Front-end complexity is all in your head

> We are trading back-end simplicity for front-end complexity.

Yes, but why? I think it's because clients have become increasingly more powerful and leveraging this comes at no cost. There is also the nature of responsiveness, which inevitably is faster to calculate only on the client side and save that trip to the server (and save money).

I see it this way: the frontend has its complexity focused in one system, whether that system is one codebase or many it still needs to coordinate and present itself as one cohesive software that is distributed across all users. On the other hand, the backend has its complexity spread out across multiple systems, most of which are designed to be completely decoupled from each other. So yes, the frontend keeps getting more complex because naturally all of its functionality is consumed by the end user, as oppose to other services or clients (in the case of the backend).

I decided to write some thoughts down after seeing another thread about front-end complexity recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38055086