Vue Storefront Next is no longer R&D

Filip Rakowski

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April 16, 2020

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Product

Just a few months ago, in a blog post about what’s in store for Vue Storefront , I depicted our new R&D pipeline, which is now getting closer to the production-ready stage. The moment has now come to share some further details with the broader community.

Technical Whitepaper

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After seven intensive months of experiments, tests, and occasional mistakes, we’ve managed to bring the Vue Storefront project to another level by introducing the current version of Next Core APIs—which is what we were aiming for all along!

We tested our ideas with two integrations natively implemented within Vue Storefront Next architecture:

1. Shopware PWA, developed in collaboration with Shopware, which is currently in the Developer Preview phase. It’s already being tested by the community members. If you’d like to check it out, the video “How to install Shopware-PWA with Shopware 6” made by Dominic Klein, Technical Specialist from Shopware, is the best place to start. You can also exchange knowledge with early adopters on our #shopware-pwa Slack channel.

2. Commercetools integration co-sponsored by LoveCrafts , which will be also the first client using it! The integration recently became a part of commercetools accelerator and will soon enter the Developer Preview phase as well. We are regularly posting updates on the #commercetools channel on our Slack, which you are welcome to join if you want to be first to test it!

Both of these integrations have proven that Vue Storefront Next APIs are well-designed and provide great developer experiences—and that gave us the confidence to take the next step.

What we are planning to do in VSF Next?

After gaining feedback from developers and partners, we decided to move the Next project into the main Vue Storefront repository and keep it under the next branch. This will make it simpler for us to keep the same tooling quality across the whole repository, maintain it together with the current version, and keep the high traffic on our main repository.

What does it mean for the current Vue Storefront project? Not much really. It will still be where it was on the master branch, so you can contribute and update your existing shops in the same way you always have. This change will only affect the Vue Storefront Next development. The only difference you will notice on the current repo is a bunch of new issues labeled next. We're also not expecting to start working on Vue Storefront Next for Magento in the next two quarters since it already has a stable and well-tested integration implemented in more than 100 live shops !

The desired branch structure in Vue Storefront repository will look like this:

master: stays the same
develop: stays the same
next: Vue Storefront Next
next-develop: Vue Storefront Next develop branch

The process of moving the Next project to the main repository will start this Friday and last (hopefully) till Monday. We will be posting updates about the progress on our Slack.

At this point, you probably have a lot of questions. Based on the ones we've already got from community members, I've already prepared some FAQs that may address your queries:

Is Vue Storefront Next production-ready?

It’s really close but not yet. We can safely assume that both Shopware and commercetools integrations will be production-ready in this quarter.

When we can expect Vue Storefront Next for Magento?

In the next 2 quarters, we want to focus on building integrations for new platforms. Vue Storefront already works great with Magento; therefore, the need for the Next integration is not urgent. We are adopting certain parts of the Next architecture within the current Vue Storefront. We recently introduced the Capybara theme with Storefront UI and soon we will also integrate Storefront API. You can read more about the relation of VSF Next to Magento in this great post written by Jisse Reitsma.

What are the main differences between the current Vue Storefront and Vue Storefront Next?

They are totally different projects. Vue Storefront Next is a full rewrite of Vue Storefront based on Composition API and Nuxt.js. It also doesn’t require any middleware. Some parts of Next architecture like Storefront UI are already implemented in the current Vue Storefront though.

Where I can learn more about Vue Storefront Next?

The main and most comprehensive source of knowledge is the official documentation (currently WIP). You can also check the videos we posted on our YouTube channel about VSF Next as a whole and API Client .

What will happen with the current Vue Storefront repository?

The only change you will notice will be two more branches and a bunch of new issues with a next tag. Everything else will remain the same. If you’re already a Vue Storefront user, you don’t need to take any action.

Can I contribute to Next?

Vue Storefront Next is not officially open for external contributions yet but no one will stop you from proposing an unofficial Pull Request :) Just keep in mind that we are still lacking some documentation about the repository, so it could be a bit challenging.

What will happen with the old Vue Storefront Next repository?

The old repository will be archived.

What else?

Commercetools and Shopware are not the only integrations that we are building within Vue Storefront Next architecture. Now that we know that our R&D efforts were fruitful, we want to deliver integrations with all major eCommerce platforms!

Recently, we started three new integrations:

They are still in the very early stages but we aim to have an MVP for each of them in the next quarter. We will inform you about the detailed roadmap for each of them soon!