At its Compose 2023 conference, Netlify today launched a composable framework that promises to make it simpler to build web applications spanning multiple backend services.
Netlify CEO Matt Biilmann said the Netlify Composable Web Platform provides a more holistic approach for loosely coupling the frontend of a web application with backend services that can be swapped out as needed.
The goal is to make it simpler to unify content, data sources, code and infrastructure at a higher level of abstraction while providing development teams with a maximum amount of flexibility, he added.
The Netlify Composable Web Platform consists of Netlify Core to manage workflows, Netlify Connect to access content and data sources and Netlify Create to build applications using JavaScript, application programming interfaces (APIs) and markup languages, otherwise known as Jamstack, framework.
Collectively, the tools will enable development teams to move away from monolithic web applications that are more difficult to update and maintain, noted Biilmann. Instead, development teams can compose applications faster using a framework that automates many of the underlying processes that conspire to slow down application development, he added.
In the face of challenging economic headwinds, interest in improving developer productivity is rising because organizations need their existing teams to consistently deliver applications faster. Most organizations can’t afford to continue expanding development teams when the current processes relied on to build software result in developers spending only a quarter of their time writing code.
There is also a greater need for collaboration using a framework that enables different members of a development team to build elements of an application in isolation from one another without impacting the entire application. Each organization will need to decide for itself whether it wants to make applications from multiple services, but at a time when the speed of adding new capabilities to an application is core to an organization’s ability to differentiate itself, the need for a different methodology for building applications has never been more apparent.
There is, of course, no shortage of frameworks for building web applications, but DevOps teams have a vested interest in making sure that whichever one is adopted is based on a modern architecture. The time and effort required to support monolithic applications in an era where new capabilities need to be added regularly has become cost-prohibitive. The challenge is finding a framework that enables developers to quickly build applications that can be deployed within the context of a DevOps workflow that typically needs to support applications being developed in multiple programming languages.
It’s not clear who inside IT organizations is driving adoption of composable frameworks for building the next generation of applications, but as more organizations become dependent on software, legacy approaches to building monolithic applications have become antiquated. The good news is that in terms of the developer talent pool, there are large numbers that are already familiar with multiple variants of the JavaScript programming language. The challenge, as always, is making sure that whatever code finds its way into a production environment is actually reliable enough to consistently drive a business process.
