Sometimes the digital landscape can be truly intimidating and I’ll not blame you for that. Any individual without a proper background in web development will feel the same. The whole action of web development process is conventionally divided into client-side coding, server-side coding and, database technology.
Best industrial practices are being carried out in developing a website, do you know why? In this post, we will learn only about the front-end web development/client-side coding in detail.
What is Front-end Web Development?
What is the first thing that you see in a browser? Well obviously, it’s the websites. It is a usual thing that before using any website you will first witness the visual aspects of a website. Then your mind questions you whether you are impressed or not? Of course, this is where things start to boil.
Front-end web development deals with the static aspect of the whole development process. The user-experience given by any website is completely dependent on the front-end development.
Till this point I know I did not provide my readers with a proper definition, so here it is, ‘Also known as client-side development, the process deals with visual front-end elements that are viewed/accessed by the users/clients’.
And you might have heard something as client-side scripts, and I’ll surely make you understand even that.
What is Client-side Scripting?
Before taking the traditional approach of explaining about the question put forward, let me tell you something, client-side scripts are essential to process every request, to support every interaction within a web page (these requests are executed by the browser).
These things seemed confusing even for me on my first encounter with this subject; hence, I will help you out with an easy approach. Before knowing about client-side scripting or whatever, first, understand the word script.
‘A script represents a set of instructions that are used as a communication channel between a web page and the browser (client-side scripting) or a server (server-side scripting).’
JavaScript is one of the widely used client-side scripting languages, and the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript are the three languages governing the front-end development.
- Structuring (HTML)
- Appearance (CSS)
- Functionality (JavaScript)
Now, I think it is the time I give a classic definition for client-side scripting, I know, irrespective of what explanations people read, in the end, they look for such.
‘It is a program where the necessary files are accessed from web browser before being executed on the client-side’.
In simple words, the front-end developers add life to the visual elements that web designers envisage.
The Challenges in Front-End Development
Even though it is a static affair, it is necessary to find the account of why the developers are facing heat in the name of fundamentals. Well, maybe they are not very elemental issues I guess, so, let us catch on few and see for ourselves.
- Cross-Browser Compatibility
- With more web browsers to work on, developers are finding it more challenging to reach every customer out there. Such setbacks are to be addressed clearly as they may affect the popularity of a website or an application.
- Responsive Design
- Another criterion, but trust me this has become stale, and seriously, every website today should be a responsive one, if not it is definitely a big setback.
- JavaScript Framework
- One can find a plethora of front-end frameworks, but the art of choosing a relevant framework is what needed in a developer.
- Web Performance Optimization
- You can call it as the loading time, the user experience and interactivity are what counts in retaining the interests of a customer.
