Hey r/reactjs! I just released an interview with Aurora Scharff (DX Engineer at Vercel, React Certification Lead at certificates.dev) and thought folks here might find it interesting.

We talked about:

Her path into React

- Started in robotics and intelligent systems, found her way into web dev

- Went deep on React and Next.js, became a Microsoft MVP

- Recently joined Vercel to work on developer experience

React Server Components

- Why RSCs require a real mental model shift, not just learning new syntax

- Experienced React devs often struggle more than newcomers because they keep reaching for client-side patterns

- How to think about the server/client boundary when designing components

Next.js App Router vs Page Router

- The shift isn't just an API change, it's a fundamentally different way to structure apps

- Practical lessons from rebuilding a legacy government system on the App Router

- Deploying on Vercel vs Azure and what surprised her

React certifications in the AI era

- She's building the React certification at certificates.dev

- Her take: when AI can generate code, proving you understand the fundamentals becomes more important

- Certifications aren't about gatekeeping, they're about depth of understanding

Speaking and community

- How she went from zero talks to 30+ conference appearances

- Why putting yourself out there early matters even when you feel like you're not ready

Full episode here:

- YouTube: https://youtu.be/4Llhem0M1Og

- Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6UW8rszpV4eOAYwxK4trH4

Would love to hear your thoughts or answer any questions!

Also suggest me some guests you want to see!

If your data only flows in one direction (server → client), you probably don't need WebSockets.

Server-Sent Events cover a lot of these cases and come with some nice defaults out of the box:

• EventSource is native to the browser
• Auto-reconnects on connection drop without any extra code
• Works over standard HTTP

That said, there are two real gotchas that don't get talked about enough:

Auth is awkward. EventSource doesn't support custom headers, so you can't just attach a Bearer token. Most workarounds involve passing the token as a query param (not ideal) or using a library that wraps the native API.

HTTP/2 buffering. SSE can behave unexpectedly with HTTP/2 in production, such as updates being delayed or connections timing out silently, depending on your infrastructure setup.

For anything needing true bidirectional communication, WebSockets are still the right tool. But for dashboards, live feeds, or progress updates, I believe SSE is simpler, faster to wire up, and more than reliable enough.

Made a short video on this if you'd rather watch than read: https://youtu.be/oZJf-OYSxbg