Modern Web Applications

The way we architect web applications today (circa 2014) is very different from how we architected them only a couple of years back.

Characteristics of Modern Web Applications:

1. All dynamic templating is done on the client instead of the server

   • JavaScript MVC frameworks on the client side (Angular, KnockOut, Ember)
   • UI is completely static, therefore highly cacheable

2. The only dynamic bytes are data, usually from a database, formatted in JSON

   • JSON over HTTP for client-server communication
   • Every server-side language stack has good implementation options

3. JavaScript plays a large role on the browser in not just UI interaction, but also server communication (AJAX)

4. Third-party services are used for analytics, ad-serving, mapping, payment processing, transactional-emails etc.

5. Token based authentication - OAuth, JWT, API keys for server-to-server

Benefits:

• Faster apps - user gets responsiveness of a desktop app in the browser
• Faster development on server - exposing Java objects as JSON over REST requires zero lines of code in JAX-RS
• Faster development on client - consuming REST services in AngularJS requires very few lines of code
• Automation & Integration for free - same REST API used by browser can be used for integration
• Mobile on the cheap - same REST APIs from mobile-web/mobile-native