9 Open Source Gems To Become The Ultimate Developer 🔥
TL;DR
Today, there are many interesting projects that are not so popular, but which have good potential to help you become a good specialist.
In this article, I have prepared 9 such hidden projects, knowledge of which will give you an advantage in the labor market.
Well, let's get started! 🏎️
1. 🐜 HMPL.js - Server-oriented customizable templating for JavaScript
Let's start with a small template language for getting HTML from the server. Thanks to its syntax and the hmpl-dom add-on, it is a great replacement for popular libraries like HTMX and Alpine.js.
The HMPL is a declarative template language designed for server-side UI rendering with client-side interactivity.
2. 👀 Mockoon - Easiest and quickest way to run mock APIs locally
Next on the list will be a module for the "fake" API. Mocking helps you speed up development and third-party API integration by reducing dependency on external services and their limitations: rate limits, costs, availability, etc.
It combines a desktop application to design and run mock servers locally, and a CLI to self-host your fake APIs. A cloud is also available to collaborate with your team, keep your data in sync, and deploy your mock APIs.
3. 💨 Vue-Vapor - Variant of Vue that offers rendering without the Virtual DOM
This is a mod coming to the Vue framework that allows for an order of magnitude speedup over regular Vue. This is a test implementation, but the day is near when this will become the main one.
This repository is a fork of vuejs/core and is used for research and development of no virtual dom mode.
4. 🧠 MLX - An array framework for Apple silicon
Also, I would like to tell you about the official solution from Apple for those who are engaged in Machine Learning.
MLX is a NumPy-like array framework designed for efficient and flexible machine learning on Apple silicon, brought to you by Apple machine learning research.
5. 🕷 Supertest - Super-agent driven library for testing node.js HTTP servers using a fluent API
Yes, a bit old, of course, but no less relevant module for testing http. Usually, other, more recent solutions are used, but this module is also valid even in 2025. Example of use:
const request = require('supertest');
request(app)
.get('/user')
.expect('Content-Type', /json/);
The motivation with this module is to provide a high-level abstraction for testing HTTP, while still allowing you to drop down to the lower-level API provided by superagent.
6. 📚 VuePress - Minimalistic Vue-powered static site generator
A library for generating documentation from .md files. Similar to Jekyll, but also uses Vue under the hood to extend functionality.
VuePress is a markdown-centered static site generator. You can write your content (documentations, blogs, etc.) in Markdown, then VuePress will help you to generate a static site to host them.
7. 🗄️ Nx - Build system, optimized for monorepos, with AI-powered architectural awareness and advanced CI capabilities
Next up is a pretty useful thing that will allow you to interact with multiple services in your app in one place.
Nx Cloud connects directly to your existing CI setup, helping you scale your monorepos on CI by leveraging remote caching, task distribution across multiple machines, automated e2e test splitting and automated task flakiness detection
8. ▲ Turborepo - Build system optimized for JavaScript and TypeScript, written in Rust
I wouldn't exactly call it something hidden, but the fact is that many people use Next.js without knowing that it is based on a module bundler called Turborepo. It can be useful, just like Webpack.
Turborepo is a high-performance build system for JavaScript and TypeScript codebases, written in Rust.
9 Readme.so - An online drag-and-drop editor to easily build READMEs
Well, and finally, I can give you a small but very useful visual editor for your Readme files.
Readme.so is an online editor to help developers make readmes for their project.
🖋️ Conclusion
All these modules are rarely found in discussions, but nevertheless, they are quite useful and knowing them, you can confidently say that you will have the skills and tools for your projects to solve seemingly complex, but with this baggage, passable tasks.
Thank you very much for reading this article ❤️!
What other projects do you know that are not so popular, but also useful? It will be interesting to find out in the comments!
P.S. Also, don't forget to help me and star HMPL!