As one of the most popular frameworks for web development out there, Angular has been providing more opportunity and easier processes for developers everywhere. And the launch of Angular 6 back in April was the first major release from Google in 2018. Even for experienced web developers, it’s worth it to take a step back every once in a while and look at the development world from a beginner’s perspective. Or if you are a beginner, understanding Angular is a good place to start your education. So here’s what you need to know about Angular 6.
What is Angular?
What started as a side project to make it possible to build web applications using simple HTML tags, is now the empowering developers, and even designers, to build all types of applications on the web, mobile or desktop. Angular is a platform that makes it easier to solve development challenges throughout the building process by combining declarative templates, dependency injection, end to end tooling and integrated best practices. It’s name comes from the angle brackets, or <>, that surround all HTML tags.
What are the Top Features of Angular 6?
Amongst a variety of upgrades and new features, Angular 6 focuses largely on the toolchain with the advantages of making it easier for the user to create different types of applications. Overall, it’s lighter, faster and easier than previous Angular versions, so we’re going to break down just what exactly that means. So here are the top features that make Angular 6 such a valuable program to developers:
- Angular Elements
Angular 6 is the first release that supports Angular Elements in its entirety. As the upgrade people most looked forward to about Angular 6, this feature permits developers and engineers to use all the components of Angular in other environments, including projects that do not have the Angular ecosystem built into them.
In the past, creating a widget or component that could be included in any existing web page was a difficult task, but now, thanks to creator Rob Wormald, we can create an Angular component and publish it as a web component for any HTML page we want. This way, you can pick specific Angular features you love and seamlessly add them into other applications.
- Ivy Renderer
Dubbed “Ivy,” this version of Angular renderer helps makes the application more nimble and responsive. After replacing View Engine from versions 2 and 4 of Angular, which increased the speed of the program dramatically and decreased its size, the new third party renderer is expected to provide the same type of enhanced experience. While only in experimental mode in Angular 6, the best part of Ivy Rendering is already part of the user experience, providing extensive compatibility potential with very minimal reports of discordants. - Tree Shaking
This new build optimization step, known as Tree Shaking, tries to ensure that any unused code doesn’t get added in our final bundle. The newer renderer in Angular 6 is going to generate any template instructions directly, instead of passing the data along to an interpreter. This will help result in smaller bundles for increased start up time. - I18n
Angular 6 now has internationalization, also known as i18n. With runtime rendering, there is no restrictions to building one application per locale. i18n has improved the currency pipeline of Angular 6, so that it can adapt applications and text to meet the technical needs of specific cultural or linguistic markets. - ngModelChange
In previous versions of Angular, if an event handler for the ngModelChange event checked the value through the control, the old value appeared instead of the updated value. With Angular 6, once the value is updated in the form control, ngModelChange will have emitted the value. - Bazel Compiler
Almost all the software at Google is built with the system, Bazel Compiler. This compiler knows to rebuild only what is necessary, and since small changes in the code happen so frequently, it prevents the need to rebuild the entire application every single time. With the help of optimized dependency analysis, advanced local and distributed caching and parallel execution, this build system allows for fast and incremental builds focused only on the specific changes that occur and the code associated with it.
These are just a few of the beneficial features that Angular 6 provides developers. For additional information on the Angular framework and the features of Angular 6, as well as more recent updates to the Angular application, browse our various Angular training courses or contact us to learn more.
