In this episode of Semaphore Uncut, we talk to Guillermo Rauch. Guillermo is CEO and co-founder of Vercel. We talk about how React has emerged as a de-facto standard for the front-end. Guillermo describes Vercel's Next.js framework that is built around React. And we also discuss front-end testing and microservices engineering trends.

Key takeaways:

• Next.js improves React development and deployment
• Next.js is a powerful framework around de-facto standard React
• Front-ends are globally distributed - Next.js supports CDN from the start
• Front-end engineers need short feedback loops
• Fast feedback drives front-end quality
• Adopt new front-end tech one page at a time
• Test in production-like preview builds
• Use headless, visual regression tests for GUI components
• Testing benefits from React being functional and declarative
• The risks and rewards of microservices
• Emerging patterns and systems mitigate microservices risk

About Semaphore Uncut
In each episode of Semaphore Uncut, we invite software industry professionals to discuss the impact they are making and what excites them about the emerging technologies.