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Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

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Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#21

Post by micaksica »

sisedi wrote: post #16
micaksica wrote: post #11

Ease of implementation? Just grab any modern Rails and pick a frontend framework later.

I worked with Rails briefly in my previous company and found a working product nearly unmanageable. Any tips on keeping the codebase legible?

Define legible, or rather, what were your frustrations with your previous company? I have worked with many Rails apps, some at very large scale, and never found them illegible in situations where the developers 1. conformed to best practices, 2. did not try to write Ruby like a C-derivative, and 3. were using rails for CRUD apps vs. trying to wing something mostly made for CRUD into doing something it probably shouldn't have.

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#22

Post by nickmerwin »

sisedi wrote: post #17
Bjorkbat wrote: post #10

So, if you already know javascript then I would look at node.js. Full disclaimer: I actually use golang for my personal projects because I'm attracted by its simplicity and how it really doesn't hide stuff from me using hand-wavy magic. Performance is also a factor, but not one I consider when comparing it to node. If I'm working on something I want to roll out fairly quickly. A prototype. Then I'll probably use node…

Thanks for the detailed reply :) I'm a little iffy with Rails myself.

Here's a great Rails learning resource:

https://www.railstutorial.org

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#24

Post by theandrewbailey »

If you want to stick to Java, look into servlets and JSPs. For databases, almost any will do, but I like Postgres. As for database API, use whichever JPA implementation that comes with the server you're using.

Sometimes, bare Java EE is good enough.

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#25

Post by ilaksh »

I am a Node.js developer and practically speaking you should probably learn that.

But so far I haven't heard anyone mention the Nim programming language which can compile to JavaScript or C and has what I consider to be superior syntax and excellent performance as well as great metaprogramming capabilities. See http://nim-lang.org

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#26

Post by dvdhnt »

Node is great if you want to utilize npm modules.

My recent projects have been built on a Node server. I like to use knexjs as an ORM, sometimes including bookshelfjs for model building. Cacheing or rather message queuing has been done with redis. Often, this backend server will feed a much smaller front end web server that leans on react and jsx to spit out HTML.

PS I started out with rails but moved to a primarily node stack last year.

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#28

Post by tarellel »

sisedi wrote: post #16
micaksica wrote: post #11

Ease of implementation? Just grab any modern Rails and pick a frontend framework later.

I worked with Rails briefly in my previous company and found a working product nearly unmanageable. Any tips on keeping the codebase legible?

As @micaksica has said Rails is generally a pretty good framework and I've build and contributed to several projects myself and most of them I've never had any problems with.

If the developers put the projects together properly, it should have been very legible and easy to jump in on. Ruby isn't exactly a hard language to learn and generally very legible, almost to the point where each function/statement should be close to reading plain English (other than regexp and a few other things). That is, if the developers are following best practices, separation of roles, and not trying to hack together various work arounds because they don't know the language.

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#29

Post by clifanatic »

Bjorkbat wrote: post #10

So, if you already know javascript then I would look at node.js. Full disclaimer: I actually use golang for my personal projects because I'm attracted by its simplicity and how it really doesn't hide stuff from me using hand-wavy magic. Performance is also a factor, but not one I consider when comparing it to node. If I'm working on something I want to roll out fairly quickly. A prototype. Then I'll probably use node…

> if you already know javascript then I would look at node.js.

I would recommend the polar opposite, actually: use a framework that has nothing in common with anything that you already know. After all, half (or more) of the point of personal projects is to learn new things, right?

Re: Ask HN: Which web stack should I learn for personal projects?

#30

Post by clifanatic »

nickmerwin wrote: post #22
sisedi wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the detailed reply :) I'm a little iffy with Rails myself.

Here's a great Rails learning resource: https://www.railstutorial.org

If you do buy it, though, read it quick. I picked up a copy a few years back and finally got around to reading it after about 6 months or so... only to find that it already was so out-of-date that I couldn't follow along with any of the examples.
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