The Evolution of JavaScript in the Last Decade

Looking back at the last decade of JavaScript and the evolution of the web, it has been a truly remarkable journey.

In 2010, JavaScript wasn’t as widely used as it is today. While I had JavaScript books from as early as 1998 in my library, I mainly used it in the form of Mootools and jQuery plugins. Although I wrote some glue code in JavaScript, it wasn’t anything groundbreaking.

Back then, JavaScript was not considered a hot language, except for projects like GMail and Google Maps that required advanced work and large budgets. The idea of building an entire application using JavaScript was still foreign to most people.

Fast forward to December 31, 2019 – JavaScript is now ubiquitous. Over the past 10 years, it has seen several new releases, including the major ES6 update. The way we write JavaScript today is vastly different from how it was written in 2010.

The introduction and widespread adoption of build tools have been one of the biggest game-changers of the decade. From Grunt to Gulp to Webpack, Parcel, and Rollup, the development landscape has evolved rapidly. As developers, we now have more power and flexibility than ever before.

In addition to syntax changes and new features, module bundlers like Webpack have provided advanced features like tree shaking, making it easier to manage larger applications.

Node.js also played a significant role during this decade. While it was technically launched in Spring 2009, it gained immense popularity and exploded onto the scene in the following years.

Browsers have also undergone significant changes. In January 2010, Internet Explorer held more than 50% market share with version 8, and Edge did not exist. Chrome, which was only one year old at the time, held a mere 5% market share. Today, Chrome dominates as the most popular browser with 64% usage, while Safari holds 16%.

The performance of JavaScript on mobile browsers has also vastly improved. Today, mobile apps are built using frameworks like Cordova, Ionic, React Native, and more, with JavaScript executing at lightning speed.

The rise of NPM has been monumental. Launched in January 2010 as a package manager for Node.js modules, NPM has now become the de-facto standard for frontend development as well. With over one million packages, NPM stands as the largest software directory in the world.

During this decade, several amazing projects were born, including Ember.js, CoffeeScript, Angular, and React, among others. The success and rapid evolution of the JavaScript ecosystem can be attributed to the enthusiastic and committed open source community, as well as numerous visionary companies.

Looking back, it’s incredible to see how far we’ve come. As we enter the next decade, the possibilities are endless, and it’s exciting to imagine where JavaScript will take us.

tags: [“JavaScript”, “web development”, “build tools”, “Node.js”, “browsers”, “NPM”, “mobile apps”, “open source”, “Ember.js”, “CoffeeScript”, “Angular”, “React”]