In recent years, Node.js has been used both by small and large companies to develop games, social media platforms, instant messengers, live streaming applications, videoconferencing tools, and a lot more. Thus, LinkedIn chose Node.js over Ruby on Rails recently, since Node.js is ideal for building real-time applications that need the data to be updated constantly. With a shorter learning curve and shorter time to generate a marketable product, Node.js is great for MVP development if you are a start-up or a small business with limited resources and time. Node.js development ensures quick time to market. The most important goal of any app development project is to maintain efficiency and gain the maximum ROI. Choosing a framework that takes too much time will cost you more money. The Node.js platform is capable of creating robust, scalable, and effective desktop and mobile applications.
Backend As Well Frontend Development With Node.js:
JavaScript features have been heavily used in web development for years. Google, Facebook, Wikipedia, and the vast majority of sites nowadays leverage JS for client-side operations. React Native, Native script, Apache Cordova, and other hybrid tools use Node.js for cross-platform app development as a core technology. Since Node.js began to make its way into back-end development, developers want to use the same tech stack for their entire website without learning a new language for the back end. Node.js brings JS code syntax and functionality to the backend.
Advantages Of Node.js Web Application Development:
Recently, companies have begun switching from their backend stacks to Node.js. LinkedIn chose Node.js over Ruby on Rails because of the better performance in handling increasing workload and reducing the number of servers. PayPal and Netflix did the same thing, except they had a plan to move to microservices. Let’s look at the reasons to choose Node.JS for web application development.
A Powerful Stack of Technologies For Web Development:
JavaScript is one of the most popular languages, with millions of free tools and an active community. Node.js is strongly linked to JavaScript, which has enabled its rapid rise in popularity. It has more than 368 million downloads, with thousands of free tools in the package module.
Along with its popularity, Node.js has acquired several advantages over traditional JS:
- Data processing and fast performance;
- Code with high reusability;
- It is easy to write, read, maintain, and learn the code;
- Thousands of free guides, an active community, and a huge resource library.
- It is also part of the popular MEAN stack (MongoDB, Express.js, Angular, Node.js, which is a multi-function framework).
An Application Developer Can Use JavaScript For The Entire Project:
Node.js web app development’s learnability is one of the major benefits since JavaScript is a useful language no matter what kind of web app you write. Syntax, basic functionality, structural principles — all these are similar to JavaScript.
The node-based Node will be much easier to learn for JS developers than committing to an entirely new language. Also, since they are both JS-based, the frontend and backend codebases will be very similar, good to read, and straightforward for maintenance.
The Rapid Development Of Microservices:
There’s another reason Node.js has gained so much popularity so fast. This environment is ideal for the concept of micro-services (splitting a monolith into dozens of smaller services).
A key Node.js benefit for software development is its non-blocking algorithms. Microservices must communicate with each other quickly — and Node.js is one of the fastest programming languages for this task.
The Node.js node system can handle several requests without waiting for the first one to complete. Several microservices can send messages to each other, which will be echoed and answered simultaneously.
Scalable Web Application Development:
Scalability is an important feature of Node.js — it suggests as much in its name. Nodes can run simultaneously and talk to each other. This makes Node.js superior to other web backend development solutions.
- There is a cluster module in Node.js that handles load balancing for every running CPU core. This is one of many Node.js module benefits: you can run multiple nodes simultaneously, and the environment will handle load balancing automatically.
- A developer can horizontally partition a Node.js application. You can differentiate editions for different users based on their location, language, age, etc. Children processes — simple operations that interact quickly and share information — achieve this with client processes.
- Node.js offers a way out so that you don’t need to scroll through call backs. Frameworks map functions to each other so that you can find the feature you need. When using frameworks, there is no need for scrolling through call backs.
V8 Engine:
The Chrome team developed Node.js’ V8 Engine, but it has now been adapted to the environment’s needs. Its purpose is to transform proprietary JavaScript into general machine code based on C++. The Google team constantly improves the engine’s speed and quality — the Google team transforms JS previously understood only by browsers into a language all servers and machines can understand.
Powerful Data Processing:
In Node’s case, the backend development language or runtime environment should be able to dispatch thousands of requests at once. Node.js is an efficient data handling tool for the following reasons:
In most languages, requests are processed synchronously — they are placed in a queue to be processed one by one. With Node.js, the asynchronous structure is adopted — the next requests will be processed simultaneously as the first one. No process will block another.
Event-Based Programming:
Different approaches exist for software development, such as linear and event-based. In the linear tool model, algorithms are executed in sequence regardless of user actions. The event-based model does not have a defined output order. Still, the app operates according to user input (triggers): no redundant background tasks, only effective handling of website visitors’ needs.
In PayPal’s case, the response time decreased by 35% after switching from Java to Node.js. Now it processes more user requests and does it faster.
Node Package Manager’s Rich Additional Functionality:
NPM is one of the most powerful features of Node.js. It’s a free marketplace dedicated to Node.js packages where you can get new functionality and ready-to-use code libraries. Approximately 100,000 new packages are uploaded every week, according to official statistics.
Open-source runtime Node.js is one of the most active communities out there. Leading Node.js developers share their tools, modules, frameworks, and packages for free.
Active Community:
The Node.js community is extremely active on GitHub, Stack Overflow, and Reddit. Developers even create group chat rooms on Slack and Gitter for everyone to join. The Node community has a thriving ecosystem for growth, learning, and innovation. Everyone reviews each other’s code, shares frameworks, and answers all Node-related questions.
Big Corporations Attest To Node.js:
The Node.js Foundation, founded by Joyent, now known as JS Foundation, was formed to help the technology grow. Any company can join in developing the tool, including industry leaders such as Microsoft, IBM, PayPal, Trello, and others.
- This is another advantage of Node.js as an application development framework; it’s one of the few open-source projects out there that doesn’t rely solely on community resources; it’s been able to attract corporate resources that have contributed to its rapid growth.
- Additionally, Node’s non-blocking processing method helps boost performance by allowing multiple requests to be processed at once.
The Control Flow Features:
Asynchronous nature is one of the biggest advantages and disadvantages of Node.js web app development. Each time a function is called, the code automatically sends callbacks. As the number of calls grows, you end up in a situation called callback hell.
Application of Node.js as the web application
- Real-time chat apps
- Automation
- Data streaming apps
- Web app framework
- Browser games
- Single-page apps
Node.js Web Application Development Services With Soft Enterprise
We want to introduce you to Soft Enterprise if you are looking for a trustworthy partner or are still unclear why to use Node.js in web app development. Soft Enterprise specializes in JavaScript and Node.js development. We optimize web-based application performance with these platforms. We provide integrated data storage solutions for backend server-side components as well as front-end applications. We have found Node.js to be a powerful backend tool capable of handling millions of monthly visitors and handling terabytes of data.
Conclusion:
Node.js is the right tool to develop scalable web applications with incredible performance. Node’s advantages and disadvantages are similar to any other technology, so if you have a non-CPU-intensive application, Node.js is the better option.
Soft Enterprise is your best bet if you are unsure which back-end technology is best for your next project or have questions about Node.js’ pros and cons. Our experts know how to choose the best Node.js components and frameworks for your next web app project. You can contact us if you would like to develop a new web app or convert an existing one to Node.js or detailed information on Node.js web application development. We will provide you with our case studies and practical insights.