Lars Gyrup Brink Nielsen is the co-author of Accelerating Angular Development with Ivy. we got the chance to sit down with him and find out more about his experience of writing with Packt.
Q: What is/are your specialist tech area(s)?
Lars: Angular, TypeScript, JavaScript, Continuous Delivery, Testing, Architecture, Automation, Cloud Native
Q: How did you become an author for Packt? Tell us about your journey. What was your motivation for writing this book?
Lars: I wanted to write a book that I would love to read and learn from myself. “Accelerating Angular Development with Ivy” is a book for the experienced Angular developer. It assumes familiarity with Angular components, services, dependency injection, and so on.
The book introduces stable APIs and features introduced by Angular Ivy with a focus on topics that are not documented well if at all or otherwise covered in the Angular community.
Q: What kind of research did you do, and how long did you spend researching before beginning the book?
Lars: I have studied Angular Ivy for years before writing this book. I thought I knew enough about the subject that it wouldn’t take a lot of effort to write a book about it. It took 3 months to get the outline right before I started writing the book.
Q: Did you face any challenges during the writing process? How did you overcome them?
Lars: I originally had another co-author. He helped me write the outline for the book. He decided to retire from the project because of COVID-19 and personal matters. I’m very thankful for his help with outlining the book.
Jacob Andresen, the co-author of “Accelerating Angular Development with Ivy”, became very busy with his previous job so it took a lot longer to finish the book than originally planned. I continued to write until he returned. I ended up writing Parts 1 and 3 while Jacob focused on Part 2. I’m very happy with the outcome.
Explaining a topic decently in reasonable time is tough. I didn’t want to let the quality of the writing drop but I took a more focused approach for some chapters. I hope you like the result as much as me.
Q: What’s your take on the technologies discussed in the book? Where do you see these technologies heading in the future?
Lars: I am well-known for having covered experimental APIs of Angular Ivy for years. It seems that 2022 is the year where we might finally see features such as standalone components and optional Angular modules. That will be amazing for the Angular newcomer learning curve and mental overhead when developing Angular applications.
For the book, I chose to focus on stable APIs and features, not on what may or may not be included in future versions. The book covers Angular versions 9-12.
Q: Why should readers choose this book over others already on the market? How would you differentiate your book from its competition?
Lars: This book is for the experienced Angular developer who wants to keep up with features and tooling introduced in the first four major Angular Ivy releases. Part 1 is a functional guide which is all about exclusive coverage of new language syntax, APIs, and features.
Part 2 of the book is a hands-on practical guide to implementing features on a real-world application using topics covered in Part 1.
Part 3 contains a migration guide from Angular View Engine to Angular Ivy but also covers tooling that supports our development workflow, including the Angular Ahead-of-Time compiler, the Angular Compatibility Compiler, the Angular Linker, and Angular’s runtime debugging API.
Q. What are the key takeaways you want readers to come away from the book with?
Lars: The reader will walk away having learnt Angular Ivy features and tooling that they were not aware of or had never fully explored. They will have hands-on experience with some of the most broadly applicable features introduced by Angular Ivy. Their productivity will increase because of recommendations and guides to modern Angular tooling.
Q. What advice would you give to readers learning tech? Do you have any top tips?
Lars: Keep learning! Find something you’re passionate about. Learn in public. Pull through.
Q. Do you have a blog that readers can follow?
Lars: https://dev.to/layzee
Q. Can you share any blogs, websites and forums to help readers gain a holistic view of the tech they are learning?
Lars: https://dev.to/this-is-angular
https://dev.to/this-is-learning
https://this-is-learning.github.io/rxjs-fundamentals-course/
https://this-is-angular.github.io/ngrx-essentials-course/
https://www.youtube.com/c/LarsGyrupBrinkNielsen
Q. How would you describe your author journey with Packt? Would you recommend Packt to aspiring authors?
Lars: Packt was a good partner for writing my first book. They insisted on having a detailed outline up front which challenged me in planning ahead for the content of the book. Packt has professionals to support you in all phases of authoring and publishing a book.
Q. Do you belong to any tech community groups?
Lars: I am a Co-Founder of Open Learning on-profit “This is Learning”. We provide a platform for Open Learning and learning in public content. I am a two time Microsoft MVP in Developer Technologies. I am also a GitHub Star which is an absolute honor since the award is based on community nominations.
Q. What are your favorite tech journals? How do you keep yourself up to date on tech?
Lars: Other than the dozens of authors publishing on This is Learning and This is Angular, I like to read Nethanel Basal’s publication at https://netbasal.com and Manfred Steyer’s publication at https://www.angulararchitects.io/en/blog/
Q. How did you organize, plan, and prioritize your work and write the book?
Lars: I paused my writing efforts for certain events and period’s of time such as my wife graduating and my daughters needing extra care. I almost lost my article writing efforts and scaled down on open source contributions as well as speaking opportunities to focus on writing my book but I am not one to sit on my hands so I have been keeping active in all these efforts.
Q. What is that one writing tip that you found most crucial and would like to share with aspiring authors?
Lars: I try to incorporate three key ingredients in my writing:
1. Theory: Explain the concepts on a high level of abstraction.
2. Code samples: Include simple but realistic code samples. No foos or bars.
3. Visuals: Add diagrams, screenshots, and other figures to support visual learning. Try to explain the abstract concepts through diagrams. They don’t have to follow a certain standard model.
You can find Lars’ book on Amazon by following this link: Please click here
