Web development has been the greatest nexus of software innovation for the last two decades, and its influence has transformed the entire landscape around it. It has fundamentally changed data storage (XML, JSON), app integration (embedded Google Maps, share buttons), graphic design (CSS sweeping away embedded images and paving the road to flat design), and much more.
Many of these innovations began as surprising hacks which pushed browsers beyond their limits and created significant problems with security, performance, and visual rendering.
As these hacks became mainstream features, developers took two different approaches to fixing the problems. Some worked on creating front-end libraries which smoothed over the flaws in the browsers, while others worked on the more difficult problem of fixing the browsers themselves.
Front-end Javascript libraries can significantly improve developer productivity and a new, improved framework will see rapid and widespread adoption. However, the slower work of fixing the browsers themselves continues in the background, making those Javascript libraries obsolete and introducing powerful new browser features.
As we speak, there is an incredible array of new features in the latest browsers which are going mostly unused, because most web developers don't want to touch them until that last 5% of older browsers die off. Today, it might look as if a certain web framework is the be-all and end-all of web development, but in reality the groundwork has already been laid for it to be obsoleted and replaced by better, faster, more secure, more productive tools.
Many of these innovations began as surprising hacks which pushed browsers beyond their limits and created significant problems with security, performance, and visual rendering.
As these hacks became mainstream features, developers took two different approaches to fixing the problems. Some worked on creating front-end libraries which smoothed over the flaws in the browsers, while others worked on the more difficult problem of fixing the browsers themselves.
Front-end Javascript libraries can significantly improve developer productivity and a new, improved framework will see rapid and widespread adoption. However, the slower work of fixing the browsers themselves continues in the background, making those Javascript libraries obsolete and introducing powerful new browser features.
As we speak, there is an incredible array of new features in the latest browsers which are going mostly unused, because most web developers don't want to touch them until that last 5% of older browsers die off. Today, it might look as if a certain web framework is the be-all and end-all of web development, but in reality the groundwork has already been laid for it to be obsoleted and replaced by better, faster, more secure, more productive tools.