January 21, 2021

Fundamentals of Web Application Development

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Small and large scale businesses continue to invest in customized web-based interfaces and mobile applications for webmail, online retail and auction services. It becomes essential to design responsive and interactive web applications in order to find an ideal solution for users.

Today, consumers spend more time searching for information on their mobile devices, smartphones and tablets, than on their desktops. 70 % of mobile users recommend brands with which they have had a positive mobile experience. It is a strategic way for a company to increase user engagement through a modern organizational approach.

Mobile-friendly web application development tends to simplify navigation menus, pictures, form elements for websites that will be rendered on all electronic devices. Web applications are divided into such types as dynamic mobile apps, e-commerce/fundraising tools, interactive web-based games, business insight dashboards, data management platforms, fully customizable web sites etc.

However, web applications development specifications are forever changing. So, make sure to discover new mobile apps design trends in our blog.

Fundamental rules of web application development

To know the fundamentals of web application development you have to realize what it is: a long process, which involves a design of a single static web application page and writing of the specific codebases. It is a definite field of software engineering, when a network sends data to a web browser from a server to demonstrate a page, which has been requested by a user.

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Logic of web application development as a control center represents functionality of a login-screen, an in-app store and a database storage. It is essential for web developers to manage a manner of interplay between all elements — user interfaces, HTTP and URLs communication, transaction processing monitors, databases.

Depending on how a logic is shared amongst a client (web browser) and a server sides, web applications can be composed as follows:

  • Single-page apps (loading required elements of content and delivering greater user experience);
  • Multi-page web apps (overloading a web page to transmit information from/to a server through web browsers);
  • Microservices (small tasks or modules that are developed for faster execution, and each service can be changed without damage to other blocks);
  • Serverless web apps (developers do not operate back-end servers);
  • Progressive (push notifications, offline access, extra APIs).

Our team are involved in internal meetings to stay up-to-dated about latest development trends and share best practices. Take a look on our online workshops during pandemic in the blog post.

Components of web application development

Fundamentals of web application development imply designing of database-backed application from scratch, building of user interface and client-server communication.

User interface and structural components are 2 categories of web application development. Web browsers allow to interact with web application functions, converting code into an interface. UI/UX components deal with a display of dashboards, configuration settings, activity logs, notifications.

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The front-end is a client-side component. It is about the visual aspects of the web application, coming up correctly in different browsers (cross-browser), operating systems (cross-platform) and devices (cross-device). Front-end is generally developed with HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

HTML, namely HyperText Markup Language, outlines rules for web applications creation. It puts content in a graphical form: text, headers, paragraphs, images, buttons and links.

CSS, or Cascading Stylesheet language, formats websites with fonts, sizes, background colors, spacing, borders, and animations to draw different shapes.

JavaScript also makes a web page and buttons dynamical.

Back-end as a server-side of a web application is not available to users. It focuses on database management, programming, testing frameworks.

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Structural components mainly include a database storage and its functionality. To better understand how a web application server works, it can be developed with the help of the next programming languages:

  • Java — one of the most widespread to work on complex web applications.
  • Python — it involves easily readable code, usage of multiple Python Web Frameworks, and full-stack development.
  • Node.js — it relies on model-view patterns for code elements identification.
  • PHP — quick development, reliable security, simple maintenance, proper community support.
  • Laravel — better routing, caching, and authentication process.
  • AngularJS — it can be done easily with the reduction of code size and lazy loading.

Most Python developers write their web applications with a combination of Python and JavaScript. Python is executed on the server-side, while JavaScript is downloaded to a client and running by Chrome, Firefox, or Internet Explorer.

General findings

Web applications must be self-contained, protecting the user’s private data, and support analytics and A/B testing. It is necessary for mobile app development companies to have a stable life cycle of web application architecture for modernization and updates, which do not interrupt any functionalities.

A web developer will learn text and link styles, centered page layout, background images, CSS-based navigation and much more before beginning a web application development.

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The fundamentals of web application development to know will be:

  • Package managers, building tools, version control system, responsive design;
  • Back-end servers and databases, different programming languages, code editors;
  • Front-end basics, JavaScript frameworks, web application interactivity.

Coreteka is focusing on best practices for structuring and visual representation of the content on your web pages and applications.

Also, we have an interesting article about the best fleet management software in our blog.

Trust us and contact CoreTeka to make a valuable product for your company!