Prerender - AngularJS SEO, BackboneJS SEO, or EmberJS SEO

CloseBrace | A Brief, Incomplete History of JavaScript

Another deep dive into web history, this time on JavaScript. The timeline of JS on the web is retroactively broken down into four eras:

• the early era: ~1996 – 2004,
• the jQuery era: ~2004 – 2010,
• the Single Page App era: ~2010 - 2014, and
• the modern era: ~2014 - present.

Nice to see “vanilla” JavaScript making a resurgence in that last one.

It’s 2017, the JavaScript ecosystem is both thriving and confusing as all hell. No one seems to be quite sure where it’s headed, only that it’s going to continue to grow and change. The web’s not going anywhere, which means JS isn’t going anywhere, and I’m excited to see what future eras bring us.

Aerotwist - The Cost of Frameworks

Here’s Paul’s write-up of his excellent talk at FF Conf.

Previously I’ve used the term “developer convenience” when describing the benefits of using a framework. Paul uses the term “ergonomics” to describe those benefits. I like that. I worry sometimes that the term “developer convenience” sounds dismissive, which isn’t at all my intention—making our lives as developers less painful is hugely important …but it’s just not as important as improving the lives of the end users (in my opinion …and Paul’s).

As I look at frameworks, I see the ergonomic benefits (and those are important, I agree!), but I can’t help but feel that, for many developers, investing in knowledge of the web platform itself is the best long-term bet. Frameworks come and go, it just seems to be the ebb and flow of the web, and, as I said above, they do contribute ideas and patterns. But if you ever find that the one you use no longer works for you, or has a bug that remains unfixed, being able to understand the platform that underpins it will help enormously.

You should use [insert library/framework], it’s the bestestest! / Paul Lewis - YouTube

This was one of favourite talks at this year’s FF Conf. But I will readily admit there’s a hefty dollop of confirmation bias in my enjoyment.

Researching the Performance costs of JavaScript MVC Frameworks

The Filament Group run the numbers on how long it takes browsers to parse the JavaScript of popular MVC frameworks: Backbone, Angular, and Ember. The results—especially on mobile browsers—are not encouraging.