DEV Community: Ellai

The Future of JavaScript

Ellai — Tue, 04 Apr 2023 06:00:02 +0000

JavaScript is one of the most popular programming languages in the world, used by millions of developers to build web applications, mobile apps, and even desktop applications. As the language continues to evolve, it's important for developers to stay up-to-date with the latest features and trends.

Here are a few things to keep an eye on as we look to the future of JavaScript:

1. WebAssembly
WebAssembly is a binary instruction format for a stack-based virtual machine that can be used in web browsers to run high-performance code. In the future, WebAssembly is expected to become a key technology for running computationally-intensive tasks in the browser, such as video encoding or machine learning.

2. Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence
JavaScript is increasingly being used in the field of machine learning and artificial intelligence, with libraries such as TensorFlow.js and Brain.js making it easier to build machine learning models in the browser. As machine learning and AI become more important in the development of web applications, JavaScript will likely become an increasingly important language in this area.

3. GraphQL
GraphQL is a query language for APIs that allows developers to request only the data they need, reducing the amount of network traffic required for a given request. JavaScript is often used to build GraphQL APIs and clients, and as GraphQL adoption continues to grow, it's likely that JavaScript will become even more important in this area.

4. WebAssembly System Interface (WASI)
WebAssembly System Interface (WASI) is a new standard that allows WebAssembly modules to interact with the operating system and file system in a safe and portable way. As WASI adoption grows, JavaScript developers will be able to write system-level code in WebAssembly and use it in their JavaScript applications.

5. Virtual and Augmented Reality
JavaScript is increasingly being used to build virtual and augmented reality applications, with libraries such as A-Frame and React 360 making it easier to build immersive experiences in the browser. As virtual and augmented reality continue to gain popularity, JavaScript will likely become an increasingly important language in this area.

6. Security and Performance
As the use of JavaScript continues to grow, developers will need to pay increasing attention to security and performance. Libraries such as WebAssembly and Deno are designed with security in mind, while tools such as Webpack and Rollup can be used to optimize the performance of JavaScript applications.

7. Serverless Architecture
Serverless architecture allows developers to build applications without worrying about the underlying infrastructure. As more developers adopt serverless architecture, it's likely that JavaScript will become an increasingly important language for building serverless applications.

In conclusion, the future of JavaScript is bright, with new features, tools, and applications on the horizon. By staying up-to-date with the latest trends and technologies, JavaScript developers can ensure that they are well-positioned to take advantage of all that the language has to offer.

Photo by Pakata Goh on Unsplash

What makes a frontend developer considered to be a senior excluding the working years ?

Ellai — Fri, 27 Jan 2023 07:19:12 +0000

My experience with JavaScript and PHP as a junior web developer.

Ellai — Tue, 12 Jul 2022 11:51:14 +0000

Community support and resource for PHP and JavaScript

JavaScript have larger community support and resources such as libraries, frameworks, tutorials and learning materials.

This could be debatable but numbers don't lie, you can literally see the numbers of tutorial uploaded everyday related to JavaScript compared to PHP language, or amount of JavaScript frameworks dominating the modern web development.

Installation hell and get started with PHP

When it comes to learning or developing with PHP as beginner, I have realised the only way you could run a PHP is via web server solution(XAMPP)/development environment(Laragon)/or Live Server(non DB connected code).

And to download one, is not a child's play. You required to be tech savvy or at least able to read documentation for several time in order to have successful PHP installation in your machine/laptop.

Don't believe? Get a laptop without any programming language installed in it, and try to run a PHP script vs a JavaScript(No installation needed, you can run JavaScript literally at your browser)

Access to DOM

When you are developing a website / or web application using PHP as your dominant stack. You are forced to write jQuery(a JavaScript library) to manipulate your DOM, or use internal JavaScript script tags to access DOM Node to add any kind of event listeners.

Control over frontend side of the application

Even Laravel the most popular free, open-source PHP framework integrates with Vue.js(a JavaScript framework) to aid the frontend reactivity and to enhance SPA web development speed.

Laravel does have a framework of its own, which is LiveWire uses AlpineJS(built with Javascript as well).

Final thoughts

If you have started working with JavaScript as a beginner, you will never come across PHP language. But if you, started as a beginner with PHP for web development, be ready to face JavaScript as it dominates the web development even in PHP's own ecosystem.

These are my personal thoughts and experiences with both PHP and JavaScript. I have learnt PHP way earlier than JavaScript and I have spend almost equal time with both development language.

I welcome all open minds to share your thoughts on post and eager to know your point of view too.

Learning Approach That You Should Take To Be Able To Code as a Beginner.

Ellai — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 06:24:58 +0000

Why this post matters to you ?

Before I start advising the newbie coders and devs, let me share to you why my advices will be useful for you in an unexpected way.

Often times, we get our career tips and advices from the most successful and talented engineers and ended up in a situation where we find it hard to related to them because they are just built different.

Yes, some people are just natural born coders from the way they look at solving problems and their ability to grasp technical concepts. But there are people who just thought they will be good at being a programmer and it turned out to be nightmare. I am one of you who had nightmares when it comes to programming and here's what I did to survive and become confident with my experience and skills.

Change of learning approach

This was the biggest game changer for me and I can't be more happy even though I only understood it at end of my bachelor's degree. Coming out from traditional education from high school.

We been adapted to a learning style where we tend to learn by reading, get informed, and watch more tutorials and lectures. We always keep it as our main approach when learning something.

But using the same approach while learning to code will only make you more anxious and grow self doubt from unseen growth in your coding skills.

The secret to learn to code, is to drop all the tutorials, lectures, and taking notes.

Watching coding tutorials and expecting to be a good programmer is like watching Football match and expecting to be a professional footballer

What makes you good at programming is practice. Practice what you learn. E.g. if you are learning about for-loop. Create a new project, and try to apply and make use of for-loop in that project. If you are looking out to be a web developer, create a simple button and make it clickable.

If you don't know where to even begin, ask yourself what's stopping you from doing what you supposed to do. Most often you may not have a tiny bit of idea if you're a completed beginner. That's okay, go read the basics, come back to create what you wanted to develop. Still have no idea ? Go back and read more and come back to develop and repeat the cycle.

This process looks so wrong but that's exactly how you teach yourself to code and that's how it worked for me(a guy who my peers used to say coding is not for me).

Also bare in mind, the hardest phase of learning to code is the beginning phase. It gets better as it goes. So expect to feel bad about your knowledge and skills once you start writing code on your own, we all do!

Now before you jump at me at the comment section, let me explain what I'm saying. Although following along the tutorials and lectures will get you more informed on what you are doing, it should never be the main learning technique.

Only because it sacrifices other experiences that you may strengthen while coding in your own like critical thinking, confidence in finding your solution, first hand experience in developing a program.

Be creative in finding learning resources.

As I mentioned, coding on your own without step by step guide should be your main learning to code approach.

Knowing where to find good learning resources comes second after that. Look out to read articles on engineers lifestyle, experiences, tech concepts breakdowns while you are not on your desk coding.

Sometimes explanation on certain topics may not be straight forward or we find it hard to wrap our mind around it. In this case, continue to find alternative articles that explains the topic in a way that you can understand it. It's very common to be in this situation.

Platforms like dev.to, medium.com can be used to learn tech topics and concepts. While Reddit platform is good for realistic, no sugar coating discussion among developers/engineers community.

Momentum in learning to code.

Be sure to engage yourself in coding or reading coding related articles frequently.

We are humans, we do have times where we don't feel like to code everyday. In this situation, feel free to relax yourself and try reading some tech articles or listen to tech podcasts.

Try to keep indulging yourself in tech discussion and keep the momentum going. And useful rule of thumb here is, don't go more than 3 days without writing code in a week. Only take that much break if you're burned out or totally busy with your schedule.

Technology world is potentially bigger than our actual world so you should be able to find something that you love within it. So don't stop exploring, you might be the leader for something we didn't even know it exists.

Hope this blog helped you to strengthen your first few steps into this amazing tech world. I will be writing more contents to help non tech savvy people.