5 ms·

Angular 5.1 and More Now Available

46 points by mikeryan52 9y ago

veidr 9y ago
The notable part of the “and more” is the first stable release of the Material theme/UI library.
candiodari 9y ago
I'm still on 1.0. Not changing either.
- zitterbewegung 9y ago
  Which 1.0 are you using? I'm on 1.6
  - pluma 9y ago
    Not OP but I'm still on 1.2 because I still had to support IE8 when 1.3 dropped it out of the blue (I wouldn't have used 1.2 if I had known the Angular team planned to drop IE8 support). Shortly after, Angular 2.0 was announced and at the point where IE8 was no longer a requirement Angular 2.0 was still not stable but not far away enough to justify spending energy upgrading the codebase to another 1.x release in the meantime (especially as AtScript was still a thing and there was no clear upgrade path yet). The app is still in production but parts of it have been rewritten in React since. Despite the added weight of another library, introducing React ironically helped reduce the file size (mostly because it allowed us to remove dependencies that were no longer necessary and the build process changed with bower being replaced by yarn). EDIT: Another factor in the decision not to upgrade to 1.x when we were able to drop IE8 support as a requirement was that the removal of IE8 support came so abruptly that we decided not to trust Angular to support any browsers that aren't on the latest version (i.e. we expected them to drop IE9 support equally sudden and it seemed clear that Angular 2.0 wasn't going to be built with compatibility in mind). For comparison, when we added React to the project two years later (when IE8 was no longer a requirement), React still supported IE8 and only several months later announced that they would drop support with the next release. But even then "dropping support" meant that bugs were deprioritised whereas the AngularJS announcement heavily suggested that existing code for IE8 would be intentionally removed or rewritten in a way that breaks compatibility outright and the code should be expected not to work in IE8 at all. So based on how the announcements were made and what "dropping support" entailed in each library, React seemed the safer bet.
- felipellrocha 9y ago
  To no other framework?
- sidcool 9y ago
  Would you let me know the reasons for not upgrading? I am on Angular 1.6 and would like to upgrade to Angular 2 and beyond, but it is not a straight forward upgrade. What would keep you on Angular 1.x?
adpirz 9y ago
Can anyone speak to their successes with Angular post 2.0? I feel like any time it comes up, it's mostly horror stories about the transition or how shops have just moved on to Vue, etc. Is it worth still considering / where does Angular shine where React and Vue come up short?
- jrs95 9y ago
  I tried it along with Vue and React and it was my least favorite by far. Feels very overengineered and the level of complexity relative to the others doesn't seem worth it. Probably the least flexible of the three too. That being said, it's still a big improvement over everything else I've used that isn't React or Vue. Angular 1.x interop seems like the only compelling thing about it in my opinion.
- ChristianBundy 9y ago
  Angular is _fine_, but it's largely a "me too" framework that brings nothing new to the table. On the other hand, it insists on using a non-standard language, which breaks all of the tooling used in the rest of the JS ecosystem. React and Vue are reasonable options, but as someone using Angular in production I'd urge you to stay far away from Angular and TypeScript.
  - jrs95 9y ago
    I understand the Angular part but why Typescript?
  - shusson 9y ago
    > as someone using Angular in production I'd urge you to stay far away from Angular and TypeScript Say what you will about Angular, but why the hate on TypeScript? I've found using TypeScript one of the better experiences I've had in the Angular ecosystem.
  - veidr 9y ago
    You're entitled to your opinion, but for many people (me being one) first-class TypeScript support is absolutely a compelling feature. I may not choose Angular for every project, but I would certainly never again use untyped JavaScript over TypeScript, for an app of any size, unless there was some unusual and very compelling reason. (And it would have to be a really unusual reason; I can't even think of a hypothetical one.) In my own experience, TypeScript is a huge advance over JavaScript without types, in both productivity (how quickly functionality gets implemented) and reliability (how many bugs ever make it all the way to a customer). I will spice up that factual statement with a bit of speculation that will perhaps be more controversial: in my experience watching other developers move to TypeScript, I think the productivity and reliability gains generally apply to their work too, whether or not they personally like TypeScript.
pcurve 9y ago
I thought this was some kind of joke... until I realized they skipped v3. But still, v5 already? Or did I just get used to Bootstrap 4 being in Alpha for years?
- tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago
  They changed to semantic versioning. From what I remember they intended to keep their development style of breaking backwards compatibility where convenient, though. The consequence is that you’ll regularly see major version bumps.
- ProblemFactory 9y ago
  4 -> 5 included some new cool features but was a smooth upgrade. 6 is coming out in March and then a new "major version" is scheduled every 6 months. This is common for end-user apps but feels very weird for developer libraries and frameworks. We are used to X.Y.Z releases where X are "major rewrite", Y are significant updates, and Z are bugfixes. That said, Angular's new scheme could be technically correct strict "semantic versioning". In semver X.Y.Z, Z releases are supposed to be bugfixes with no feature additions, Y releases add features but with perfect backwards compatibility, and X releases introduce breaking changes. A backwards incompatible change, no matter how small and easy to adjust for, should be a major version bump according to semver.
  - pluma 9y ago
    It'd be interesting to see Angular join the React bandwagon and embrace codemods. React has broken compatibility several times (though you now get deprecation warnings on the final minor release before a breaking major) but Facebook has an internal policy that if React breaks compatibility, the React team has to fix the application code it breaks -- which has lead to every breaking change coming with codemods which can automate the necessary adjustments, making upgrades significantly smoother.
  - at-fates-hands 9y ago
    > 6 is coming out in March and then a new "major version" is scheduled every 6 months. I work in a large corporation and they're still planning their transition to 1.5 and then to 2. I'm keeping up by building stuff in my off time, but trying to keep a fortune 200 corporation on a six month upgrade track? Not happening. I've already heard rumblings from upper management of going back to some open source Java frameworks like Spring MVC, Vaadin or gulp Struts because of how fast they are releasing major versions and the time and cost of keeping up. My fear is Angular will be regulated to startups, medium sized businesses or small autonomous business units within larger companies. When faced with a six month upgrade schedule, many larger organizations I fear are going to balk and just drop it in favor of something they are already comfortable with. . ergo my company wanting to go back to Java since 95% of everything built here is done with Java.
tprince 9y ago
Even if you never use Angular you can thank them for finding and fixing a huge Webpack memory leak: https://github.com/webpack/webpack/issues/5992#issuecomment-346384896 https://github.com/webpack/webpack/issues/5992#issuecomment-...
- vesrah 9y ago
  Which version of webpack is this fix included in?
  - tprince 9y ago
    3.10 I think.
mythz 9y ago
I created a new project using @angular/cli 1.6 which the release says is tied to Angular 5.1: https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/releases/tag/v1.6.0 https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/releases/tag/v1.6.0 But all npm package.json dependencies are still anchored on the same ^5.0.0 dependencies that ng v1.5.0 had and still depends on typescript "~2.4.2", basically ignoring the 5.1 announcement. How can we create a new Angular 5.1 App using ng? Are we meant to manually change all dependencies to ^5.1.0
- shusson 9y ago
  See https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/pull/8766 https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/pull/8766
  - mythz 9y ago
    I manually updated the typescript dependency which breaks the build, even when manually upgrading the compiler-cli to ^5.1.0, so basically 5.1 doesn't work with typescript 2.5.3 as indicated in the announcement. I also don't get the point of upgrading to the latest angular-cli v1.6 and using it to create the same 5.0.0 app that v1.5 did. Is the way to create a v5.1 ng app is for everyone to manually update all dependencies to ^5.1.0?
    - shusson 9y ago
      the caret ('^') will update a minor version[1]. So ^5.0.0 will install 5.1.0. [1] https://bytearcher.com/articles/semver-explained-why-theres-a-caret-in-my-package-json/ https://bytearcher.com/articles/semver-explained-why-theres-...
      - mythz 9y ago
        The question is what's the best way to create an ng 5.1 app? i.e. what was just announced. I've just manually updated all deps to ^5.1.0.
        9y ago
davidjnelson 9y ago
It’s pretty good but react is better. There is still no documentation on the details of projection which is super frustrating.
- sidcool 9y ago
  As I see it and know about it, React is a library which does a small set of things very very well. Angular on the other hand is a behemoth framework that does a lot of things, all reasonably well. I am sure there would be use cases where Angular is a better choice than React. Not having used React, I am not sure of such cases.

46 points by mikeryan52 9y ago

veidr 9y ago

The notable part of the “and more” is the first stable release of the Material theme/UI library.

candiodari 9y ago

I'm still on 1.0. Not changing either.

zitterbewegung 9y ago
Which 1.0 are you using? I'm on 1.6
- pluma 9y ago
  Not OP but I'm still on 1.2 because I still had to support IE8 when 1.3 dropped it out of the blue (I wouldn't have used 1.2 if I had known the Angular team planned to drop IE8 support). Shortly after, Angular 2.0 was announced and at the point where IE8 was no longer a requirement Angular 2.0 was still not stable but not far away enough to justify spending energy upgrading the codebase to another 1.x release in the meantime (especially as AtScript was still a thing and there was no clear upgrade path yet). The app is still in production but parts of it have been rewritten in React since. Despite the added weight of another library, introducing React ironically helped reduce the file size (mostly because it allowed us to remove dependencies that were no longer necessary and the build process changed with bower being replaced by yarn). EDIT: Another factor in the decision not to upgrade to 1.x when we were able to drop IE8 support as a requirement was that the removal of IE8 support came so abruptly that we decided not to trust Angular to support any browsers that aren't on the latest version (i.e. we expected them to drop IE9 support equally sudden and it seemed clear that Angular 2.0 wasn't going to be built with compatibility in mind). For comparison, when we added React to the project two years later (when IE8 was no longer a requirement), React still supported IE8 and only several months later announced that they would drop support with the next release. But even then "dropping support" meant that bugs were deprioritised whereas the AngularJS announcement heavily suggested that existing code for IE8 would be intentionally removed or rewritten in a way that breaks compatibility outright and the code should be expected not to work in IE8 at all. So based on how the announcements were made and what "dropping support" entailed in each library, React seemed the safer bet.
felipellrocha 9y ago
To no other framework?
sidcool 9y ago
Would you let me know the reasons for not upgrading? I am on Angular 1.6 and would like to upgrade to Angular 2 and beyond, but it is not a straight forward upgrade. What would keep you on Angular 1.x?

adpirz 9y ago

Can anyone speak to their successes with Angular post 2.0? I feel like any time it comes up, it's mostly horror stories about the transition or how shops have just moved on to Vue, etc. Is it worth still considering / where does Angular shine where React and Vue come up short?

jrs95 9y ago
I tried it along with Vue and React and it was my least favorite by far. Feels very overengineered and the level of complexity relative to the others doesn't seem worth it. Probably the least flexible of the three too. That being said, it's still a big improvement over everything else I've used that isn't React or Vue. Angular 1.x interop seems like the only compelling thing about it in my opinion.
ChristianBundy 9y ago
Angular is _fine_, but it's largely a "me too" framework that brings nothing new to the table. On the other hand, it insists on using a non-standard language, which breaks all of the tooling used in the rest of the JS ecosystem. React and Vue are reasonable options, but as someone using Angular in production I'd urge you to stay far away from Angular and TypeScript.
- jrs95 9y ago
  I understand the Angular part but why Typescript?
- shusson 9y ago
  > as someone using Angular in production I'd urge you to stay far away from Angular and TypeScript Say what you will about Angular, but why the hate on TypeScript? I've found using TypeScript one of the better experiences I've had in the Angular ecosystem.
- veidr 9y ago
  You're entitled to your opinion, but for many people (me being one) first-class TypeScript support is absolutely a compelling feature. I may not choose Angular for every project, but I would certainly never again use untyped JavaScript over TypeScript, for an app of any size, unless there was some unusual and very compelling reason. (And it would have to be a really unusual reason; I can't even think of a hypothetical one.) In my own experience, TypeScript is a huge advance over JavaScript without types, in both productivity (how quickly functionality gets implemented) and reliability (how many bugs ever make it all the way to a customer). I will spice up that factual statement with a bit of speculation that will perhaps be more controversial: in my experience watching other developers move to TypeScript, I think the productivity and reliability gains generally apply to their work too, whether or not they personally like TypeScript.

pcurve 9y ago

I thought this was some kind of joke... until I realized they skipped v3. But still, v5 already? Or did I just get used to Bootstrap 4 being in Alpha for years?

tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago
They changed to semantic versioning. From what I remember they intended to keep their development style of breaking backwards compatibility where convenient, though. The consequence is that you’ll regularly see major version bumps.
ProblemFactory 9y ago
4 -> 5 included some new cool features but was a smooth upgrade. 6 is coming out in March and then a new "major version" is scheduled every 6 months. This is common for end-user apps but feels very weird for developer libraries and frameworks. We are used to X.Y.Z releases where X are "major rewrite", Y are significant updates, and Z are bugfixes. That said, Angular's new scheme could be technically correct strict "semantic versioning". In semver X.Y.Z, Z releases are supposed to be bugfixes with no feature additions, Y releases add features but with perfect backwards compatibility, and X releases introduce breaking changes. A backwards incompatible change, no matter how small and easy to adjust for, should be a major version bump according to semver.
- pluma 9y ago
  It'd be interesting to see Angular join the React bandwagon and embrace codemods. React has broken compatibility several times (though you now get deprecation warnings on the final minor release before a breaking major) but Facebook has an internal policy that if React breaks compatibility, the React team has to fix the application code it breaks -- which has lead to every breaking change coming with codemods which can automate the necessary adjustments, making upgrades significantly smoother.
- at-fates-hands 9y ago
  > 6 is coming out in March and then a new "major version" is scheduled every 6 months. I work in a large corporation and they're still planning their transition to 1.5 and then to 2. I'm keeping up by building stuff in my off time, but trying to keep a fortune 200 corporation on a six month upgrade track? Not happening. I've already heard rumblings from upper management of going back to some open source Java frameworks like Spring MVC, Vaadin or gulp Struts because of how fast they are releasing major versions and the time and cost of keeping up. My fear is Angular will be regulated to startups, medium sized businesses or small autonomous business units within larger companies. When faced with a six month upgrade schedule, many larger organizations I fear are going to balk and just drop it in favor of something they are already comfortable with. . ergo my company wanting to go back to Java since 95% of everything built here is done with Java.

tprince 9y ago

Even if you never use Angular you can thank them for finding and fixing a huge Webpack memory leak: https://github.com/webpack/webpack/issues/5992#issuecomment-346384896 https://github.com/webpack/webpack/issues/5992#issuecomment-...

vesrah 9y ago
Which version of webpack is this fix included in?
- tprince 9y ago
  3.10 I think.

mythz 9y ago

I created a new project using @angular/cli 1.6 which the release says is tied to Angular 5.1: https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/releases/tag/v1.6.0 https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/releases/tag/v1.6.0 But all npm package.json dependencies are still anchored on the same ^5.0.0 dependencies that ng v1.5.0 had and still depends on typescript "~2.4.2", basically ignoring the 5.1 announcement. How can we create a new Angular 5.1 App using ng? Are we meant to manually change all dependencies to ^5.1.0

shusson 9y ago
See https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/pull/8766 https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/pull/8766
- mythz 9y ago
  I manually updated the typescript dependency which breaks the build, even when manually upgrading the compiler-cli to ^5.1.0, so basically 5.1 doesn't work with typescript 2.5.3 as indicated in the announcement. I also don't get the point of upgrading to the latest angular-cli v1.6 and using it to create the same 5.0.0 app that v1.5 did. Is the way to create a v5.1 ng app is for everyone to manually update all dependencies to ^5.1.0?
  - shusson 9y ago
    the caret ('^') will update a minor version[1]. So ^5.0.0 will install 5.1.0. [1] https://bytearcher.com/articles/semver-explained-why-theres-a-caret-in-my-package-json/ https://bytearcher.com/articles/semver-explained-why-theres-...
    - mythz 9y ago
      The question is what's the best way to create an ng 5.1 app? i.e. what was just announced. I've just manually updated all deps to ^5.1.0.
      - 9y ago

davidjnelson 9y ago

It’s pretty good but react is better. There is still no documentation on the details of projection which is super frustrating.

sidcool 9y ago
As I see it and know about it, React is a library which does a small set of things very very well. Angular on the other hand is a behemoth framework that does a lot of things, all reasonably well. I am sure there would be use cases where Angular is a better choice than React. Not having used React, I am not sure of such cases.