Opensource.com publishes a wealth of information for a wide range of technical topics. We all have our own favorites, and programming languages seem to be a special delight among our readers.
JavaScript is undeniably a super popular language. Browsing the web seems to consistently put JavaScript into the top 10 used and sought-after skills, especially since something over 90% of web sites use it in some capacity. NPM alone has over 800k package offerings, further affirming its popularity. Given this, I suspect very many of our readers have some experience with this technology.
This year we saw a pair of introductory articles I thought gave a nice introduction to JavaScript’s popularity:
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How JavaScript became a serious programming language gives a brief history of how JavaScript came to be, mentioning a bit of nostalgia that some of you more seasoned techies will remember.
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4 reasons why JavaScript is so popular is a follow-on article to the above that affirms those qualities that make JavaScript so successful. JavaScript caters to all levels of skill, spans multiple platforms, has a great community, and a multitude of modern frameworks.
As noted above, one of JavaScript’s defining qualities is the wealth of frameworks and tools available to the developer. Check out these articles for a number of great references that may help you start or improve your programming workflow:
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9 open source JavaScript frameworks for front-end web development Dives into some of the JavaScript’s heavy hitters. Well knowns like Angular and ReactJS are there, as was a surprising number of others that are great to learn about.
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13 of the best React JavaScript frameworks If you are interested in ReactJS, here is a huge list of compatible frameworks you can consider to supercharge your application. Each is given brief examples on how to install, how to initialize, and the specific advantages the code has to offer you.
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10 ReactJS tools to boost your web development skills Following along the frameworks, ReactJS has a plethora of useful tools you can adopt to help bootstrap, design, and organize your projects. The author suggests learning these "must have" utilities to bolster your potential value to employers.
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9 favorite open source tools for Node.js developers Node.js is JavaScript’s entry into server-side programming. Having direct control over both front-end and back-end helps to streamline development productivity. Here is a list of Node.js specific productivity tools that cover security, developer productivity, and build management.
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My favorite 10 Node.js projects This article covers essential tools that will help you with Node.js projects. These include editors, testing tools, style/linting processors, and application frameworks. Some great stuff here to consider; VSCode and Electron being 2 of my personal favorites.
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Use your favorite programming language to provision Infrastructure as Code Pulumi is a cross-language “Infrastructure as Code” provisioning tool that can help create project resources such as containers and cloud services. The author here presents some basic provisioning examples centered around the TypeScript programming language.
Last but not least we have a pair of articles covering new JavaScript features and framework conversion:
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Streamline your JavaScript code with top-level await This article first introduces the concepts of asynchronous event processing by explaining callbacks, promises, and async/await. It explores a new JavaScript feature called “top-level await” to support module level asynchronous initialization. The author then dives into construction of a simple news reading app using this new top-level await functionality.
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9 reasons I upgraded from AngularJS to Angular Angular is very popular framework which currently has 2 active flavors, the original AngularJS and its more modern TypeScript successor, Angular. No (migration) pain, no gain -- but the benefits to both developer and end user seems well worth it.
It is clear from the multitude of “lists” here that JavaScript has a rich and vibrant community of developers. Given the enormous number of projects and tools available, I'm sure we’ve missed many gems that you enjoy. Comment here on your thoughts for what we could cover … or better yet, sign up to write your own Opensource.com article to teach us about your passions!