Separating Product Decisions from Technical Decisions

In today’s episode, we go to war with Sam Selikoff, co-host of the Frontend First podcast, and specialist on everything Frontend related.

We have an amazing conversation where we discuss Sam’s journey, as he also did some backend work in the past, we talk about abstractions, what JavaScript is doing differently from other languages and frameworks, why the frontend should be driving the backend and not the other way around, and finish it off with a discussion about RSCs (React Server Components).

Learn back-end development - https://www.boot.dev

Listen on your favorite podcast player: https://www.backendbanter.fm

Frontend First: https://frontendfirst.fm/

Sam's X/Twitter: https://x.com/samselikoff

Sam's Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/samselikoff

Timestamps:

00:00 Intro

00:51 Who is Sam Selikoff

02:12 Abstractions - Should you go a level deeper?

06:37 What was Sam's talk about

10:51 What is JavaScript doing differently?

19:10 Do you want the frameworks to push more features out of the box for backend work?

24:04 Strong opinions on a library level

30:29 Shipping more standardized interfaces

37:06 The frontend should be driving everything in the backend

39:12 Your types should flow from the database to the frontend, but not the product decisions

46:53 React Server Components

58:49 Where to find Sam