The digital world is always changing, and in the last few years, the pace of change has been staggering. With each passing day, new technology emerges, displacing the old and bringing with it a bevy of new opportunities. However, sometimes it’s the previously accepted standard that winds up being the last man standing.
One sector of technology that saw a dramatic shift in recent years is the software stack. Client-server architectures were displaced by web services, and most of today’s software stack is now comprised of open source technologies such as JavaScript, HTML5, and Node.js. But there was one piece of the puzzle that refused to go the way of the dinosaur, and that was the trusty web application framework.
When Google introduced AngularJS in 2010, it quickly gained traction in the software engineering community. The rethinking of how web apps should be built allowed developers to create cleaner, more extensible applications. This in turn allowed developers to create richer user experiences, which led to consumers having better expectations of websites. As AngularJS gained in popularity, other web application frameworks were left in its wake.
Even as AngularJS lapped the competition, its long-time rival Microsoft had one last trick up its sleeve. In 2016, Microsoft introduced ASP.NET Core, a completely rethought version of its web application framework. ASP.NET Core was designed to combine the power of Microsoft’s technologies such as C#, ADO.NET, and Visual Studio with the flexibility and scalability of modern web architectures.
As a result, ASP.NET Core instantly became the most popular web application framework in the enterprise world, and the only one capable of truly competing with AngularJS. Although it took a few years for ASP.NET Core to be adopted by developers, Microsoft’s product was tough enough to withstand the changing tides of technology, and today ASP.NET Core is the last man standing.
It’s amazing to think that an industry-standard technology from the ‘90s was able to outlast the changing tides of technology. ASP.NET Core is proof that old-fashioned hard work and engineering brilliance can still lead the way in an ever-evolving digital landscape. Whether or not ASP.NET Core will continue to be the go-to framework in the future remains to be seen but, for now, it’s the undisputed champion of the web application framework world.
