When it comes to building dynamic and interactive user interfaces, Angular stands out as one of the top frameworks in the world of web development. Its component-based architecture, robust performance, and comprehensive toolset make it an excellent choice for developers looking to create sophisticated and high-performing UIs. However, even with Angular's powerful capabilities, development can be significantly enhanced with the help of Angular UI frameworks.
Angular UI frameworks are collections of pre-built components, libraries, and tools that facilitate the creation of user interfaces in Angular applications. These frameworks not only speed up the development process but also improve design consistency and user experience. By leveraging these frameworks, developers can focus more on functionality and business logic while relying on tested and optimized UI components to deliver a polished product.
In this article, we will delve into some of the best Angular UI frameworks available, explore their features, and discuss why they are essential for creating outstanding user interfaces with Angular. Whether you are looking to streamline your development workflow or enhance the aesthetics of your application, understanding these UI frameworks will be invaluable.
1. Angular Material: The Official Google UI Library
Angular Material is a comprehensive UI component library for Angular developers, designed to follow Google's Material Design principles. It provides a wide range of reusable, well-tested, and accessible UI components that facilitate the creation of high-quality, responsive applications with a consistent design language.
Key Features of Angular Material:
High Quality: Angular Material offers internationalized and accessible components that are well-tested to ensure performance and reliability. This ensures a seamless experience for all users.
Versatile and Customizable: It provides tools that help developers build their own custom components with common interaction patterns. Components are customizable within the bounds of the Material Design specification, allowing for tailored solutions that fit specific needs.
Straightforward APIs: Angular Material's APIs are designed to be straightforward, providing consistent cross-platform behavior. This makes it easier for developers to implement and maintain their applications.
Frictionless Integration: Built by the Angular team, Angular Material integrates seamlessly with Angular. Developers can start from scratch or incorporate Angular Material into existing applications, ensuring a smooth development process.
Responsive Design: The components are designed to work seamlessly across different devices and screen sizes, ensuring a consistent user experience.
Step-by-step Installation Process
To start with, Angular CLI should already have been installed.
Add Angular Material to your application by running the following command:
ng add @angular/materialThengaddcommand will install Angular Material, the Component Dev Kit (CDK), AngularAnimations and ask you the following questions to determine which features to include:Choose a prebuilt theme name, or "custom" for a custom theme:
You can choose from prebuilt material design themes or set up an extensible custom theme.Set up global Angular Material typography styles:
Whether to apply the global typography styles to your application.Set up browser animations for Angular Material:
Importing theBrowserAnimationsModuleinto your application enables Angular's animation system. Declining this will disable most of Angular Material's animations.
The ng add command will additionally perform the following actions:
Add project dependencies to
package.jsonAdd the Roboto font to your
index.htmlAdd the Material Design icon font to your
index.htmlAdd a few global CSS styles to:
- Remove margins frombody
- Setheight: 100% onhtmlandbody
- Set Roboto as the default application font
You're done! Angular Material is now configured to be used in your application.
2. NGX Bootstrap: Extending Bootstrap Capabilities for Angular
NGX Bootstrap, a popular library, extends the capabilities of Bootstrap by integrating seamlessly with Angular. This combination leverages the robust styling and layout features of Bootstrap, along with Angular's powerful framework for building dynamic web applications. NGX Bootstrap provides Angular components built on top of Bootstrap, enhancing your development process with reusable, accessible, and well-documented components.
NGX Bootstrap is an open-source project licensed under MIT, supported by ongoing development thanks to its backers. It offers high-quality, internationalized, and accessible components, ensuring consistent performance across platforms. With straightforward APIs and versatile tools, developers can build custom components adhering to Material Design specifications. Built by the Angular team, it integrates seamlessly with Angular, whether starting from scratch or incorporating it into existing applications.
NGX Bootstrap Features
Flexible Design NGX Bootstrap is built with modularity in mind, allowing developers to implement custom templates, styles, and more. The components are designed for both mobile and desktop environments, ensuring consistent performance across devices.
Tinker-friendly Code The library follows a set of style guides and guidelines to enhance code maintainability and readability. It supports the latest Angular versions and provides comprehensive unit-test coverage, making it a robust choice for developers.
Good Documentation Understanding the importance of documentation, NGX Bootstrap offers well-written and continually updated guides. This documentation is designed to ease developers' workflows and improve overall software quality.
Extensive Demos To give developers a clear understanding of what they can achieve, NGX Bootstrap includes a large set of demos for most component methods. These demos help visualize component functionalities without the need for installation.
Installation Guide for NGX Bootstrap
Ngx-bootstrap contains all core (and not only) Bootstrap components powered by Angular. So you don't need to include original JS components, but we are using markup and css provided by Bootstrap.
For this demonstration, we’re choosing one of the many different methods to install the framework. Let’s get started!
Install ngx-bootstrap from npm
npm install ngx-bootstrap –save
You will need bootstrap styles (Bootstrap 3)
Or Bootstrap 4
To enable bootstrap 4 theme templates in ngx-bootstrap, please read here
3. NG Semantic UI: Leveraging Semantic UI for Angular Development
NG Semantic UI is a powerful framework that combines the versatility of Semantic UI with the robust capabilities of Angular. Semantic UI, known for its human-friendly HTML and responsive layouts, makes creating intuitive and visually appealing user interfaces straightforward.
Semantic UI uses natural language principles, treating words and classes as exchangeable concepts, which simplifies HTML coding. Its intuitive JavaScript utilizes simple phrases called behaviors to trigger functionality, allowing developers to easily modify settings. Additionally, performance logging in Semantic UI aids in tracking down bottlenecks, making debugging simpler.
When integrated with Angular, NG Semantic UI provides a seamless development experience. This fusion allows for the creation of responsive, accessible, and customizable web applications, enhancing both frontend aesthetics and backend functionality. By leveraging NG Semantic UI, developers can streamline their workflow, ensuring a cohesive and professional user experience.
Unique Features of NG Semantic UI
NG Semantic UI offers a unique blend of features that enhance Angular development by leveraging the strengths of Semantic UI. Here are some of its key features:
Concise HTML: NG Semantic UI utilizes Semantic UI’s approach of treating words and classes as exchangeable concepts. This intuitive syntax uses natural language principles, making HTML more readable and easier to maintain.
Intuitive JavaScript: The framework employs simple phrases called behaviors to trigger functionality, allowing developers to easily modify component settings. This approach simplifies the implementation of complex functionalities.
Simplified Debugging: Performance logging in NG Semantic UI helps track down bottlenecks efficiently. This feature makes debugging straightforward by eliminating the need to dig through complex stack traces.
Flexibility: NG Semantic UI is designed to be highly adaptable, allowing developers to implement their own templates and styles. The components are built with extensibility and adaptivity in mind, ensuring they perform equally well on mobile and desktop devices.
Developer-Friendly Code: The framework incorporates style guides and guidelines that enhance code maintainability and readability. It supports the latest Angular versions and ensures comprehensive unit-test coverage, promoting robust and reliable development.
Comprehensive Documentation: NG Semantic UI provides well-written and regularly updated documentation, making it easier for developers to understand.
Implementing NG Semantic UI in Your Angular Project
Implementing NG Semantic UI in your Angular project is a straightforward process that significantly enhances the user interface with its intuitive design principles and powerful features.
Start by installing the NG Semantic UI library using npm
Import the necessary modules into your Angular application.
Customize your components using Semantic UI's human-friendly HTML syntax, which makes it easy to create clean and responsive layouts.
Integrate JavaScript behaviors to add dynamic functionality, and leverage the performance logging features to optimize your application's efficiency.
Optimizing User Experience with NG Semantic UI
Optimizing user experience with NG Semantic UI involves utilizing its extensive range of features to create an engaging and responsive interface. Use the framework's concise HTML and intuitive JavaScript to streamline the development process and ensure your application is accessible and easy to navigate.
Implement responsive design principles to guarantee your app performs well on all devices, and take advantage of the built-in debugging tools to identify and resolve performance issues quickly. NG Semantic UI’s modularity allows for seamless customization, ensuring your application meets the specific needs of your users while maintaining high performance and reliability. By focusing on these elements, you can create a superior user experience that sets your application apart.
4. NG-Lightning: The Angular Component Library for Salesforce Integration
NG-Lightning is an open-source project, a robust Angular component library specifically designed to integrate seamlessly with Salesforce projects. It provides a comprehensive set of components and utilities that adhere to Salesforce's design guidelines, enabling developers to create sophisticated and user-friendly applications within the Salesforce ecosystem.
Functionalities and Features of NG-Lightning
NG-Lightning boasts a variety of features, including:
Salesforce Lightning Design System (SLDS) Components: Pre-built, customizable components that ensure a consistent look and feel aligned with Salesforce’s UI standards.
Responsive Design: Components are designed to be fully responsive, ensuring optimal performance across devices.
Extensive Documentation: Comprehensive guides and examples to assist developers in implementing and customizing components efficiently.
Integrating NG-Lightning with Salesforce Projects
Integrating NG-Lightning with Salesforce projects involves a straightforward process:
Installation: Add NG-Lightning to your Angular project using npm or yarn.
Configuration: Import the necessary modules and configure them within your Angular application.
Customization: Utilize and customize the pre-built components to fit your project’s specific needs while maintaining adherence to Salesforce’s design principles.
Enhancing Salesforce Development with NG-Lightning
NG-Lightning significantly enhances Salesforce development by:
Streamlining Development: Reducing the time and effort needed to develop custom components from scratch.
Ensuring Consistency: Maintaining design consistency with Salesforce’s UI standards across various applications.
Improving User Experience: Providing a rich set of features and responsive components that enhance the overall user experience.
Conclusion: create dynamic and scalable user interfaces with Jalasoft
Angular UI frameworks like Angular Material, NGX Bootstrap, NG-Lightning, and NG Semantic UI offer robust solutions for building dynamic and scalable user interfaces. Angular Material excels in providing high-quality, accessible components that ensure consistent behavior across platforms.
At Jalasoft, we have a deep understanding of the capabilities and nuances of these Angular UI frameworks. Our team of experienced developers is proficient in Angular Material, NGX Bootstrap, and NG Semantic UI, allowing us to deliver robust and scalable applications tailored to our clients' needs.
We pride ourselves on our ability to integrate these frameworks seamlessly into both mobile and web applications, ensuring that our solutions are not only functional but also visually appealing and user-friendly.
