While everyone is analyzing what was popular in 2022 in web development, we want to look at entirely different trends. What will happen to the development field, and what changes await developers? What is already implemented but will continue to evolve?
1. Serverless
This approach to architecture is usually divided into subtypes:
- BaaS - applications with a large share of the server side stored in the cloud. This model usually provides standard functionality in SDKs or API gateways, and all necessary actions are performed in the cloud. However, software and infrastructure maintenance responsibilities lie on the BaaS solution provider.
- FaaS provides a third-party development, launch, and functionality management platform that runs parts of its code by targeting event triggers. FaaS is a perfect approach for implementing microservices.
2. Containers
Because of the growing popularity of serverless applications, containers are also relevant: Gartner predicts that by 2022, over 75% of organizations worldwide will use containerized applications (currently only 30%).
A container is a software package that contains all the dependencies: code, runtime, configuration, and system libraries. Containers are almost a silver bullet for web-based systems: they are lightweight, fast, and can work at a sufficient level of abstraction (that is, independently of other processes). They also reduce the cost of software engineering services and running applications.
3. SSG - Static Site Generators
Typically, most sites and applications work like this:
- user clicks on a link;
- a browser sends a request to the server;
- a server executes the code and figures out what content to show the user;
- server unloads the desired content from the database into the page template;
- server renders the resulting HTML code and sends it to the browser;
- The user can see and use the desired content on the page.
Static website generators (SSGs) work differently. They create static HTML pages based on a template or components and use a separate source for content.
Pros:
- simplified technology stack for maintaining static pages;
- better performance - pages are generated in advance;
- security - minimized dynamic content due to pre-rendering equals better attack resistance.
4. Headless CMS
Traditional content management systems (CMS) use a framework for content management that combines both the interface (frontend) and the server side (backend). The content is then linked to a specific technology and architecture within that CMS. But such a solid approach in modern web environments turns out to be clumsy.
Headless CMS solves this problem: they provide only the server side (the backend) to manage the content through APIs. It allows you to use one backend to manage several products at once: several websites or a website plus applications. It also allows you to automate content distribution through all necessary channels simultaneously. The main task of such CMS is to store and deliver content; how it will look to the user depends on the developer's actions.
Pros:
- optimization of resources for development;
- unlimited possibilities for structuring and delivering content to the user;
- centralized management of content in several channels;
- flexibility - the content is adjusted to each channel.
Disadvantages:
- complexity - you need a sufficient level of software development partners’ skills;
- justified only for large projects, where a set of different interfaces of interaction with the user is initially assumed.
Summary
Trends are always more assumptions than a direct call to action. Serverless architecture and Headless CMS sound quite viable and ambitious, but context and specific tasks decide everything.