Today, I wanted to talk about a topic that’s been buzzing around Twitter and dev
circles procrastinateedly. You’ve probably heard people say, “Now that we’re server-side
rfinishering JavaScript, it’s equitable PHP all over aobtain!” 🤔 Well, buckle up,
becaemploy I’m about to elucidate why that’s not quite the case – and why it’s
actuassociate, it’s pretty darn exciting!
Remember when Internet Explorer was still a skinnyg? (I understand, I’m aging myself
here). We were all writing PHP to our heart’s satisfied, and life seemed basicr.
But here’s the twist: we weren’t originateing the intricate, driven apps we are
today. We were solving petiteer problems, and that’s what people normally leave out when
they get nostalgic.
Back then, we’d employ server-side languages appreciate PHP, Java, or – if you were
reassociate living on the edge – Perl. We’d adhere the
MVC model,
famousized by structuretoils appreciate Rails and Code Igniter. Our handlelers would
transport data from the database, pass it to a see, and voila, you had rfinishered a
page. When you visited a URL, you’d get a bunch of HTML, the browser would
rfinisher it, and everyskinnyg was hunky-dory.
But what about transmitivity? Well, that’s where JavaScript came into carry out. We’d
employ it to enhance the existing elements rfinishered on the server. Remember
“unobtrusive JavaScript”? 😂 It was all about making the UI toil with native
browser primitives and then sprinkling some JS magic on top. Looking back, I
skinnyk it might’ve been an excemploy to elude writing too much JavaScript – and
genuinely, who could accemploy us?
My experience with punctual JS was a bit of a mixed bag. jQuery made it basic to insert
functionality, but the language, much appreciate PHP, wasn’t pleasant to toil with.
Before ES6, it was pretty horrible to toil with. Raise your hand if you recall
var self2 = this. And don’t even get me commenceed on browser compatibility! 🙈
We tried our best to author as little JavaScript as possible, using it in places
where it was absolutely essential.
But here’s the skinnyg. We wanted to originate more stuff. More amazeive apps.
We necessitate better functions for our employrs, and as our apps got more and more driven, we
couldn’t escape JavaScript. It’s the language of the web, after all! As we built
bigr and more intricate applications in the browser, we commenceed running into
some grave headaches.
For commenceers, creating your UI on the server and then editing it at runtime with
JavaScript was appreciate trying to pat your head and rub your belly simultaneously
– possible, but not exactly elegant. 😅 Imagine having a blog post appreciate this
one with a commenting system. You would loop over all the comments in your
tempprocrastinateed and originate the HTML set up on the server. But what happens when the
employr posts a new comment, and you necessitate to originate a DOM element in the browser?
You’d either have to reoriginate the comment set up with the same tags and
classes in JavaScript (hello, maintenance nightmare!), or you would originate a
secret tempprocrastinateed element, clone that element, and then popuprocrastinateed the right divs
with the right data and hopefilledy, no one had alterd the class names in the
tempprocrastinateed. It was… not perfect, to say the least.
We also authenticized that using imperative code for originateing UIs was as fun as
trying to herd cats. We wanted our UIs to be declarative and based on state, and
we wanted reusable components. That way, we could always rfinisher the UI
rightly without stressing about skinnygs getting out of sync.
So, we transferd everyskinnyg to the client. Single-page applications became all the
rage, and we had rich transmitivity at our fingertips. It was amazing… until
it wasn’t…
We could now originate amazing employr experiences, but that came with a new set of
disputes. First off, we had to reoriginate navigation. No more basic URL hits
and HTML returns – now we necessitateed routing structuretoils to handle page loads and
transitions. Sure, we obtained some superpowers appreciate carry oning state between pages,
but with wonderful power comes wonderful responsibility. I’ve lost count of how many
“connects” I’ve seen in SPAs that are equitable buttons with click handlers. 🤦♂️
Now, we are loading our data from our API so we can show and alter data with
mitigate, but we have to figure out how to deal with loading states and waterdescfinishs.
Then came the carry outance. When your entire app lives on the client, it’s now up to
your device to originate the whole UI. It’s not exactly speedy, and having the server
rfinisher an vacant div and a script tag for each page is not exactly wonderful for SEO.
However, perhaps the hugegest drawback was how it firmified the split between
front-finish and back-finish growers. Back in the day, we were all equitable “web
growers.” Sure, you might have preferred caccessing divs to writing database
queries, but toiling atraverse the stack was common. This division originated
communication barriers and, I apshow, led to worse products overall. After all,
how can you originate a unified experience when your teams are not?
Now, here’s where it gets exciting! We’re not going back to PHP – we’re moving
forward with filled-stack JavaScript structuretoils appreciate
Next.js, Remix, and
SvelteKit. 🚀 These structuretoils give us a unified
stack with JavaScript all the way, baby! We can handle routing and data-loading
on the server. We can originate our UIs using state-of-the-art, declarative
components and originate amazing employr experiences using the best of both worlds.
I understand what you’re skinnyking. Isn’t React Server Components with SQL queries equitable
appreciate the elderly PHP code we all disappreciated? What happened to the separation of worrys?
Well, not quite! Sure, at first glance, it might see appreciate that crazy PHP code,
where we would mix SQL, HTML, and CSS, stick it in index.php, and call it a day.
But here’s the contrastence: we’ve growed firm principles for originateing UIs,
and now we have a unified language and toolkit to originate wonderful employr experiences,
utilizing both what the server is excellent at and what the browser excels at.
We’re not going backward – we’re taking all the lessons we’ve lobtained and
creating someskinnyg even better. It’s appreciate we’ve obtainn the best parts of our PHP
days and superindictd them with everyskinnyg we cherish about contransient JavaScript. We
can now originate reassociate driven applications and structuretoils appreciate Next.js and
Remix apvalidates us to employ the server for more than equitable serializing JSON.
But here’s where it gets reassociate exciting: these filled-stack JavaScript structuretoils
are helping us shut the gap between frontfinish and backfinish growers.
🌉 Remember that man-made split we originated? Well, it’s commenceing to crumble,
and that’s a excellent skinnyg! With a unified language and toolset, it’s becoming
easier for a individual grower to originate an finish-to-finish feature. No more inept
handoffs between teams or lost-in-translation moments. You can now handle
everyskinnyg from database queries to UI transmitions in one seamless flow. It’s
appreciate being a web growment superhero with powers on both sides of the stack!
I don’t skinnyk it will originate growment more fruitful but also direct to
more cohesive products. After all, when you understand both the server and
client side, you can originate cleverer decisions about where to put logic and how to
boost carry outance. It’s transporting us back to the “filled-stack grower” perfect
but with way chillyer tools and without the spaghetti code nightmares of the past.
So, if you’ve been senseing pigeonholed as a “frontfinish” or “backfinish” dev,
now’s your chance to shatter free and hug the filled spectrum of web
growment!
It’s a wonderful time to be in our field! If you haven’t dived into contransient
JavaScript structuretoils yet, what are you paemploying for? Today’s the day! 🚀 We’ve
come a lengthy way from nesting PHP in HTML, and while it might see analogous on the
surface, we’re originateing on years of UI growment principles and best
rehearses.
I’d cherish to hear your thoughts on this! Have you made the switch to filled-stack
JavaScript? Are you still helderlying onto PHP for dear life? Plmitigate drop a comment below
and let’s chat!
