An introduction to full stack web development

Modern web applications are complex and rapidly evolving. The business community’s needs and system requirements are motivating software developers to stretch beyond being able to function only as either a frontend or backend developer. The ability of web developers to develop full stack applications is now essential more than ever and on the rise.

In this book, we will focus on full stack web development, which refers to both the frontend and backend parts of web development. The frontend, sometimes referred to as the client side, is the visible part of any web application that users can see and interact with. The backend, sometimes referred to as the server side, is that portion where programmer code resides, coupled with a database and other server infrastructure.

Web developers who are skilled in both the client side (frontend development) and server side (backend development) are usually referred to as full stack developers.

In this book, we will use React as a library to develop an intuitive user interface (UI), or frontend, and Flask, a microframework, to build backend business logic components.

Let’s take a closer look at these tools and the reasons we have chosen them.