The Details: Frontends and Backends

“The Details” is a paid-subscriber-only series that dives deep into technical topics, surfacing only the details you need to know. The last “The Details” post was about SQL and NoSQL production databases. Have an idea for a “The Details” topic? Just reply to this (if it’s in your inbox) or send it to justin@technically.dev.

It seems like I’m referencing the difference between a frontend and a backend in almost every single Technically post, so I figured it made sense to spend some time diving into what those really are, and most importantly, give you a real example of what goes into a frontend vs. what goes into a backend in a real life application.

This distinction – so important! If I’ve done my job correctly, you’ll begin to see all software you use as frontends and backends of varying shapes and sizes. So without further ado…

## Frontends and backends: the restaurants of code