Have you recently used the latest version of Laravel? If yes, then you might have noticed that it generally comes with Vue coupled in with other tools such as Bootstrap and jQuery. Moreover in Laravel documentation, you would also notice that they have included a small introduction to using Vue components.
You must be wondering why you should use VueJS with Laravel and how? Laravel is a PHP framework and VueJS is a JavaScript framework, so what purpose could they serve to each other? So what’s all about VueJS vs Laravel?
In order to understand all this, you first need to acquaint yourself with a number of facts about both VueJS and Laravel framework. After that, you’ll be able to analyze how VueJS with Laravel is going to be a useful combination to build applications. So, let’s start with VueJS first.
Brief Introduction About VueJs
VueJS is an advanced JavaScript framework that is used to create user interfaces and single-page applications. Unlike many of its monolithic counterparts, VueJS has been designed from scratch so as to be incrementally adoptable. The basic library of the framework is focused on the view layer of the application and is extremely simple for developers to pick up and integrate with other libraries or any of the existing projects.
Brief Introduction About Laravel
Laravel is one of the eminent members of a new generation of web frameworks. It’s an open-source PHP web framework, developed in 2011 by Taylor Otwell with the intent to build web applications following the MVC (Model View Controller) model. Moreover, it is also free.
As now you are familiar with both of the platforms, so let’s move to our main objective, which is to understand why developers prefer to use VueJS with Laravel while creating the user interface of an application.
So, there are 6 foremost reasons that justify the usage of VueJS with Laravel by developers. These are as follows:
- Everything happens on the frontend
- Reactive components make for an amazing event-driven app
- Creating optimal complex frontend pages
- Single page application
- Easy to learn and use
- Allows developers to issue database queries using PHP Syntax
Let’s discuss all the above-mentioned points in detail so as to have a better understanding of the idea.
6 Prominent Reasons to Use VueJS and Laravel
Although both VueJS and Laravel drive from different programming languages, it may appear irrelevant as to how VueJS with Laravel could offer support to each other. However, you would be surprised to know that VueJS supports Laravel in more than one way. Below discussed are 6 main reasons for why one should use VueJS and Laravel.
1. Everything happens in the frontend
All the applications available on the internet today are event-driven. They are developed to offer the users a smooth experience as if they would have used the application installed on their computers.
VueJS enables Laravel developers to build the front end in a way that their application doesn’t have to reload the pages whenever an update is made.
2. Reactive components make for an amazing event-driven app
VueJS can help you to create a full-scale event-driven web application that manages all the activities on the frontend. It also provides composable components that can be used in whichever way you wish to use. As it couples amazingly with Laravel, you will only require to make a few trips so as to request data from your Laravel application and make user interface changes by just switching components without the need to reload the page.
You can easily prompt user interface changes in your VueJs frontend, which in turn offers an incredible experience to your users. It could be as simple as creating a text on your page editable or swapping out a complete component so as to load up a video that is requested by a user without reloading the page.
Considering the speed and performance of VueJS, this happens quite smoothly as well as fast without consuming much of your computer resources.
3. Creating optimal complex frontend pages
If you have been thinking of developing an application with parts that require frequent updating, you don’t have any other choice other than to make the frontend run entirely on JavaScript.
The main challenge with other JavaScript libraries is that they don’t have a virtual DOM. This is the reason you hit the performance issues quickly as the frequency of the updates increases or the data volume to track the changes significantly increases.
The changes to DOM will discreetly stop being instantaneous and you start to experience substantial performance lags. When your application is developed with VueJS components, the dependencies of every component while it is rendered are tracked automatically. Because of this, the system precisely knows which component needs to be updated in actuality when there’s a change in the data.
VueJS is also agreeable with state managers such as Redux, Vuex, and Flux which are outstanding in handling data flow in complex applications. The application of VueJS of the one-way data binding model also makes state management simpler in complex applications.
4. Single Page Application
Single Page Applications or the SPAs are the most amazing thing to happen to the internet in the past few years. It opens up applications to a broader audience of users than it was possible before. When you realize the fact that many internet users outside of certain parts of Europe and America have challenges when it comes to getting on the internet, you start to appreciate the role played by Single Page applications in delivering a rich web experience. Your complete application assets get loaded once and most of it is cached. As the user engages with your application, all it does is request data which usually needs low bandwidth to fulfill.
5. Easy to learn and use
VueJS is quite easy to get into. As a developer, it provides you with many options and has a lot abstracted away. You feel as if you are writing plain JavaScript when using VueJS and can build a simple application with plain JavaScript which remains valid in VueJS.
Another fantastic thing about VueJS is that your valid HTML is also a valid VueJS template. You can either keep your CSS external or can process it with JavaScript as per your application requirements. You can also take advantage of scoped styling so as to apply style changes to a single component on the fly without the change actually affecting other components.
You can easily develop a non-trivial application with VueJS if you are familiar with JavaScript, after just one day of going through the documentation.
6. Allows developers to issue database queries using PHP syntax
Just like all other frameworks, VueJS employs virtual DOM where the ideal representation of the user interface is kept in memory in the form of JavaScript data structures.
Laravel presents the Eloquent ORM, which is a progressive PHP implementation of the active record pattern that enables web developers to issue database queries leveraging PHP syntax.
Wrapping Up
Combining VueJS with Laravel into one project is not an easy task. It takes a team of great expertise and talent to combine the two powerful frameworks and build an outstanding web application. What you require is to bring together a team of top developers in VueJS and the top developers in Laravel who carry the expertise over the frameworks. The Laravel developers shall develop a quick and functional core for your web application, while the VueJS developers shall build a richer and more interactive user interface for your web application. If you manage to get it right, you can develop web applications that will become a work of art.
With over 15+ years of expertise in web and mobile app development, our developers are highly professional, well-skilled, and experienced in their trade. Get in touch and our team will reach out to you very shortly with the right solution as per your project requirements.
