Jeff Dickey

@dickeyxxxhttp://dickey.xxx/

The Thick Front-EndAngularJS Mountain View

Agenda

• Why we need a Thick-Client

• How I’ve written JavaScript in the past

• How I architect new applications

This talk is about why, not what

Carbon Five

Rails is amazing

• Apps are easy to build

• We test everything

• Easy to deploy

• Packages everything for you

However applications require more interactivity now

• Automatic refresh (notifications)

• Animations

• Fast editing

• More speed

JavaScript and Rails are at odds with each other.

• JavaScript is hard to test.

• No structure is given for JavaScript.

• Turbolinks causes bugs

I used to avoid JavaScript whenever possible.

Why?

Browsers are a real platform now!

Progressive enhancement ruins applications.

Why have a Single-page app?

• Simple architecture

• Insanely fast

• Can architect back-end separately

• Free API!

• State lives in the client

If the web came out tomorrow…

Generating code intended to be executed by the client

would be insane.

Browsers are smart now. Let’s architect for that.

Demo time.

Single-page app not without problems

• 2 projects, new workflow

• Initial page-load performance

• SEO

There are solutions

• BromBone

• Prerender (phantomjs)

• render_static gem (selenium)

• escape_fragment

Marketers should not dictate how we architect.

Tooling is available!

Grunt

• Compile SASS

• Minify CSS/JS

• Shrink .png

• Test front-end

• Automate deployments

Bower

• Front-end package manager

• Like rubygems, brew or package control in Sublime

• Unobtrusive. Really simple.

Summary

• The way we build applications is dated

• The web is now ready for Thick-Client apps

• Thick Clients make architecture simple

Browsers are smart now. Treat them like it.

@dickeyxxx