Don't you kinda have this image that "frontend is flashy, backend is plain"? But I recently discovered that frontends made by backend engineers are actually pretty good💡
What I want to share is how they "come with responsive design from the start" and "load ridiculously fast." When you think about it normally, this seems super impressive... but actually, it's a bit different😳
Why Are Backend Developers' Frontends So Fast?
Frontend is the part that users directly interact with, so there's often a lot of tweaking appearances, adding animations, and various enhancements🍓 But when backend people make it, they write only the minimum necessary code without extra decorations, which results in lightweight performance💭
- Less unnecessary CSS and JavaScript ✨
- Communication is simpler because it's directly connected to server processing ⚡
- Most importantly, they build with a "if it works, it's good" mentality, so there's no waste👍
I feel like this contributes to the fast loading speeds🥺
What Does "Responsive from the Start" Mean?
Normally, when we say responsive, we think about making it "easy to view on smartphones" or changing layouts according to screen size, right? But frontends made by backend developers often have a simple structure that naturally works across different screen widths🌸
For example...
- Not fixing image and text widths too rigidly
- Using flexbox or simple layouts instead of complex grids
- Adjusting with CSS alone without JavaScript
With these approaches, it often ends up feeling "naturally compatible with smartphones"💗
To Summarize...
Frontends made by backend engineers have this charm of being
"clean without visual clutter, and incredibly fast in performance"🍀
Of course, if you want flashy, elaborate UIs, you'd want to leave it to frontend professionals, but
when you just want to "build necessary features simply and quickly!" I think frontends handled by backend people are worth considering too🤔✨
We tend to get drawn to flashiness, but I realized once again that simplicity has its own merits💭
This kind of story isn't widely known, but it's quite an interesting perspective, isn't it👀❣️
Hatena
Comments
ハンナ
This meme is older than most JavaScript frameworks.
グレース
Fake news, backend just turns cities into IDs. Finding Paris? Not my problem.
ハンナ
This is what happens when frontend developers make backend.
ロバート
Looks perfect to me (I'm a backend developer).
リリー
System analyst needs 40 hours to finalize the specs.
ベン
Is this real? I want it, I'm tired of weather apps full of ads.
エイダン
So clean.
ロバート
I want this, no four popups or flashy animations needed, and being able to use curl is nice.
ロバート
It perfectly does what you want it to do, that's enough isn't it.
サラ
I feel kinda attacked...
クリス
At least it gives you the data you want... frontends everywhere just return random text based on city names.
レオ
・Works on all devices ・Loads in under 2ms ・Easy to maintain ・Clean UI ・No build needed ・No dependencies ・Screen reader compatible ・Does exactly what it should ・No ads ・Easy to extend ・Easy to integrate with other apps ・Deployable with rsync Basically much better than 99.99% of today's crappy web apps.
ミア
Much more usable than weather.com.
ジョージ
Nah bro, my frontend isn't a browser, it's postman.
