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Comment by Joeri | Hacker News Reader

You don't need a build system during development. I work on a 500.000 line web app, and it has no dev time build step. You check out the source into your web root, and run the app. Edit + f5 is fast enough, no need for smart build systems. Build steps are ofcourse inevitable for the jump into production.

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For my front-end dev, it's really:

  (modify Stylus line,
  save).repeat(500)

vs :

  (modify Stylus line,
  save,
  focus terminal,
  run make (or whatever your build tool is),
  focus browser window,
  ctrl-r,
  focus editor window).repeat(500)

Of course, if you're not taking advantage of better tools than pure CSS, it's still:

  (modify CSS line,
  save,
  focus browser window,
  ctrl-r,
  focus editor window).repeat(550)

You don't NEED livereload, it's just a lot more comfortable.

Well, maybe my perspective is different because i don't touch css that often, seeing as i use extjs.

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