Introduction

Angular has come a long way since its inception, evolving from the groundbreaking yet sometimes challenging AngularJS to the highly optimized and efficient Angular Ivy. In this article, we take a conversational journey through the history of Angular, exploring how it has transformed over the years. Join Ram and Krish as they reflect on the highs, lows, and everything in between, offering insights and anecdotes from their own experiences as developers. Whether you’re a seasoned Angular expert or just starting out, this discussion will give you a fresh perspective on one of the most popular web frameworks today.

Ram: Hey Krish, do you ever look back and think about how much Angular has changed over the years? From the early days of AngularJS to what we have now with Angular Ivy, it’s been quite the evolution!

Krish: Oh, definitely, Ram! It’s like watching a baby grow into a mature adult. AngularJS was that baby—full of potential but also full of, let's say, "learning opportunities." Remember how exciting it was to use two-way data binding for the first time?

Ram: Exciting is one word for it! I remember thinking two-way data binding was pure magic. You could just link your model to the view, and everything would sync up. But then, as soon as the app grew a bit, the performance issues started. The whole thing would slow down, and you’d spend hours trying to figure out which binding was causing the problem!

Krish: Right! And don’t even get me started on the digest cycle. It was like AngularJS had this secret inner life, constantly checking for changes. If something went wrong, good luck finding it in the 10,000 digest cycles happening every second!

Ram: Hah, yes! But AngularJS did give us a structured way to build single-page applications. Before that, we were just throwing jQuery around and hoping it would stick. AngularJS gave us directives, controllers, and services—a whole new way to think about web development.

Krish: True, AngularJS laid the groundwork, but by the time we hit 2016, the web had changed a lot, and so did the needs of developers. That’s when Angular 2 came in like a breath of fresh air—or maybe a tornado! It was a complete rewrite.

Ram: A complete rewrite is right! Angular 2 dropped like a bomb. No more controllers, no more $scope. Instead, it was all about components and TypeScript. It was a huge shift. At first, I thought, "Why are they making us learn a whole new framework?"

Krish: Exactly! And that was a big jump—moving from JavaScript to TypeScript. But in hindsight, it was the best decision. TypeScript brought in static typing, which helped us catch errors early in development. It was a bit of a learning curve, but once you got the hang of it, everything felt so much more robust.

Ram: And then, the updates started coming in fast. Angular 4, Angular 5, Angular 6... It was almost like they were on a mission to confuse us with all these rapid releases. Do you remember the chaos when Angular 4 came out?

Krish: Oh, yeah! Everyone was scratching their heads, thinking, "Wait, what happened to Angular 3?" They just skipped it! The truth was, the core libraries had already reached version 4, so they wanted to keep everything in sync. But it did feel like we missed a version while we were sleeping!

Ram: And with each version, they brought in some cool new features. Angular 4 made our bundles smaller, which was great for performance. Angular 5 improved the build optimizer, making our apps load faster. And then Angular 6 introduced Angular Elements, which allowed us to use Angular components as web components in other projects. That was pretty neat!

Krish: Yeah, and let's not forget about Angular CLI. It was around Angular 6 or so that the CLI really started to shine. They added commands for schematics and libraries, which made setting up new projects and maintaining them so much easier. It was like Angular had finally grown up and realized it needed to help developers manage the mess it was creating.

Ram: For sure! And then came Angular 7, 8, and the big one—Angular 9 with Ivy. Ivy was a complete game-changer. Do you remember how we used to struggle with large bundle sizes and slow load times? Ivy turned that around completely.

Krish: Absolutely! Ivy was like a superhero swooping in to save the day. It made everything faster and more efficient. Smaller bundle sizes meant our apps loaded quicker, and the new rendering engine was far more efficient. Plus, the debugging experience improved drastically.

Ram: Ivy also made working with Angular so much more pleasant. Remember how hard it used to be to figure out error messages before Ivy? It was like trying to read ancient scripts!

Krish: I remember! Now, with Ivy, the error messages are so much clearer. You actually understand what went wrong. And don’t forget about the enhanced testing. Ivy’s approach made our component tests more reliable and easier to write.

Ram: Speaking of improvements, do you remember how painful it was to manage forms in AngularJS? We had to manually track each input and handle validation ourselves. Now, with Angular’s Reactive Forms, we get a much more structured and powerful way to build forms.

Krish: Oh, Reactive Forms have been a lifesaver! They make complex form validations so much easier to manage. It’s like comparing a bicycle to a sports car. The old way was slow and required a lot of effort, while Reactive Forms handle things so smoothly.

Ram: Exactly. And then came Angular 10, 11, 12... Each version kept improving on the last. Angular 10 introduced stricter types for catch errors early. Angular 11 focused on improving the developer experience with updates to the CLI and the Hot Module Replacement (HMR). And Angular 12 pushed even further with new features like inline support for Sass in styles and better support for Webpack 5.

Krish: And let’s not forget Angular 13 and 14. They finally gave us optional strict mode by default and brought improvements to Angular Universal, making server-side rendering much more straightforward. Plus, better integration with the latest versions of TypeScript always helps.

Ram: True! And Angular 15 and 16 brought more incremental improvements, focusing on enhancing performance and developer experience. The team’s focus on refining and optimizing shows they’re serious about making Angular as developer-friendly as possible.

Krish: You know, Ram, it feels like Angular has been growing alongside us, getting better with each release. From those early days of AngularJS to the modern, sleek Angular Ivy, it’s been a journey of continuous improvement.

Ram: Absolutely, Krish. It’s like Angular has gone from being a clunky, unrefined tool to a mature and powerful framework. And it's not just the framework itself—it's also the ecosystem. The Angular community, the tooling, the libraries—everything has evolved.

Krish: That’s so true! And the best part is, Angular is still evolving. With every new version, there are new features and improvements that make our jobs as developers easier and our apps better. I’m excited to see what’s next in the Angular roadmap!

Ram: Me too! Here’s to more updates, more improvements, and an even better Angular. And to all the developers out there, whether you started with AngularJS or jumped in later, you’re part of this journey. The best is yet to come!

Krish: Cheers to that, Ram! Cheers to the future of Angular!

Thank's for your time, see you soon in another one :)