Rome

Rome is an ambitious unified toolchain project for JavaScript and TypeScript, designed to consolidate formatting, linting, bundling, and compilation capabilities into a single performant tool. Built in Rust to ensure optimal performance, Rome seeks to drastically simplify the front-end tooling ecosystem by offering zero configuration and a consistent developer experience. Although the original project was archived in 2023, its legacy continues through Biome, its direct successor.

Fundamentals

• All-in-one tool written in Rust combining formatter, linter, bundler, and compiler in a unified interface
• Zero configuration by default with intelligent conventions inspired by industry best practices
• Monolithic architecture optimized to reduce overhead and improve performance by 10 to 100 times compared to traditional tools
• Plugin and extension system enabling customization without compromising execution speed

Benefits

• Significant reduction in configuration complexity by replacing multiple tools (ESLint, Prettier, Webpack, Babel) with a single solution
• Exceptional performance through Rust implementation with parallelized parsing and intelligent caching
• Guaranteed consistency between formatting and linting through shared AST usage
• Instant project startup without requiring hours of tooling configuration
• Detailed and contextualized error messages with automatic correction suggestions
• Reduced memory footprint compared to running multiple Node.js tools simultaneously

Practical Example

Here's how Rome simplifies the development workflow by replacing complex multi-tool configuration:

{
  "$schema": "https://docs.rome.tools/schemas/12.0.0/schema.json",
  "linter": {
    "enabled": true,
    "rules": {
      "recommended": true
    }
  },
  "formatter": {
    "enabled": true,
    "indentStyle": "space",
    "indentSize": 2,
    "lineWidth": 100
  },
  "javascript": {
    "formatter": {
      "quoteStyle": "single",
      "trailingComma": "all"
    }
  }
}

# Format entire project
rome format --write .

# Lint with auto-fix
rome check --apply .

# Run format + lint in one command
rome ci .

# Check in CI/CD workflow
rome ci --formatter-enabled=true --linter-enabled=true

Implementation

1. Install Rome via npm or yarn: `npm install --save-dev rome` or use Biome (active successor)
2. Initialize configuration with `rome init` to generate a rome.json file with default settings
3. Configure linting and formatting rules according to project needs in rome.json
4. Integrate Rome commands into package.json scripts for format, lint, and check
5. Configure VSCode extension or IDE integration for automatic formatting on save
6. Add Rome commands in pre-commit hooks with Husky to ensure code quality
7. Integrate `rome ci` into CI/CD pipelines to validate code before merging

Related Tools

• Biome - Direct successor to Rome with active development and extended features
• ESLint - Traditional JavaScript linter that Rome aimed to replace
• Prettier - Opinionated code formatter often used with ESLint
• SWC - Ultra-fast Rust compiler for JavaScript/TypeScript
• esbuild - Extremely fast JavaScript bundler written in Go
• Oxlint - Ultra-fast linter developed by the Oxc team

Rome represents a bold vision of radical simplification of the JavaScript ecosystem, proving that a unified toolchain can deliver exceptional performance while reducing complexity. Although the original project is archived, its impact persists through Biome and inspires a new generation of Rust-based tools for JavaScript. For teams seeking to reduce configuration and improve development speed, transitioning to Biome offers Rome's benefits with active community support and continuous improvements.