Micro-frontends have emerged as a powerful architectural pattern for building complex web applications. By breaking monolithic frontends into smaller, independent services, we can achieve greater scalability, maintainability, and development velocity. In this blog, we'll delve into the core concepts, technical implementation, and best practices of micro-frontends.
Imagine a large, complex front-end application. It's like a monolithic building, difficult to maintain, scale, and update. Now imagine breaking that building down into smaller, independent units, each with a team and development process. That's the essence of micro-frontends.
The three fundamental principles of micro-frontends are independent development, loose coupling, and technology agnosticism. These principles allow us to build modular, scalable, and flexible applications.
Each unit is a self-contained component with micro-frontends that can be developed, tested, and deployed independently. This means faster development cycles, reduced risk, and greater technology flexibility.
One way to implement micro-frontends is through server-side composition. The server assembles the micro-frontends into a single page.
Another approach is client-side composition, where micro-frontends are loaded dynamically on the client.
Aligning micro-frontends with business domains, maintaining a consistent user experience, and optimizing performance are important to ensuring a successful micro-frontend architecture.
Reduced risk: By releasing modules individually, you can mitigate the risk of deploying a new system with bugs or other issues. If there is a problem with a particular module, you can easily roll back to the previous version without affecting the entire system.
Faster time to market: Releasing modules incrementally allows you to get new features and functionality to users sooner. This can be especially beneficial if you are pressured to meet a deadline.
Improved maintainability: Micro frontends are easier to maintain and update than a monolithic UI. Each module is independent and can be developed and deployed separately.
Flexibility: You can easily experiment with different UI technologies and frameworks by developing micro frontends in other languages or using various libraries.
Micro-frontends are independently deployable units that make up a larger application. They offer benefits like scalability, maintainability, and team autonomy.
Monorepo is a single repository that houses the code for all micro-frontends. It provides centralized management, code sharing, and streamlined workflows.
Benefits:
The key is to find the right balance. By breaking down the project into smaller pieces (micro-frontends) and keeping them organized in one place (mono repo), you can create a more efficient and effective development process.
The MFE-starter-kit project provides a starting point for building a micro-frontend architecture using Nx, a powerful tool for managing monorepos (codebases with multiple projects).
Key Features:
Refer to the mfe-starter-kit’s README (https://github.com/bbpcoforge/mfe-starter-kit) for detailed instructions on creating a new project and leveraging these features to build your micro-frontend application.