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Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

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Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#181
Rails. Use the default Rails 7 stack (Importmaps, Hotwire).

You also can't get away from knowing at least a couple programming 'languages', it's hard to get away from writing at least some HTML/CSS unless you go with all pre-built solutions, at which point you may as well use a website builder...

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#182
post #110

No one mentioned Spring Boot and Spring Data with Thymeleaf yet? I find it quite simple to build stable web apps in a short time. Plus it removes a metric ton of boilerplate that's inherent in Java applications.

yup, spring boot, jpa, thymeleaf and htmx if you want to sprinkle sunshine.

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#183

Maybe this sounds a bit dumb, but you could just use git and store everything in files? I mean if you think about it, git is technically a CRUD app...

People do this - usually when they want to encourage contributions from a wider community.

I'm working on a python tool to make this easier. You can set up your data repository in git with some config files and it will help with a static site builder to make using and contributing data easier. It's at https://pypi.org/project/DataTig/ but I haven't had the chance to set up a good intro yet, tho I have started a tutorial: https://datatig.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorial/index.html

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#184
post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except for Node.js, unfortunately there's still no good way of building a simple CRUD app like with Django/RoR. Available solutions are still very much do-it-yourself or very niche-buggy. This has some advantages! But it's really bad if you just want a CRUD app.

Have you heard of AdonisJS[1]? A couple of years ago we had JS as a hard requirement for a new project, and coming from a Rails background, Adoins was really good. 1: https://adonisjs.com/

Sure, it's one of the best looking for that case and actually looks better than I remembered, but still everything from the view templating system[1] to the database[2] it uses "by default" needs to be manually installed, which makes it def not like Django/RoR IMHO. Heck, even the simple session management needs to be installed separately[3].

[1] https://docs.adonisjs.com/guides/views/introduction#setup

[2] https://docs.adonisjs.com/guides/database/introduction

[3] https://docs.adonisjs.com/guides/session

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#185

I’m surprised nobody had said MS Access. You don’t need to learn any programming languages, it comes with everything you need, and every Access app has lasted way longer than anyone wanted it to. ;)

That and FileMaker were my first thoughts, too, but reading https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/access-2010-web-d... Access isn’t an option anymore if web access is required.

FileMaker Pro (https://www.claris.com/filemaker/pro/) probably still is an option. It isn’t free in any sense, though.

dBase also still exists (http://www.dbase.com/ (web page looks like a print of an ugly presentation)), but I wouldn’t know whether that ticks all the boxes.

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#186

I'm reading this as a CRUD GUI app. Definitely Ruby on Rails coupled with Avo (shameless plug). It literally takes you less than an hour to create a realistic usable CRUD app (that would take you at least a few days in the traditional way) without learning anything new. Generate a DSL (a Resource) and add one line per field. Avo knows how to read and display in a rich way, handle creating/updating records using your…

I second Rails. It's incredibly polished and has really good gems to speed up dev. ActiveAdmin is a great gem if you need to quickly make an admin dashboard. It was useful when I had a small consultancy.

https://activeadmin.info/

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#188
post #162
post #56

I'll probably be a minority here, but I'd say: java + Vaadin [1] + raw jdbc (no ORM nonsense). On Vaadin site, you can use starter [2] to create an app template. There is no need to write javascript; most Vaadin code looks like good old desktop programming. Due Java stability, that thing will run forever and will be performant. If you want to be "cloud native" (or whatever cool name now is) in the future, you can lat…

Vaadin is interesting, and choice of java is ok (though I prefer Kotlin). But raw jdbc in 2022 is absolutely bonkers. If you don't prefer ORMs that's ok, but a light abstraction like SQLDelight or Spring data jdbc (if you prefer working with SQL) or a query builder like jOOQ (if you like type-safety) can make your life simpler by an order of magnitude.

I was hoping someone would mention Kotlin and Spring! Kotlin is a pleasure to code with. And Spring Boot simplifies Spring tremendously, https://start.spring.io/

Lots of documentation for Java/Spring out there, but somewhat lacking for Kotlin/Spring. Some IDEs help by automatically converting from Java to Kotlin, like IDEA InteliJ.

Re: Ask HN: Easiest way to build a CRUD app?

#190
post #79

I would answer at the meta-level - pick the framework in the language you know best. If you are already fluent in Python, use Django. PHP; Laravel? Etc. The benefit of using the “best” CRUD tool (if there even is one) is far less than the cost of learning a new language these days. When Rails first came out, it was so much better than anything else that it was worth it to learn Ruby just to use that toolchain. Nowada…

I love Heroku but build packs are a nightmare. Getting the right libraries installed so I can process HEIC images is frustrating. I should be able to check a box to get this kind of support.

Heroku also supports docker containers if that’s more your style.
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