Software Unscripted HTMX Creator Carson Gross on Comp Sci's Evolution
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Apr 1, 2026 
Carson Gross, creator of HTMX and Montana State instructor who teaches systems and hardware, joins to discuss why HTMX jumped from v2 to v4 and the tough calls behind breaking changes. He explains async/fetch trade-offs, attribute inheritance redesign, open-source funding and licensing, and how CS teaching is shifting with AI, oral exams, and hands-on hardware lessons.
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FixieJS Taught The Fetch Lesson
- Carson built FixieJS as a minimalist HTMX-style kernel and learned async/fetch by reimplementing features.
- That hands-on experiment convinced him fetch made further HTMX rewrites worthwhile.
Support Old Releases During Big Breaks
- Support older major releases long enough to give users time to upgrade and provide clear migration guidance.
- Carson will keep HTMX 2 supported while staging 4.0 in alpha/beta and provide config toggles to revert behaviors.
Open Source Sponsorships Are Fragile Income
- Monetizing an open-source front-end library is hard and fragile, so treat sponsorship income as unreliable.
- Carson relies on teaching and a conservative view of sponsorships rather than building HTMX into a standalone business.