issues, how fast are they responded and solved, and the docs. There I think RVF is doing better. The question is if the impact of that plus what @airjp73 mentioned is worth changing the forms library in the Epic Stack.

[kentcdodds]

I've talked with @edmundhung directly, and he's been really busy recently but plans on working on those issues in the next few weeks. He's definitely still very committed to the project.

[cjoecker]

Nice to hear that :)

[wargha]

Hi! Joining the conversation here as I put together an example of how the Epic Stack could use TanStack Form in the future, just as a reference. I added it to the notes-editor as a starting point.

To be honest, I’m not super happy with how I’m handling errors in this example — but since it’s just an experiment and I don’t have the bandwidth to refine it further right now, I figured it’s good enough to start a conversation.

IMO tanstack is a lot more verbose, and will likely add lots of extra lines of code, but it also provides very granular control. The community around it seems very active as well.

I’d love to hear thoughts on how this compares to Conform, and RVF especially in terms of implementation differences.

https://github.com/epicweb-dev/epic-stack/compare/epicweb-dev:main...wargha:feature/tanstack-form-example?expand=1