How important is JavaScript for Web Developers?
In this blog, I will struggle, as a motion graphic designer, to try and explain why JavaScript is one of the most important tools for a modern-day web developer. I will attempt to explain why every modern web developer must know how to leverage all the benefits of JavaScript.
How Important Is It?
JavaScript’s importance can be determined from the fact that just under 95% of all websites use it. It helps make dynamic and free-flowing interactive web pages by using custom client-side scripts. There are cross-platform runtime engines like Node.js that help web developers write server-side code into JavaScript. The combination of HTML5 (Foundation), CSS3 (Looks) and JavaScript (Functionality) create websites that look amazing over multiple browsers and platforms, they are also made to be mobile responsive. Below I will list a multitude of reasons why web developers have to know how to use all of the best features of JavaScript.
Implementing Client-Side Scripts
At first JavaScript was designed as a client-side scripting language and a majority of websites still use it for this purpose solely. It is really easy to write custom client-side scripts inside of JavaScript and it is also easy to integrate the scripts seamlessly into HTML. JavaScript can also make the web page more dynamic and interactive, respond to end users instantaneously and create better UI using less server interaction and reduces the server load.
Responsive Web Design
Web designers should be making their websites responsive across multiple browsers and devices. This means not only does it have to look good, but it has to work. Responsive web design lets developers optimize a website for both computers use and mobile use using a single code base. This is done by combining all 3 of CSS3, HTML5 and JavaScript to make the web pages responsive. This is why developers use JavaScript to optimize web pages for mobile devices.
Simplify Complex Web Application Development
JavaScript simplifies the development of complex web applications by allowing developers to simplify the application’s composition. The programmers can use JavaScript libraries to create shadow DOM boundaries. In addition to simplifying the web application’s structure, the shadow DOM further decouples components of individual JavaScript libraries. The shadow DOM further make web browsers deliver documents with widely used HTML tags like div, select and input.
Keeps Evolving
As mentioned earlier, JavaScript lacks some of the advanced features provided by modern programming languages like multithreading capability and file read/write option. But the programming language has been evolving consistently to meet the emerging trends in web application development. For instance, ECMAScript 6, the latest version of JavaScript simplifies modern web application development by providing several new classes, modules, module loaders, generators and symbols, along with Unicode support and reflect API.
The modern web developers must use JavaScript to make their web applications deliver optimal user experience across various devices, operating systems, and browsers. However, they must be familiar with various JavaScript libraries, frameworks, and tools. They can even combine multiple libraries and frameworks to enhance and extend JavaScript according to requirements of large projects.
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