Jamstack Is An Advanced Solution For Designing Websites. Jamstack Architecture Allows You To Develop Websites With Lower Cost, Increase Their Speed And Use Good Security Mechanisms To Protect Website Modules. 

JAMstack is not a programming language but a unique framework that provides the necessary infrastructure to develop high-speed and secure websites.

It is predicted that in 2023, this architecture will attract the attention of a broader range of programming teams because surveys show that the above technology can improve 80% of the performance of web-based sites and applications, which plays a vital role in increasing the rate of website audience acquisition.

Surveys show that most developers and organizations have used this architecture at least once. This issue has made the above architecture one of the essential front-end trends in 2023.

What is a stack?

A stack in the world of web development refers to the combination of several different technologies that allow front-end developers to use them to design a website. A website or web-based application based on JAMstack is created using only three technologies: JavaScript, APIs, and Markup. In this case, everything the user sees on the website is based on HTML and CSS. JavaScript also adds dynamism and reactivity to the website by calling APIs.

How is JAMstack different from traditional design architectures?

If we examine the underlying technologies that have shaped the web today, we can see that they all play a vital role in the JAMstack stack. Before server-side solutions were invented, web developers had to write HTML code and expose static sites to users manually.

As the web grew, the underlying technologies that shaped it matured, and complex and powerful server-side solutions emerged, of which WordPress is one. Large projects like WordPress allow developers to build a complete website quickly and use an efficient content management system (CMS) to manage website content.

While WordPress became one of the critical tools in the web development world, developers looked to it to deliver consistent content with the highest performance. Also, they were looking for an efficient design mechanism with fewer modules to simplify the maintenance process of websites hosted on servers.

Over time, modern design patterns such as Static Site Generators and cloud-based hosting solutions such as AWS S3 emerged, allowing developers to design static websites more efficiently. This eventually led to the formation of platforms like Netlify and Vercel, which made the development process more accessible and provided developers with a wide range of useful features to improve the web development process. So that today, we see the emergence of various stacks like JAMstack in the world of web development.

What is JAMstack?

If you are a front-end developer, you are most likely familiar with stacks like MEAN or MERN. These stacks are used to group unique technologies. Stacks are combinations of different technologies used to build an application. JAMstack stack is one of these stacks, with the difference that it uses certain technologies compared to similar examples. JAMstack is not about server-side coding and focuses on the client side. Websites developed based on JAMstack technology have better speed and performance than websites created based on standard technologies.

It is no exaggeration to say that JAMstack is an advanced software architecture that uses pre-built components to develop web-based applications and scalable websites that are fast and secure.

A key feature of JAMstack is its ability to use tools that improve workflow and performance and maximize productivity for front-end developers. This software architecture is expected to become one of the important front-end trends in 2023. Today, most web developers around the world use this architecture to build small and large enterprise web-centric websites and applications, which shows the popularity of this technology.

JAMstack ‘s official documentation notes that JAMstack is an advanced architecture for developing front-end JavaScript-based websites.

 A technology that allows developers to use reusable APIs and uses pre-built markup.

JAMstack is a front-end development architecture. The front end is the part of the website that users view and interact with. You can create and develop static websites using the mentioned architecture more quickly. Websites developed using the JAMstack architecture can use ready-made code stored in the content distribution network. More precisely, instead of running a set of server-side principles to generate dynamic content, this content is built based on the location of APIs. If the above architecture is developed correctly, the design and loading speed of the website will be significantly improved.

Regular websites rely on servers and databases to perform their activities. Still, websites based on JAMstack architecture load a small amount of JavaScript that receives data through APIs and sends it to users via markup and CDN technologies, ultimately displayed by browsers.

JAM is the name of three words JavaScript, APIs, and Markup. JavaScript is a web programming language used in designing websites and web applications; To be more precise, it is used in both front-end and backend fields. API stands for Application Programming Interface and is a way to request or use data from another program.

Markup is a valuable and essential technology in this stack. Markup is a markup and code language, like HTML and CSS, that provides browsers with instructions on structuring pages. The critical thing to note is that it doesn’t matter if you write your HTML code manually or if your code is converted into HTML commands.

In both cases, these codes are the first part of a web application that users’ browsers receive.

HTML codes are an essential part of a website, so how the code is presented to browsers is very important because it makes a website perform well or poorly. So, what is the program that makes JAMstack so great?

The fact that you serve JAMstack apps as static files directly from a CDN gives the impression that your app will load quickly. This is true to a large extent. More specifically, gone are the days when a server had to generate pages before responding. Now you render the page in plain HTML or through client-side technologies like React.

In most cases, JAMstack sites are cheaper than their server-side counterparts. Static assets are more affordable to host than dynamic assets. Since you are serving your files from a fixed host, which in most cases is a CDN, the scalability is relatively unlimited.

What is a static website?

A static website consists of one or more static HTML pages. These static pages are shown in the same way in all browsers. Static websites do not need to call information from different sources and consist only of HTML.

This makes content loading speed on these websites faster than similar examples. If you want to see the content of the HTML codes of a website, right-click on an empty area of ​​the page after opening the website in the browser and select View Page Source.

In contrast to static websites, there are dynamic websites, which are displayed differently on each visit because the content of these websites is updated regularly, and the content you visit on the site in the morning may change by the evening.

A clear example in this field isis news sites with constantly updated content. To provide a better user experience, the dynamic website is shown differently to the user according to the type of visit, the way he is active on the site, and any changes in the input data. A simple example in this field is YouTube or Aparat.

At certain times, JAMstack displays updated content to the user by calling APIs and provides a dynamic and personalized experience. Each time a dynamic webpage is displayed, the code must be executed in the user’s browser or on the server that hosts the web page. This issue causes the website to take a long time to load.

How to manage backend functions using JAMstack?

In the design of a website, the codes that run behind the scenes and the user cannot see them are the backend codes of the website. Usually, when visiting a website, users do not know the language used in website coding and do not even see the backend codes of the website.

Although the JavaScript and markup languages ​​in JAMstack define how the website displays information to the user, the website needs supporting functions to run smoothly. JAMstack makes optimal use of backend functions by calling APIs through JavaScript.

It is necessary to explain that using APIs means that developers do not have to develop the website’s backend separately. They can use existing APIs to build their websites and applications.

When a developer wants to add new functionality to their web application or website, they must call a new API. Fortunately, APIs are reusable, so it is possible to use them in different projects. Hence, whenever developers need to add a new API function to a project, they need to call it.

 How does JAMstack interact with microservices?

JAMstack developers using APIs can develop backend code based on the microservices programming paradigm. In the microservices architecture, an application’s backend codes are divided into small modules that are independent and manageable from each other, and the process of deploying and executing them is done quickly.

In this context, microservice architecture and a JAMstack program have a lot of affinities. In a JAMstack application, there is a place to call various APIs as needed.

Using JAMstack, you can create a program that does not need a server in the backend. Serverless functions are small, reusable modules of website backend code that can be easily reused. In a serverless architecture, developers don’t need to worry about server-related issues and instead focus on how to call APIs related to backend code.

What benefits does JAMstack offer?

JAMstack applications naturally provide the critical components of a successful site: a fast, secure, high-performance, flexible, and efficient infrastructure. In general, the JAMstack architecture is of interest to developers to make websites easier to design and increase speed and security. However, it also offers other benefits, the most important of which are the following:

• Performance: Almost all the content of a website built based on JAMstack architecture consists of static files provided by CDN. Loading data from CDN is the fastest way to provide information to the user, increasing the website’s loading speed. 

• Scalability: A scalable website is better able to handle requests when there is a sudden increase in incoming traffic. Because the front-end part of JAMstack is fast and the backend is light, if the number of inputs or operations performed on the website increases, the performance and speed are still maintained. Standard web design architectures implement content caching mechanisms based on specific logic when facing heavy traffic loads. In JAMstack, content is cached by default in the content delivery network. The programmer does not need to engage in complex logic or workflow to recognize the data type and when the caching process should be performed.

• Ease of design and development: JAMstack allows developers to focus on improving the engaging user experience on the front end of the website without worrying about the back end of the website and its possible errors. JAMstack websites are not limited to proprietary technologies or lesser-known frameworks and can be built using various tools. 

• More security: In JAMstack, the existing content is already prepared and allows the user to read only. Therefore, there is no change in the content or codes for manipulation and malicious activities. Only the hosts regularly check and control their system for security issues mentioned in the architecture. We must say that JAMstack is more secure than other web design architectures.

• Maintainability: When the complexity of hosting websites is reduced, the maintenance process becomes more straightforward.