Why AngularJS? Why Now?

With the explosive growth of web applications, it’s important more than ever for developers and organizations to fully leverage the web’s power by investing in the right framework. There are almost too many options to choose from, but one framework stands above the rest….AngularJS.

Let’s take a look at some important qualities of this tool and see how it could benefit you.

So, why Angular?

• Flexibility - If you are planning on creating an ambitious web-app or just a simple prototype, Angular has got you covered. A lot of people compare Angular to MVW (Model-View-Whatever) JavaScript frameworks, when in reality Angular has more to offer than the MV* aspect. Angular describes itself as a toolset for building the framework most suited to your application development. That statement alone takes Angular out of the “just-another-framework” category.

• Community - Another important aspect to consider would be the AngularJS community. Aside from the excellent API documentation, Angular has a very impressive community support. From stackoverflow to IRC and even from the creators themselves. In 2013, AngularJS was ranked #4 on the most contributed open source projects in the world. Impressive, huh? Their constant meet-ups and the conferences show how passionate the creators, maintainers, supporters, sponsors, and contributors are about this amazing technology.

How does it help in building apps?

• Philosophy - Angular’s greatness starts with its philosophy. It was built with testability in mind and how we can leverage today’s browsers’ power to extend native client-side technology HTML through JavaScript. For developers, Angular will help by eliminating a lot of the boilerplate with features like two-way data-binding, directives, filters, routing, and animation. It will provide the necessary tools to build a solid application architecture layer with features like dependency injection, RESTful services, built-in utilities, testing and not to mention all the other available contributed modules.

• Efficiency - All these benefits translate accordingly on the business side of things. Less boilerplate code equals less development time. More testability equals fewer bugs in your application, which equals less QA and UAT time and resources. Less time and resources equal shorter timelines and smaller budgets. Sounds like a win-win, right?

Who else is using AngularJS?

• Everyone Who Is Anyone - Google is and has been using Angular for many internal and public-facing projects. Some of Google’s most ambitious projects have been built with Angular, like their DoubleClick platform, which has been one of the biggest AngularJS apps that have been pushed to production. Other Angular projects include YouTube for Sony’s PlayStation 3, Udacity, Lynda.com and many more.

For a showcase of apps built with AngularJS visit: https://www.madewithangular.com/

Increasing interest over time in the US (2004 to Present):

View the full report in Google Trends here.

AngularJS is rapidly becoming the go-to front-end framework for web-apps and developers love it. What do you think of Angular? Let us know by commenting below.

Alex Castillo is an Associate Director at DOOR3 and has played an essential role with leading the Front-End Development Team.