7 ms·

A bit unrelated, but what happened to Angular?

by aerzen 4y ago

wetpaws 4y ago
Same thing that happens to every JS framework after a few years.
- candiddevmike 4y ago
  Not sure what your definition of few is, but there are plenty of old, boring, stable frameworks out there that run perfectly fine, like Mithril. You don't have to constantly rewrite your frontend if you stick as close to raw JS/TS as possible.
pictur 4y ago
Probably few people use it, but it is probably very useful for those who use it. I like angular's philosophy of trying to solve every issue in itself.
- JenrHywy 4y ago
  Maybe it's not so popular for startups, but Angular is kinda like .NET - maybe not the new hot thing, but very well bedded down in large orgs and govt.
robopsychology 4y ago
Angular 14 is the latest version, last I looked it was 5. Things move so fast in FE world!
- iamsanteri 4y ago
  And soon quite a bit of us FE devs or any devs for that matter are nailed out anyhow, just look at the LLMs developing. Give it some time, haha.
- operatingthetan 4y ago
  They started doing fast top level versions like Chrome, since Angular is Google too.
blowski 4y ago
I learned Angular with v1. When v2 came out, it was so different I had to learn a new framework either way. I went with React because it was the one gaining the most traction. I think that’s what happened writ large.
swsieber 4y ago
Angular doesn't play well with newer build tools - esbuild, vite, etc., making Angular quite isolated from the other frameworks. So a plug for vite is a plug for most frameworks except Angular (and others not on the radar). But also Angular has egregiously big build times as your project scales up, and that sucks.
- Bellend 4y ago
  What about your developers though? Our company pays for 5 days a week 8 hours a day of talented humans in a medium team. I can throw compute for 1/10000th that. A 56 module Angular 15 codebase `npm start` takes 10 seconds, and compiles after change faster than a browser refresh. The build takes 67 seconds. What scale up are you talking about so that I know in the future what to look out for?
  - swsieber 4y ago
    I think we were at around ~150k lines of typescript I think. We were also stuck on Angular 12 due to browser compatibility issues (cries in IE11). I think we were looking at ~20s for the dev server and ~25 minutes for the the prod builds.
    - phist_mcgee 4y ago
      25 minutes?? Do you know which parts of the build are taking the longest? Transpiling, bundling etc?
      - Bellend 4y ago
        I'm struggling with those numbers personally.
Bellend 4y ago
I still love it, after 6 years I don't really know what problem it isn't solving and I mean 10 versions later! Also keep it to yourself but RXJS, my old hatred is now responsible for some of the best code I have ever written as far as being proud is concerned.
- jeremycarter 4y ago
  Couldn't agree more!
jrsj 4y ago
Angular is basically headed down the same path that Ember went down IMO. A stable & mature but declining framework. The same could ultimately happen to React as well. I'm working on a new project right now using Remix, which is great, but I've also realized that really nothing I've done wouldn't have worked just as well without React. Fortunately I really enjoy Remix, but if SvelteKit or SolidStart provide a similar experience I don't really see why I would stick with React.
- epolanski 4y ago
  Stable? dont they release breaking majors each 6 months?
  - jrsj 4y ago
    Technically yes but just because they have a scheduled major release every 6 months doesn’t mean you’re going to see significant breaking changes. They’re not as conservative as Ember in that regard (still on 3.x!) but relative to React, Vue, etc things aren’t changing as quickly.
    - epolanski 4y ago
      That's never been my experience at all. React's backwards compatibility has been always in a class of its own. Angular? Migrating from one major to another was always source of great pain.
valcron1000 4y ago
Still the best choice in my opinion. Batteries included for pretty much anything and RxJS is a delight. I really never have to think about state management issues. My only concern are signals. They seem like worse Observables just for the sake of something new. Hope they never get added
- doodlesdev 4y ago
  Just keep in mind that SSR in Angular is a bit more painful than in other libraries. It's also quite bloated in both development and production. Other than that I quite like it. RxJS takes some time to learn but pays off well. If you're ok with learning something with less adoption but similar batteries-included feel I'd recommend learning SvelteKit. I see it do a lot of things that Angular does well without failing were it's bad (i.e. breaking changes every six months).
SomeCollegeBro 4y ago
I use Angular daily as a frontend for our C++ app, hosted in Electron. I personally love the fact that it's opinionated (using their router, DI, etc) and most of their API is pretty extensible. For our purposes, it beats out Qt if you want an app with a highly custom UI. We chose it over React for the simple fact that it is so "batteries included".
jamesfinlayson 4y ago
I'm still using it - it does the job. I think there can be a bit more complexity than React (components, services, interceptors etc) but I've never found it to be hard to understand, even with all the extra stuff.
ioseph 4y ago
Still heavily used in gov / enterpries / finance. Anecdotally after 6 years of React, switching back to Angular it has a huge learning curve. Such a large surface area with zonejs, rxjs, modules. I feel productive with it now and actually prefer services + rxjs to redux. I like how much is included and has established pattern but it feels very heavy handed, just adding a single component involves a stupid amount of boilerplat.
- hdhrufjdi 4y ago
  Angular has a deprecated modules now, so dealing with components should be less work as well.
rk06 4y ago
It is stuck on webpack, while everyone else moved to next gen tool. If you are new to angular, then I suggest stay away and come back in a year or two because Angular is going through a major paradigm shift. From webpack to esbuild, from zones to signals, from Rxjs everywhere to signals for synchronous change detection etc.

A bit unrelated, but what happened to Angular?

by aerzen 4y ago

A bit unrelated, but what happened to Angular?

wetpaws 4y ago

Same thing that happens to every JS framework after a few years.

candiddevmike 4y ago
Not sure what your definition of few is, but there are plenty of old, boring, stable frameworks out there that run perfectly fine, like Mithril. You don't have to constantly rewrite your frontend if you stick as close to raw JS/TS as possible.

pictur 4y ago

Probably few people use it, but it is probably very useful for those who use it. I like angular's philosophy of trying to solve every issue in itself.

JenrHywy 4y ago
Maybe it's not so popular for startups, but Angular is kinda like .NET - maybe not the new hot thing, but very well bedded down in large orgs and govt.

robopsychology 4y ago

Angular 14 is the latest version, last I looked it was 5. Things move so fast in FE world!

iamsanteri 4y ago
And soon quite a bit of us FE devs or any devs for that matter are nailed out anyhow, just look at the LLMs developing. Give it some time, haha.
operatingthetan 4y ago
They started doing fast top level versions like Chrome, since Angular is Google too.

blowski 4y ago

I learned Angular with v1. When v2 came out, it was so different I had to learn a new framework either way. I went with React because it was the one gaining the most traction. I think that’s what happened writ large.

swsieber 4y ago

Angular doesn't play well with newer build tools - esbuild, vite, etc., making Angular quite isolated from the other frameworks. So a plug for vite is a plug for most frameworks except Angular (and others not on the radar). But also Angular has egregiously big build times as your project scales up, and that sucks.

Bellend 4y ago
What about your developers though? Our company pays for 5 days a week 8 hours a day of talented humans in a medium team. I can throw compute for 1/10000th that. A 56 module Angular 15 codebase `npm start` takes 10 seconds, and compiles after change faster than a browser refresh. The build takes 67 seconds. What scale up are you talking about so that I know in the future what to look out for?
- swsieber 4y ago
  I think we were at around ~150k lines of typescript I think. We were also stuck on Angular 12 due to browser compatibility issues (cries in IE11). I think we were looking at ~20s for the dev server and ~25 minutes for the the prod builds.
  - phist_mcgee 4y ago
    25 minutes?? Do you know which parts of the build are taking the longest? Transpiling, bundling etc?
    - Bellend 4y ago
      I'm struggling with those numbers personally.

Bellend 4y ago

I still love it, after 6 years I don't really know what problem it isn't solving and I mean 10 versions later! Also keep it to yourself but RXJS, my old hatred is now responsible for some of the best code I have ever written as far as being proud is concerned.

jeremycarter 4y ago
Couldn't agree more!

jrsj 4y ago

Angular is basically headed down the same path that Ember went down IMO. A stable & mature but declining framework. The same could ultimately happen to React as well. I'm working on a new project right now using Remix, which is great, but I've also realized that really nothing I've done wouldn't have worked just as well without React. Fortunately I really enjoy Remix, but if SvelteKit or SolidStart provide a similar experience I don't really see why I would stick with React.

epolanski 4y ago
Stable? dont they release breaking majors each 6 months?
- jrsj 4y ago
  Technically yes but just because they have a scheduled major release every 6 months doesn’t mean you’re going to see significant breaking changes. They’re not as conservative as Ember in that regard (still on 3.x!) but relative to React, Vue, etc things aren’t changing as quickly.
  - epolanski 4y ago
    That's never been my experience at all. React's backwards compatibility has been always in a class of its own. Angular? Migrating from one major to another was always source of great pain.

valcron1000 4y ago

Still the best choice in my opinion. Batteries included for pretty much anything and RxJS is a delight. I really never have to think about state management issues. My only concern are signals. They seem like worse Observables just for the sake of something new. Hope they never get added

doodlesdev 4y ago
Just keep in mind that SSR in Angular is a bit more painful than in other libraries. It's also quite bloated in both development and production. Other than that I quite like it. RxJS takes some time to learn but pays off well. If you're ok with learning something with less adoption but similar batteries-included feel I'd recommend learning SvelteKit. I see it do a lot of things that Angular does well without failing were it's bad (i.e. breaking changes every six months).

SomeCollegeBro 4y ago

I use Angular daily as a frontend for our C++ app, hosted in Electron. I personally love the fact that it's opinionated (using their router, DI, etc) and most of their API is pretty extensible. For our purposes, it beats out Qt if you want an app with a highly custom UI. We chose it over React for the simple fact that it is so "batteries included".

jamesfinlayson 4y ago

I'm still using it - it does the job. I think there can be a bit more complexity than React (components, services, interceptors etc) but I've never found it to be hard to understand, even with all the extra stuff.

ioseph 4y ago

Still heavily used in gov / enterpries / finance. Anecdotally after 6 years of React, switching back to Angular it has a huge learning curve. Such a large surface area with zonejs, rxjs, modules. I feel productive with it now and actually prefer services + rxjs to redux. I like how much is included and has established pattern but it feels very heavy handed, just adding a single component involves a stupid amount of boilerplat.

hdhrufjdi 4y ago
Angular has a deprecated modules now, so dealing with components should be less work as well.

rk06 4y ago

It is stuck on webpack, while everyone else moved to next gen tool. If you are new to angular, then I suggest stay away and come back in a year or two because Angular is going through a major paradigm shift. From webpack to esbuild, from zones to signals, from Rxjs everywhere to signals for synchronous change detection etc.