Challenges in front-end JavaScript development for web applications — Developers’ perspective

Abstract

Front-end development has become an integral part of web development. It has consistently gained popularity among developers in recent years, with React being part of this popularity. As this popularity continues to rise, developers in this field also encounter increasing challenges. As developers play significant roles in web development, their feelings and thoughts towards their work matter. Therefore, this thesis explores the challenges in front-end web development, including those related to modern web frameworks and those common in front-end development, from the developers’ perspective as a creator and end-user. For the data collection, the study conducted semi-structured interviews with 10 developers with different expertise levels in front-end development. The interview responses were then analyzed using thematic analysis. Based on the responses, the challenges were identified and then grouped into themes. The themes were framework (i.e., learning, keeping up, dependencies, project structure, component creation) and process (i.e., requirements engineering, testing, documentation, maintenance). The results suggest that component creation (i.e., styling, handling states and data fetching, accessibility, nested component, and using external libraries) is the most challenging task in front-end development regardless of their expertise levels, followed by dependencies (i.e., selection process, maintaining compatibility) and learning (i.e., learning concept and state management). Prolonged exposure to these challenges can lead developers to feel frustrated, demotivated, avoidant, and trapped within the situation. Given that this study mainly focuses on the technical aspect of front-end development, further research is needed to address challenges in other areas of this field.