You’ve probably heard that HCL Digital Experience can run modern JavaScript apps - yes, even your favorite React, Angular and Vue.js creations. And if you’ve tried Vibe Coding, you already know how effortlessly it lets you spin up these kinds of applications.
But here’s the real question: what happens when you bring these capabilities together inside HCL Digital Experience — and how can that actually move your business forward?
Transforming an existing Front-End JavaScript application into an HCL Digital Experience (DX) Script Application can provide several strategic and operational benefits - especially if your organization is already using HCL DX as a primary digital experience platform.
Here’s why you might want to do it and how to get you started:
1. Seamless Integration into the HCL DX Ecosystem
HCL DX provides a unified platform for managing content, personalization, security, and rendering. Converting your Front-End JavaScript app into a Script Application allows it to:
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Run natively inside HCL DX pages as Micro Frontends
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Share the same authentication and session context
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Integrate with DX-specific services (APIs for content personalization, DAM and HCL Foundry)
This avoids building separate integration layers.
2. Easier Content Authoring & Page Composition
Non-technical authors can:
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Drag and drop your Front-End JavaScript app as a component onto a page, and mix and match with other content and applications (these applications may be other Front-End JavaScript Script Applications as well as HCL Leap and HCL Volt MX ones)
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Reuse it across different sites or pages
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Configure it using standard DX page component settings, for example using portlet preferences and configure spot/targeting options
Your development team still writes Front-End JavaScript (or other kind of applications), but marketing teams can structure pages without deploying code changes.
3. Centralized Governance and Security
HCL DX provides:
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Standardized login/session management
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Access control
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The ability to take advantage of the standard outbound HTTP connection service that proxies URLs
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Auditing and governance tools
Turning your standalone Front-End JavaScript app into a Script Application ensures it inherits these security and compliance controls automatically.
4. Simplified Deployment & Lifecycle Management
A Script Application allows you to:
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Deploy JavaScript bundles through DX
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Version and manage the app directly in the DX environment
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Take advantage of WCM syndication to avoid manually syncing front-end assets across environments
Different teams may each write and manage their own applications and as DX Script Applications, it makes updates easier and safer for enterprise IT.
5. Leverage DX’s Performance Framework
DX optimizes delivery of Script Applications via:
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Caching
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CDN integration
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Shared DX resources
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Optimized loading and rendering pipelines
You get enterprise-grade performance without needing to rebuild your own optimization layer.
6. Reduce Friction in a Multi-Channel Delivery Strategy
If your organization distributes content across:
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Web portals
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Internal authenticated portals
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Partner sites
Converting the Front-End JavaScript application makes it automatically available to these channels.
7. Keep Your Existing Investment
Switching to a Script Application allows you to package your existing SPA or widgets into a DX-managed environment.
You keep:
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Your existing Front-End JavaScript architecture
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Your component library
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Your build process (Webpack/Vite/etc.)
DX simply becomes the hosting, integration, and delivery layer.
Try this out now?
Convert for example a React app into an HCL DX Script Application to gain integration, governance, and enterprise capabilities from HCL DX while still using your React codebase. It’s about combining the flexibility of React with the enterprise features of the HCL Digital Experience platform.
These are the main steps to follow:
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Project Creation: Start with your existing React app or directly create an HCL DX React Script Application using create-dx-script-app.
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DX Integration: Transforming the standard React application into a reusable DX Script Application by:
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Ensuring relative URLs in the build output.
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Using the Script Portlet Namespace (
__SPNS__) to generate a unique root ID, allowing multiple instances on the same page. -
Optionally updating styling to match the one of your DX theme, so you may centrally manage the look & feel.
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Data Integration: You may want to consider using HCL Volt Foundry to manage these integrations and use it as a secured middleware.
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Build and Deployment: Building the application using
npm run buildand then deploying the minified resources to the DX server as a new Script Application using the configured DXClient commands and package.json scripts. -
Inter-Application Communication: Optionally setting up communication between different applications on the same DX page.
To try this out yourself now, you may use the HCL DX Help Center and HCLSoftware U Learning Materials.
For example, you may learn more about Script Applications with HDX-DEV-200 Script Application which comes with the Script Application Lab and corresponding Script Application Lab Resources.
Part 3 of this lab, titled “Create a new React Script Applications that manage product data stored in HCL Leap”, focuses on the end-to-end process of developing and deploying a modern JavaScript application into HCL Digital Experience (DX).
You will create new React Product List and Product Details Script Applications that work with HCL Leap application data. You will first test them locally, then build minified versions, deploy them to the server, add them to a DX page and finally have them communicate with each together.
Have fun and I’m looking forward to hearing your results and feedback.