How Netflix is using JavaScript
Netflix is one of the most popular video streaming services. Since launching globally in 2016, the company has found that many new users are not only signing up on mobile devices but are also using less-than-ideal connections to do so. According to Global Internet Phenomena Report Netflix consumes 15% of all Internet bandwidth globally, the most by any single application.
Netflix rapidly transformed itself from a movie rental business into one of the largest media companies in the world.
The company was originally founded as a local DVD subscription service in 1997. Today, Netflix has over 200 million subscribers across the globe and is the most popular video streaming service in the world.
By refining the JavaScript used for Netflix’s sign-up process and using prefetching techniques, the developer team was able to provide a better user experience for both mobile and desktop users and offer several improvements.
WHAT IS JAVA-SCRIPT ?
In some ways, JavaScript is the programming language that made the World Wide Web what it is today. JavaScript’s original legacy to make web pages come alive is demonstrated by its features.
As a client-side scripting language tailored to the browsing experience it is made to support all major browsers with full integration of HTML/CSS.
Its description as a scripting language means code can be written right into HTML and executed at run-time without the need for prior compilation.
Ultimately this reduces the load on the server each time you run a project with JavaScript. JavaScript code is also object-oriented, meaning front-end developers can create objects that can be manipulated.
Many different programming languages, like Pearl, PHP, and CSS, support JavaScript too.
When Is the Use of JavaScript Is Recommended?
JavaScript’s primary use is to transform web pages from static to dynamic. Adding behavior to web pages is at the core of JavaScript’s pervasiveness. Many of these behaviors have been mentioned as:-
- Sliders
- Dropdown menus
- Animations
- Audio
- Video
- Showing or hiding information
- Zooming in/out
- Displaying a timer or countdown
- Gallery carousels on homepages, and many more.
JavaScript functions well at the front-end and back-end sides of development.
On the front-end, JavaScript works with the likes of HTML and CSS to optimize web pages for the use. At the back-end, JavaScript positions Node.js to manage data and handle user requests.
JavaScript in NETFLIX ?
In last five years, Netflix has also ventured into media production field. It also made several of original movies and television shows like House of Cards and Stranger Things which have provided the company with much-needed credibility as a content creator and makes more successful in this profession.
After a while the company have a mood to redesign its online streaming platform, by the time the development team turn in to Node.js., the JavaScript library had already developed a reputation as a simple framework with wide applicability and is spreaded in Web development filed very speedly.
Previously, the company used Java for the server side and JavaScript for the front-end. The back-end was handled by a single large application running Groovy scripts. This forced developers to become fluent in two different programming languages. Node.js eliminated this problem.
By using the same JavaScript framework on the front-end and back-end, developers reduced their workload and increased the quality of the final web application. By utilizing separate APIs written in Node.js, Netflix was able to reduce its total development time and improve their application’s speed.
Netflix has reached 130 million subscribers in June 2018 and requires an extremely scalable solution to handle all the requests and approx.
When it comes to reasons why the decision to switch from Java on the backend to Node.js, there are a few of them. Netflix team wanted to have the same language both on the back and frontend side of their product (their frontend was already written in JavaScript), build a single page and, what’s very important, to decrease its startup time. Thanks to Node’s performance, they have managed to go from 40 minutes to under 1 minute. That’s quite impressive, isn’t it?
The company also saw an improved user experience as a result of faster loading times and intuitive movie previews. This is because Node.js uses an event loop and an asynchronous and non-blocking I/O to handle tens of thousands of request per second with ease. This reduced latency dramatically, a problem which had been throttling Netflix’s services prior to the switchover.
Not only Netflix using Node.js or we can say JavaScript in their application but their are many more companies and applications like Trello, PayPal, LinkedIn, Mozilla, Candy Crush and many more where JavaScript and its frameworks (node.js, React, Angular.js, etc) are being used so that their application or website work with speed and efficiency.