I wont go into detail about what it is (since the docs are good enough) but in short, it's a feature to let you setup multiple TypeScript projects in the same repo.

Some things that project references will solve: - importing test files from your impl files will throw an error - you can specify what types are available. for example you shouldn't be able to use `@types/node` in your frontend code or the `DOM` type in your test code (or vice-versa) - no type checking the whole repository again just because you changed the test.

I think there's quite some control over how strict you can be when you say you're using TypeScript. Project references is another way of making your config more robust, and it may not be necessary depending on your needs (like when some people disable strict:true). I think it's a better choice and relying on a properly configured project shouldn't be a issue for users who are actually going to use this (who are likely maintainers of their project)