My city builder game, Microlandia[1], runs on Deno. The game's graphics and UI is a Three.js/React app, but the guts of the game are in a "sidecar" process that is a `deno compile` typescript executable.
On Mac, there's a Tauri shell that runs both client and server, and for Linux and Windows we use Electron, (Tauri proved to be quite problematic except when in macOS)
Why on earth did I choose this cursed stack instead of a "proper" game engine? Well,
Turns out developing the simulation in typescript with a performant sqlite driver hot reloads very fast and with a light code editor and my browser open on a second window I see the stuff updating live as I make it.
Deno has a good VSCode extension with test helpers and a fast language server. WebGPU is good enough for me to write any cool shader I can think of and I don't miss any capability of a game engine.
More importantly, not using Unity/Unreal brought back to me the joy of game development that I had lost due to and horrendous UI-driven workflow that takes me back to Macromedia Flash (yes, I am that old). Oh, and the licensing.
And I know I could switch to Bun with small changes in code but Deno has never got in my way. Maybe it's because I avoid using libraries at all costs (and don't need much).
Also, Typescript/React is such an amazing language for building a complex tycoon/simulation type of game that deals with a lot of data and displays it. Anyone who's worked on Unity knows it's the dark ages for UI over there.
I'm unsure if i'll port the game to Deno Desktop anytime soon but if I start a game again I will use this stack again, as my game engine, this time without Electron or Tauri.
I'm also using a cursed stack (deno + pyodide) and it's awesome! Everything works surprisingly well and I can do my Python experiments in a notebook while hot reloading via vite in a browser + quickly try things in the dev console.
IMO, Deno has always been more methodical, more focused (maybe too focused?) on standards. But now the Deno team is on the right track: using Claude extensively to improve the node.js compat which was absolutely herculean if not impossible before AI. [+]
On the other hand, Bun has always played a bit fast and loose, chasing metrics at the cost of stability. Access to abundant AI has sent that project off the rails.
Disclaimer: Former Deno engineer - I'm obviously going to have some biases. All IMO of course, but if you ask me I'd still bet on Deno in the long term, and I personally still use it for any .ts projects.
[+] There might be a dozen people in the world that know how sensitive and subtle the timing and ordering in the JS event loop is and how meticulous just this single part needs to be for major node.js projects not to completely crap themselves.
Original message: --------------------------------
I just tried to migrate using their `deno install` -> `deno task dev` instructions, and I got an error about vite needing a newer version of Node.
I'm not pathologizing deno, and I have (and will continue to) consistently tried to migrate my projects to deno, first from npm, then from pnpm, and now from bun. But every single time I've tried, there has been some kind of stupid "edge case", "simple fix" issue like this that stops me in my tracks. It's not a huge deal, but the simple fact is, when I run the project using bun, it runs. When I try it using deno, it doesn't. That has been a consistent pattern every single time I've tried. Last time, deno blew up because it wasn't able to work out the IndexedDB api calls I was using without some kind of bridge/shim/environment config. These are terribly minor issues, but it's the lack of care for the details that really sours me on this stuff.
Obviously, deno should have used the version of vite that bun did which would have worked with the version of node on this machine. But even barring that, they could have dropped a little note around the instructions that says "if some packages need updates, you can run X command to do that". Even that would have allowed me to just move on, instead of forcing me to query the solution and hope for the best. Like I said, none of this is damning. It's just the exact kind of friction that prevents immediate adoption. At least for me.
but the project is structured the same as another public domain project I've built, and I just checked to make sure it has the same issue. I've gone ahead and made that project public so you can give it a try[0].
but, just to be clear, I don't think the message is wrong? The Node version on this machine is out of date. And when comparing the deno.lock file to the bun.lock file, I can see that the deno.lock has a slightly newer version (8.1 vs 8.0) of vite. So I think the message could be correct and is just telling me to update my version of Node, which is perfectly reasonable. It's just the discrepancy between not needing the newer version of vite/node on bun while invoking an error using deno. Feels like I should have either gotten perfectly matching versions, or error messages (with commands) to update node.
in any case, if you're still interested in seeing the error yourself, my steps were: 1. clone the repo 2. run deno install 3. run deno task dev
```
catapart@snake:~/Development/magnitce-code-example$ deno install
Warning The following packages are deprecated:
┖─ npm:boolean@3.2.0 (Package no longer supported. Contact Support at https://www.npmjs.com/support for more info.)
catapart@snake:~/Development/magnitce-code-example$ deno task dev
Task dev vite
You are using Node.js 20.11.1. Vite requires Node.js version 20.19+ or 22.12+. Please upgrade your Node.js version. error: Uncaught (in promise) SyntaxError: The requested module 'node:util' does not provide an export named 'parseEnv' at file:///home/catapart/Development/magnitce-code-example/node_modules/.deno/vite@8.1.0/node_modules/vite/dist/node/chunks/node.js:11:46
at async CAC.<anonymous> (file:///home/catapart/Development/magnitce-code-example/node_modules/.deno/vite@8.1.0/node_modules/vite/dist/node/cli.js:706:27)
also: I'm using Linux Mint, if it matters.
``` function checkNodeVersion(nodeVersion) { const major = parseInt(nodeVersion.split(".")[0], 10); const minor = parseInt(nodeVersion.split(".")[1], 10); return (major === 20 && minor >= 19) || (major === 22 && minor >= 12) || major > 22; } if (!checkNodeVersion(process.versions.node)) console.warn(`You are using Node.js ${process.versions.node}. Vite requires Node.js version 20.19+ or 22.12+. Please upgrade your Node.js version.`); ```
And that error should be thrown only in Deno < 2.2 which presented `process.version` as `20.11.1`.
Are you 100% sure this is not running some old version of Deno on your system?
I actually started this after another user said they couldn't reproduce the issue, but you figured it out before I finished reporting back.
Thanks for straightening me out on this! As I said a few days ago on the Deno Desktop HN Topic, I'm looking forward to this newest version!
Parent is getting downvoted because they're suggesting something that is akin to "why are you running this simple, reliable, efficient Python script instead of feeding inputs to an LLM and praying you get the outputs you want".
Respect yourself by respecting your craft.
For example, those two issues recently directly affected my projects:
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/issues/34297
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/issues/35289
Seems like the core of these issues was a Claude-coauthored PR: https://github.com/denoland/deno/pull/33208
I think I'll probably just go back to normal Node because it's stable and won't break things like this between minor releases, plus it's not full-on vibe-developed like Deno and Bun.
P.S.: Deno does genuinely have good parts: built-in type checking, LSP server, formatter with sane defaults, and so on. I'm just very disappointed that they seem to be focusing less on the actual core runtime.
Disclaimer: I'm the author of the linked PR. Using AI here is not really at fault here - it was just a giant rewrite that replaced how we do `node:http` in Deno. Replacing the engine while driving is never easy and we did the best we could. While we have a lot of test coverage and we use tests directly from Node.js codebase, we just don't catch everything. We're constantly working on improving the situation and I'm sorry you hit a problem. I can assure you that we are fixing all Node compat bugs as quickly as possible.
Maybe reality isn't represented by the git logs, but according to them, you appear to have composed, reviewed and merged 131 commits affecting 58 files and 6000 lines -- a task that you say amounts to "replacing the engine while driving" -- in the span of one week.
If that's accurate, of course your reliance on AI is at fault here. It invites you to mistake velocity for quality and conflate test satisfaction for completion.
Without AI, this effort would likely have taken much longer and an experienced team would have approached it with due meticulousness, being especially stringent in review. Absorbed in it, the work would have weighed on their unconscious while they slept, with "Ah shoot, did I consider XYZ?" moments striking them in the shower. Ideally, familiar with the specific contributors (i.e. you) and their style of work, the reviewer who later consider merging the work would have ideas what to watch out for and would spend extra time looking at the details you might not have fully considered. It's a whole decades-matured craft practice that can do a pretty good job of making sure that a refactor of this scale doesn't land in main too broken.
And while that version still probably wouldn't have been entirely flawless either, or might never have even been attempted because of its greater calendar and attention burden, that doesn't mean that using AI wasn't responsible for why and how this version is broken.
This is exactly how AI makes things worse and why many people are wary of relying on third-party projects that embrace it too blithely. If you're going to use it, that's great, and maybe it will help you keep landing big features more quickly than otherwise -- but at least accept responsibility for the tradeoffs that you're inviting when you do so.
Can we please not turn Deno into junk? If you do the above -- what's the point of Deno?
Once you bolt everything on like that you might as well just use Node.
Deno started off with its own tools. Bun has managed a good balance between compatibility and its own thing (the recent moves aside) without resorting to these tactics...
Are you sure you "failed"? Maybe there was good enough compatibility and that wasn't the problem?
The problem sounds like a business 1 where you're after more users and you deem this "magic compatibility" is fixing it. Well maybe that's not it.
A lot of people tried Deno and even tried to build libraries for it back some years ago. What you "failed" at is building the traction, ecosystem and community support.
Compatibility doesn't buy you moat. Deno specific ecosystem, libraries and services etc do.
To demonstrate how amazing bun is in comparison.
> "Deno has no future"
I think there may be other things bothering you? These comments aren't really productive and discourage maintainers to even continue replying.
Disclaimer: I am a maintainer.
bro what
I've been told I'm insane, retarded, a megalomaniac, or simply extinct. People I once respected are trying to convince the next generation not to learn, not to gain skill, not to build community. People with as much logic as a heap of bat feces tell me confidently that code is "over". Now if I was an AI I'd be very polite about this, but I'm a human so I say they can go fuck themselves.
I started a new project on Deno to avoid the NPM mess. Node compatibility was a distraction for the product.
I'm tired of everything depending on Node. Assuming that everybody uses it is lazy.
I've gone back and forth on this point over the years.
Yeah, Node compat has probably affected the rest of the product. I imagine at some point they (or their investors) freaked out because adoption wasn't happening. And the reality is it really doesn't matter if your product is better when nobody is using it.
In retrospect I think it would have been a better decision to target Node compat from the start like Bun did. An impossible option at the time given Deno started trying to make something different from Node.
Or maybe the problem was simply they couldn't afford low adoption after having investors on board.
Ryan Dahl is assuredly a poor steward of open source software if these are the results. Node is popular because of the massive, inclusive community behind it; not because of a few rock star individuals, but for the VC mindset it's much easier to control an individual programmer than a community of them.
Only wonders are what other communities VC will try to rat fuck next, how fast do we think Evan You will speed run this exact same arc (which has already happened a dozen times in lived memory), and why does Bryan Cantrill feel like the only smart tech executive that doesn't fall into these traps?