Vue.js is a cutting-edge frontend technology for building highly interactive websites and apps. If you are undecided whether you need to hire Vue.js developers for your next project, this post will dispel your doubts.
There are several characteristics vital for a business site or app. This is the development speed, that is how fast an idea can turn into a real product that users can actually interact with. This is the loading speed, which can significantly boost or push down the conversion rate. Business owners are also concerned about issues, such as scalability, smooth performance, search engine visibility, and extensibility.
Finding the right tool is extremely important for building solutions where all those indicators would have the highest values. The present-day IT world is awash with frameworks, programming languages, APIs, and other tooling to meet any business requirements. All of them are different. Some are good for one type of project. Others are the best fit for another. In addition, they all have their strengths and weaknesses.
How to choose a technology for your specific project then? You can start by asking a developer who uses a technology if it can give your business the value you need. In this post, we’ve listed questions that you might ask before you hire a Vue.js developer and answers to them. We hope it will help you make the right decision. First, let us explain what Vue.js is.
JavaScript (JS) is currently heading the list of the most popular programming languages worldwide. Building apps and sites in pure (vanilla) JS is, however, a bit cumbersome. The code can be verbose and repetitive. This lengthens the development time and, consequently, increases overall development costs.
That is why developers are always inventing ways to simplify and streamline coding in JS by means of various frameworks. These are superstructures built atop core programming languages. Read this post to learn more about the reasons frameworks are created.
Vue.js is one of such JS frameworks. It was invented by Evan You, a former software developer at Google. While working for the tech giant, You faced a problem: there was no way to build prototypes of feature-rich user interfaces quickly. The technologies available around a decade ago (Angular.js and Backbone.js) were too complicated and mainly targeted at enterprise-grade projects. Here is how Evan himself describes the situation in a documentary about his brainchild (from approximately 4:50).
This prompted You to experiment with new ways of building UI prototypes. In 2013, the new technology saw the light of day. Originally, You wanted to call it Seed.js, but that name was already taken on npm. He looked for another and ended up with Vue. Watch the same documentary (from approximately 6:14) to learn how exactly You coined this name.
From then on, the framework started to gain more popularity among the front-end development community. In 2021, Vue.js was fifth in the rating of the most loved web frameworks.
The main purpose of Vue.js is building UI prototypes fast. Besides, the framework is perfect for adding interactive visual elements and animations to existing sites and apps.
Another important function of Vue.js is creating single-page applications, or SPAs. As the name suggests, an SPA contains just one page. It’s loaded from a server to a user’s computer once. Then, it only updates the data it receives from the server and sends data back. No complete reload of the page, that is HTML, CSS, and JS code, is necessary.
This contrasts with the conventional multi-page approach, wherein to retrieve one page, the client sends one request to a server. The image below illustrates the traditional and SPA approaches.
The key advantage of SPAs is a many times-faster operation speed. Just send the entire code bundle (HTML, JS, and CSS) to a user’s computer once and update data as required without reloading the page every time. There’s no client-server overhead: sending a request, establishing a connection, waiting for a response, sending the response – and all this just to get a single page. This is a perfect solution for locations with unstable or slow networks.
Very soon. Here is why.
One of the distinctive features of Vue.js is simplicity. That was You’s primary objective: to do the same things more complex frameworks were capable of by writing less code. Vue.js took the best features of React.js and Angular.js and discarded all complex ones. Listen to Scott Tolinski — the host of LevelUpTuts & Syntax podcast — talking about this (from approximately 19:02).
Taylor Otwell, the creator of the popular back-end framework Lavarel, also preferred Vue.js over other front-end libraries because of its gentle learning curve. Take a listen (from approximately 9.46 and 11:41).
In essence, Vue.js uses standard web technologies: HTML, CSS, and JS. Developers can also apply the JSX (extension to JavaScript) syntax. This makes learning to code in Vue a several-week or even several-day affair for any front-end professional.
Here are some other features of Vue.js that make development in it a breeze.
Simple syntax, detailed documentation, component-based architecture, and an eager-to-help community greatly facilitate the development of SPAs and web interfaces in Vue.js. This, in turn, allows businesses to reduce expenses considerably when they hire Vue.js developers.
Yes, it will. We’ve already said that SPAs operate exceedingly fast because they only have one page that is loaded once and then simply retrieves or sends data to a server without a need for multiple requests. There is more, though.
Another feature of Vue.js that enables solutions based on this framework to run fast is virtual DOM (Document Object Model). In a nutshell, it’s a replica of the real DOM that Vue.js makes and operates on most of the time.
When an event is triggered and an element in the DOM has to be re-rendered, Vue.js does it on the virtual DOM instead of the real DOM. Then, it compares the copy with the original. The nodes that have changed are modified. Those that have not stay the same.
This is different from traditional multi-page sites where the DOM is redrawn entirely when at least one node changes. As a result, a Vue-based app or site reacts to a user’s actions much quicker, contributing to better user experience.
Vue.js is called a progressive framework. This is because it can easily integrate with other technologies and libraries. The core Vue.js only contains bare-minimum functionality without extensions. Thus, it weighs considerably less than the frameworks it took some of its features from.
A lightweight framework means that users will not even notice how it’s been downloaded to their devices. A fast loading speed contributes to an increase in the conversion rate.
We’ve covered the main benefits of SPAs in the answer to question one above. It’s not all so cloudless, though. One of the pain points of SPAs is bad or null search engine visibility. The main SPA’s advantage can also be its main disadvantage from an SEO perspective.
The thing is that one page has a URL that essentially stays the same. The names of different parts of a single-page app are separated by a slash and an anchor from the base URL, like this: mysite.com/#/offers or mysite.com/#/about. A search engine considers both these pages one page – mysite.com. You can hardly expect any favors from merciless Google in this case.
Vue.js solves this problem by using server-side rendering (SSR). In essence, it means rendering Vue components into HTML strings on the server and then sending them right to the browser. Then, the static markup gets converted into an interactive app on the user’s end. For more on server-side rendering, read the official guide.
With the SSR in place, you can be confident that your potential or current customers will find your site on the Internet and can still enjoy all the benefits of an SPA. Another compelling reason to hire Vue.js developers.
Vue.js represents nothing but a mix of the most popular web technologies with JS in the lead. In practical terms, it means that Vue.js can be used not only to build completely new SPAs but also to enrich existing applications with specific components.
This is particularly useful for adding interactivity to currently static sites with little effort. You can simply take a ready-made Vue.js component, such as a button, and integrate it into an existing site’s code. Moreover, it makes no difference what technologies the site uses: Lavarel, React, Angular, or something else.
The component-based nature of Vue.js applications facilitates their testing by means of unit tests. A unit test is intended to check that the smallest part of software functions properly and produces no errors. In Vue.js, this smallest piece is represented by a component.
Thus, Vue.js developers work with isolated chunks of code and always know where exactly a bug resides. To perform unit testing in Vue.js, developers can use the official library Vue Test Utils. It allows them to test their code from all possible angles: catch events, render components, inspect their internal properties, and so on. As a result, you can expect to get a bug-free, well-performing app that your customers will enjoy working with.
We cannot stress enough the importance of choosing a robust, efficient technology for building a website or app. It must be adequate to satisfy your key business requirements, such as SEO-friendliness, interactivity, good performance, fast loading speed, and short development time frames.
Vue.js is a JS framework that meets all those expectations. This versatile technology can be used to create complex prototypes quickly and effortlessly, build single-page applications from the ground up, and add interactivity to existing sites. Vue.js also scales well and is suitable for large companies too. It’s for a reason that giants such as WizzAir or GitLab have chosen Vue to build their UIs.
In this post, we’ve covered only some of the benefits that Vue.js offers to businesses. Our Vue development team has completed multiple projects based on this technology and can give you any consultation related to it.
We can make your current site more interactive or build a completely new Vue-powered SPA in compliance with your requirements and ideas. Need a clickable prototype? We’ve got you covered here too.
Get in touch with us to hire Vue.js developers with years of experience and get the best value for your money.
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