Web Frameworks Review for PoC

[gildegoma]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Web_application_frameworks

Best Client-Side (JavaScript) Candidates:

• jQuery, of course (default JS framework in Rails 3.1)
• + CoffeScript? will be natively supported by Rails 3.1

  Best Server-Side Candidates:

• Ruby on Rails 3.x
  • +https://github.com/justinfrench/formtastic#readme (plugin / add-on: Forms Engine)
• Scala on Play 2.0: http://www.playframework.org/2.0, http://scala.playframework.org/, https://github.com/playframework/play-scala
  • TypeSafe website is powered by Play, not Lift -> http://www.typesafe.com
  • Pros: friendly, simple, classic MVC-style, Play 2.0 is written in Scala itself (1.x is written in Python), Commercial support from Typesafe (Odersky company) started in November 2011
  • Cons: Play 2.0 is still in Beta state, maybe not as functional-oriented as Lift ?
• Scala on Scalatra+ORM.lib?+Mailer.lib+...?
  • http://www.scalatra.org/ is a micro/pico framework inspired from Sinatra (Ruby)
• Scala on Bowler (based on Scalatra and Scalate)
• Scala on Circumflex (ORM is part of this framework)
• Scala on Lift ? :
  • Pros: Functional programming, Strong Typing, Comet, not MVC but View first
  • http://jeppenejsum.wordpress.com/2010/01/18/scala-and-lift-status-after-six-months/
  • Cons: Framework/community Sizes/Maturity/Doc + Needs to run on a Java Application Server, but we want an application ready to deploy on easy/cheap web-hosting providers

    Other Candidates:

• PHP on Symfony 2.x
• (http://www.photon-project.com/ ???) -> too early, KarShare is not exactly the target (very very fast webapp)
• Scala on Wicket:
• PHP on Silex (micro-framework based on the Symfony2 Components)
• PHP on other frameworks, like very fast Photon, or simple CakePHP,...
• PHP on Symfony 1.4 : handy and handled Framework, but support end of life in 2013...
• Django ?
• Facebook application ?

  Pro/Cons Matrix

|Feature/Aspect to consider|RoR|Symfony|Lift|Comment| |Easy deployment on cheap web hosting (anywhere)|Average|Good|Bad|PHP5 is everywhere| |i18n|not too bad|very good|?|http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5487289/is-there-an-equivalent-to-symfonys-localized-schema-in-rails-3|

(why GitHub does not support Wiki Markdown tables... ? I have first to dig in https://github.com/github/help.github.com/pulls)

Related Stuff found on the way

• http://capifony.org/ - Deployment recipes collection that works with both symfony and Symfony2 applications (inspired from Capistrano for RoR

[gildegoma]

Internet Popular Opinion

• Symfony is the bomb
• Play! is the bomb
• Lift is brilliant
• Django is a beautiful thing
• Rails is a beautiful thing.

sources:

• http://www.hiprank.com/django-vs-lift-vs-rails-vs-symfony.html
• http://www.hiprank.com/lift-vs-play-vs-rails.html

Rails 3.x Trends

• Assets Pipeline
• jQuery by default
• Bundler... good versioning for Plugins and Dependencies (e.g. jquery,...)
• http://blog.stevecoast.com/what-the-hell-is-happening-to-rails (critic about increasing complexity in Rails 3.0, 3.1,...)
  • brought me to RailsConf DHH speach where Assets Pipeline and other goodies from 3.1 are quite well presented: see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGdCI2HhfAU&feature=player_embedded#!

Symfony 2.x Trends

• http://cmf.symfony.com/

Lift, Play, Wicket or Scala Trends

• http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3670237/should-i-use-play-or-lift-for-doing-web-development-in-scala
• http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3954088/frameworks-comparation-lift-play-and-wicket

Symfony vs Rails

• http://blog.enricostahn.com/2009/11/30/comparison-symfony-vs-ruby-on-rails.html
• http://vschart.com/compare/symfony/vs/ruby-on-rails
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Web_application_frameworks
• http://www.iamseree.com/application-development/a-thing-to-concern-that-made-me-stay-away-from-ruby-on-rails-of-my-recent-project

Jérémy Lecour said in late 2009

le plus grand handicap de Symfony, c’est PHP

... and I agree with him. Unfortunately this advice still applies for Symfony2 :-/

Gist for Comparing Rails 3 with Symfony2: https://gist.github.com/991832

[gildegoma]

Current (personally oriented) conclusions:

Rails 3.1 Pros:

• Ruby is nicer Language, more concepts to learn, more coding safety
• I want to learn coding in Rails in depth (for maybe contributing to other projects, like Redmine/ChiliProject)
• I want to discover Rails Community and Project Management style

Symfony 2 Pros:

• PHP is STILL easier to deploy anywhere (simple webhosting) than Ruby
• more people 'knows' PHP (rather than Ruby)
• I want to learn in Symfony2 in depth
• I like Symfony Project Management style

Open Questions:

• Who wins the Concepts War between both frameworks ?

Proposal for decision making: build a 2-days PoC with both candidates, then feedback experiences...

If I must decide today, I'd say: Rails!

[gildegoma]

Reading Seven languages in Seven weeks, I don't want to code in PHP (despite nice advantages of Symfony2, like nice community, nice design,...)

Now, I focus on Frameworks using Scala or Ruby

Ruby/Rails, Scala/Lift, but why not outsiders like Ruby/Merb or Scala/Play(2.0), Scala/Scalatra, Scala/Circumflex ?

[gildegoma]

Very important dev-stuff that I want to be available 'stable today and effortless' are:

• continuous integration service (no need to start my own CI server) -> Travis CI is ready for Ruby, not yet for PHP or Scala
• database schema migrations (up/down)
  • Rails/ActiveRecord and Symfony/Doctrine are OK
  • Few Java/Scala frameworks embed such feature out of the box, need for 'flyway', 'liquibase', ... extra-tooling... that not fun !
  • Play! framework with 'evolutions' seems to make it well enough
• Nice and strong community

[gildegoma]

Some of the Programming Environments supported by Heroku http://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/cedar :

• Ruby / Rails
• Java or Scala / Play!
• Clojure / Ring
• Node.js / Express
• Python / Django
• Spring MVC Hibernate

See also Programming Languages Trends:

• 2011: http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
• 2008: http://www.caffeinatedcoder.com/programming-language-trends/

[gildegoma]

Ouah, there are already lots more tools (as I thought) for Scala, see huge lists there : https://wiki.scala-lang.org/display/SW/Tools+and+Libraries

[gildegoma]

Reviewed, Surveyed and waited enough:

• Typesafe company announced commercial support for Play 2.0, as part of their official Scala stack
• Play 2.0 Features are realy Rails 3.1-like, and for sure will improve in short time
• I like typed and compiled languages, compared to nice but risky duck-typed Ruby
• I'm pretty sure that Scala community will soon help Travis project to provide for CI platform for Scala

The proposed stack for Alpha Development is therefore:

• Scala / Play 2
• CoffeScript + jQuery (or YUI, or ... ?)
• LESS CSS
• Herokku deployment ?

As methodology, I do want to investigate BDD practices (still have to study tools match for Scala, see cucumber, specs2, ScalaTest, Webrat/Selenium, ...)

Let's have fun and start coding!