After four years of React, the ecosystem felt both familiar and completely different. React 18 brought concurrent features. The React Compiler was announced. Server Components changed the game. Frameworks battled for dominance. Here's my honest map of where everything stands and what actually matters.
React is a library, not a framework. I kept hearing that, but I didn't understand what it meant until my create-react-app project needed routing, SSR, API endpoints, and image optimization. Configuring everything myself was exhausting. Then Next.js entered the chat.
I'd been managing server state wrong my entire React career. useEffect for fetching, useState for caching, manual refetching, stale data bugs everywhere. Then React Query showed me that server state was never meant to live in my components. Everything I thought I knew about data fetching changed.
After learning React Server Components, I had a strange realization: we've come back to where we started. Server-side rendering, SQL in templates, zero client JavaScript—it sounds like PHP circa 2005. But is it really the same? A reflection on 20 years of web development coming full circle.
Deep dive into React Server Components (RSC) - components that render on the server with zero client JavaScript. Learn 'use client' directive, server vs client components, the composition pattern, streaming, and data fetching without useEffect. Complete guide for Next.js App Router architecture.
Master React Suspense for declarative loading states. Learn React.lazy for code splitting, Suspense boundaries for coordinated loading, streaming with React 18, useTransition for smooth transitions, and integrating with React Query/SWR. Eliminate scattered isLoading checks forever.
Learn to implement React Error Boundaries to catch JavaScript errors and display fallback UIs. Understand getDerivedStateFromError, componentDidCatch, strategic boundary placement, and the react-error-boundary library. Build resilient React applications that gracefully handle failures.
Compare modern React state management solutions: Zustand for simple global state, React Query/TanStack Query for server state, and Jotai for atomic state. Learn the server state vs client state paradigm, when to use each library, and build a modern state management stack without Redux.
Master Redux Toolkit (RTK) - the official, recommended way to write Redux. Learn createSlice for reducing boilerplate, createAsyncThunk for async operations, configureStore setup, Immer for immutable updates, and RTK Query for data fetching. Complete migration guide from vanilla Redux.
Complete Redux tutorial covering actions, reducers, store, and middleware. Learn Redux DevTools for time-travel debugging, async actions with Redux Thunk, selectors with Reselect, and real-world patterns. Understand when Redux makes sense and how to structure large React applications.
Fix slow React apps with this performance optimization guide. Learn why components re-render, how to use React.memo to prevent unnecessary renders, when to apply useMemo and useCallback, and how to profile with React DevTools. Includes virtualization, code splitting, and real-world optimization patterns.
From localhost to production. Error handling, logging, environment configs, API documentation, health checks, and the lessons learned from deploying my first Spring Boot API. Everything I wish I knew before going live.
From 'anyone can delete anything' to proper security. Learn to implement JWT authentication in Spring Boot with Spring Security, protect your endpoints, handle login/logout, and make your React app work with tokens.
Master React Context API to share state across components without prop drilling. Learn createContext, Provider pattern, useContext hook, and best practices for theme switching, authentication, and shopping carts. Includes performance tips and when to use Context vs Redux.
Goodbye in-memory ArrayList, hello real database. Learn to connect Spring Boot to MySQL using MyBatis, write SQL mappers, handle transactions, and stop losing data every time you restart the server.
Learn to build custom React hooks that extract and share stateful logic across components. Includes practical examples: useFetch for data fetching, useLocalStorage for persistence, useDebounce for performance, and useOnClickOutside for UI patterns. Complete guide with rules and best practices.
From Hello World to a full CRUD API. Learn to handle POST, PUT, DELETE requests, parse JSON bodies, validate input, and structure your Spring Boot application with controllers, services, and repositories. A practical guide for frontend developers.
A frontend developer's journey into backend development with Java and Spring Boot. From npm install to Maven dependencies, from JavaScript objects to Java classes. How I built my first REST API to power my React projects.
Master React Hooks with this comprehensive tutorial. Learn useState for state management, useEffect for side effects, and how to migrate from class components. Includes practical examples, common pitfalls like stale closures, and the mental model shift from lifecycle methods to hooks.
After months with Laravel 5.6, I had built complete applications — Blade UIs, REST APIs, email, SMS, background jobs. A reflection on what Laravel taught me about web development, and why it prepared me for everything that came after.
Sending daily reports, cleaning up old files, expiring unused tokens — all the recurring tasks your app needs. Learn Laravel's scheduler, which turns ugly cron syntax into expressive PHP methods.
Complete guide to React lifecycle methods in class components. Learn componentDidMount for data fetching, componentDidUpdate for prop changes, and componentWillUnmount for cleanup. Understand the mounting, updating, and unmounting phases with practical examples.
Sending emails, processing uploads, generating reports — all things that slow down your app. Learn to use Laravel queues, create jobs, handle failures, and make your application feel instant while heavy work happens in the background.
Database queries are expensive. API calls are slow. Learn to cache the expensive stuff — with Redis, Memcached, or just files. Cache tags, cache invalidation, and the patterns that made my Laravel apps actually fast.
My app had beautiful Blade templates. But mobile developers needed JSON, not HTML. Learn to build REST APIs in Laravel alongside your web routes, handle API authentication, transform responses, and serve both worlds from one codebase.
Master React state management with this comprehensive guide. Learn why regular variables don't trigger re-renders, how this.setState works in class components, and common pitfalls like async state updates. Perfect for understanding React's core concept.
Handling file uploads the right way. Learn Laravel's filesystem abstraction — store files locally in development, S3 in production, switch with one config change. No more hardcoded paths and manual file management.
Some notifications can't wait for users to check their inbox. Learn to integrate SMS into Laravel with Nexmo/Vonage and Twilio, handle delivery status, manage costs, and decide when SMS is actually worth it.
No more 'run this SQL file I emailed you.' Migrations track database changes in code. Seeders fill your database with test data. Together, they make database management sane and shareable.
My controllers were doing too much. Create order, send email, update inventory, notify warehouse, log analytics — all in one method. Events and listeners taught me to decouple, and suddenly everything was cleaner.
My PHP mail() days were over. Laravel's Mailable classes, notification system, and queue workers transformed how I thought about user communication. Beautiful emails, multiple channels, all from one notification class.
After weeks of building login systems from scratch, I discovered Laravel's built-in authentication. One command, and I had registration, login, password reset, and middleware protection. The day I stopped reinventing the wheel.
Users have posts. Posts have comments. Orders have products. Learn to define and query relationships in Eloquent — hasMany, belongsTo, many-to-many, and the magical eager loading that saves you from the N+1 problem.
Before React, before Spring Boot, there was Laravel. How I went from writing spaghetti PHP to understanding MVC architecture, Blade templates, and why frameworks exist. A journey back to early 2019 when everything clicked.
Learn what React components are and why they revolutionized frontend development. A beginner-friendly guide explaining component-based architecture, JSX syntax, and how to think in components. Perfect for developers transitioning from HTML/CSS/JavaScript to React.