front matter
GraphQL is a game changer. It immediately grabbed my full attention when I first heard about it back in 2015, when Facebook first announced the project. I’ve been a frustrated maintainer and user of multiple REST-ish APIs, and hearing how Facebook engineers were trying to solve common data API problems with this new GraphQL language was a clear sign for me to learn about it.
GraphQL has many advantages and disadvantages. It solves many technical problems beautifully; but the best thing about it, in my opinion, is that it greatly improves the communication process between frontend clients and backend services. Not only does GraphQL make communication a lot more efficient for both sides, but it also gives them both a rich, declarative language. GraphQL services can use that language to express what data they can provide, and GraphQL clients can use the language to express what data they need. GraphQL also enables frontend developers to be independent of backend developers, and that in itself is a big deal. Frontend developers get more freedom and a stronger impact on the features of the data APIs they use.