When Should You Use Node.Js?
Node.js is probably the new cool technology that has been used by some of the big heads
when to use node.js?
and techies. But that should not be the reason why you should be using node.js for your web development. It is a powerful technology that is capable of providing flexibility and speed but it may not be suitable in all cases.
How it works?
To know when you should be using node.js, you must first understand how it works. Node.js was originally conceived as a way to create websites with push capabilities. It is completely based on JavaScript and works under an asynchronous and even driven I/O. It fills the particular need for building fast and scalable network applications.
Node.js is lightweight and fast and can work well with several databases (Redis, MongoDB ). The major feature of node.js is its flexible I/O scaling. All I/O operations are implemented in an asynchronous non-blocking way. Node.js applications are usually single threaded hence it places less burden on RAM and processor. It uses Google’s V8 engine for execution making it even more efficient. It comes with a pre-installed package manager npm that handles package installations and organization. Node.js uses an event loop that enables efficient scaling as millions of threads need not be processed for each connection. The event loops are called via callbacks and servers automatically enter event loop at the end of the call back definition.
Reasons to use node.js
The most prominent attractions of node.js are listed down below
- Node.js uses the power of javascript and hence if you already know javascript it will be easy to adopt node.js and practical usage is very high due to the widespread usage of javascript in both server and client applications.
- Node.js is 90% faster than PHP and uses the v8 engine. The features like event loop, single thread execution add to its rapidity in all kinds of read/write operations to and from the back end (file system, database).
- It provides excellent tools like npm, grunt, gulp, brunch and many more that help in fast, robust and consistent application development.
- Real time operations are made easy with the help of websocket protocol.
- It enables transcoding of audio and video files during upload.
- Using meteor framework you can have a single code base on both client and server.
- Node.js has an enthusiastic community that keeps you updated. New modules can be easily included with the help of package.json file.
- It can also be used for creating scripts and command line tools.
When to use node.js
- Node.js is especially suited for applications that require a persistent connection between the browser and the server. Node.js is really efficient in terms of long polling that otherwise creates extreme load on servers.
- Real time applications like online games, chat rooms can be created using node.js as it reduces real time latency.
- Applications using concurrent connections and when each request demands only few CPU cycles are suitable candidates for node.js development.
- It can be used in the development of sockets only servers like chat and apps.
- Real time resources can be easily manipulated with node.js and hence applications requiring geo-location, video stream, audio stream etc., can use node.js
- Analytics webapp handle only small chunks of data and the processing can be made faster with the help of node.js
- Node.js is the best option for a completely cloud based application development.
- Mobile apps that need to have a middleware that translates requests to and fro from platform API and database can use node.js
Some common applications that can benefit from node.js are chat applications, applications or API that require constant connection with object oriented database, counters in websites, real time data streaming, proxy, application and system monitoring dashboards.
When not to use node.js?
- It lacks a compiler set up so it may be difficult to debug huge complex projects.
- When your server request depends heavily on a CPU consuming job, node.js may slow down the event loop (with all the other clients) and is blocked during execution of a function.
- Node.js is not a good choice for applications that work on top of relational databases.
In case you have any work related to node.js development or maintenance then you can contact our team at [email protected] or visit us at Sufalam Technologies
