I'm starting a new job soon, in web-app development. While I'm experienced with programming, my background is primarily in game development and desktop/server applications. I have very little experience from modern web app development. Anyway...
Our primary development tool is going to be something called ESN Planet, which I've not heard about before. Their website is not very specific about its features, and it seems unlikely for one to get a trial invitation ("We have been getting lots of applications, so please try to be as detailed as possible when applying for an invite below.").
Is anyone using this tool, and can explain what kinds of skills are involved in development of apps using this tool? Should I learn Python, JavaScript, CSS, or something else? All of the above? What is the workflow like for a developer? Will I need modern HTML skills?
I'd like to prepare for this job, but not sure what to expect and prepare for. My contact with the company is not a developer, so I figured I would ask here.
I saw a talk by the boss of the company that developed this stuff, at the Europython conference this year. It was ostensibly about the custom IDE that they created to develop in it, but also touched on the Planet system itself. It seems like a pretty run-of-the-mill MVC framework, as far as I can tell.
As far as what to learn, you will definitely need Python. Normally in web development you also need HTML, CSS and Javascript as well - but some frameworks abstract a lot of that away from you, to a greater or lesser extent. Impossible without knowing more about the framework to tell whether this is one that does. And it also depends on the way the company you're working for is set up - some have separate front-end teams that deal with that side of things, leaving the Python developers to just manage the server-side stuff.
For what it's worth, ESN Planet has been used to build Battlelog (http://battlelog.battlefield.com), the web platform for stats tracking and web launching of Battlefield 3.
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This is more of a request for general guidance from experienced developers than a real question, so please bear with me.
As you may have guessed, I come from web development. Lately I have been interested in developing computer assisted production management software, which I hope, will go gradually by developing modules until such a time we have enough to start building a full Enterprise resource planning software. (Forgive me if the terms are incorrect, I'm struggling a bit with english).
Hence my conundrum. Being a web developer, I'd have hoped to reutilize my skills to that end, and with the surge of hybrid apps and desktop apps based on web languages (with the likes of Meteor and its library Electrify), I just can't help but wonder if these technologies are "adapted" to creating such -let's not say complex- intricate apps, hence the following questions.
Are these technologies mature enough for a development of this
scale and commitement over time. I'd hate to start on them just for
them to "fall out of fashion" and lose all traction.
Are they adapted for this kind of development? Compared to
native apps -say in C# or Java, are they truly suited for, say;
intensive database management?
In this endeavor I intend to recruit a small team (Who are
primarilly coming from native dev). Is it safe to assume that the
learning curve will not be too steep, that they'll not become
hopelessly lost at the early stages of learning?
Given that these apps will have to be highly modular to allow for
the hypothetic Entreprise resource planning software, are hybrid
apps a viable option?
And the final question might seem somewhat off-topic, but given
that these apps will be heavily reliant on forms and database
access, aren't web technologies just not the tool of the trade in
this case? Even when associated with libraries like React or
Angular, form creation and validation is a pain, whereas in IDEs
such as VS in C#, creating forms equals dragging them in a GUI fashion from the
database; if I remember correctly.
These are roughly my interrogations. What i'm hoping here for is for you to shed an experienced light on my situation if you can, and if you have any other remarks, please feel free to comment.
Inspired by John Papa's video at Pluralsight, I started learning SPA. It appears pretty interesting. However, before I fully jump in, I'd like to clarify some of my questions.
From what I learnt, SPA is a lean server, fat client app. I think this should work well for small apps like what John Para demonstrated. Does it scale? How big it can be? Anybody has experience with this?
In SPA, you seem to code all the business logic in JavaScript. Is this a good idea at all? How do you hide the business "secret"?
With my background primarily in C#/WPF/.NET, moving to JavaScript seems to be very difficult (well, I learnt a little JavaScript more than 10 years ago - I hated it and never touched it again). With my limited knowledge, I ran into several problems. Debugging JavaScript seems to be a nightmare to me. The highly praised component Breezejs seems to be still in its early stage (e.g. it doesn't support UOW, doesn't support CascadeDelete, doesn't support enums). So, I'm wondering this is good time to jump in?
Directly to your questions:
Since the server logic is thin you can use some kind of cloud services and they scale pretty good. The most of the logic will be handled by the browsers of your users.
You should be careful if you depend on client. HTTP protocol can be easily manipulated. Don't forget that you should always do the validation logic both on client and server side! Also the "hidden" validation and other "secret" logic should be located only on the server.
Debugging JavaScript isn't so bad at all. You can use the built-in tools (Inspect element in Chrome and FireBug in Firefox, etc.) Also there are a lot of useful third party tools that will help you with the debugging.
If you start a new project just for your own use then I advice you to try the SPA approach. If you are writing production code you should become an expert in this area and then try to use these technologies.
Regarding UoW, take a look at the TempHire sample. It demonstrates using the UoW pattern on the client as well as the server.
https://github.com/IdeaBlade/Breeze/tree/master/Samples/TempHire
I believe SPA's provide a better framework for Business Intensive Applications as well as simpler application workflows such as that of Facebook. I have worked with Multi Page Applications for banking application with complex workflows and it get daunting to handle every thing and still keep up the application performance.
But I do think Knockout Alone wont be able to handle large applications as it is to connected in nature. I would recommend something like Backbone Marionete or Angular for that venture.
I am building a framework for large scale SPA development for the opensource community so I do believe it is the right direction.
Interested parties can go to my demo page at http:\saqibshakil.github.io I have demonstrated some of my work there.
i have been looking into it for months. My conclusion is to use Knockout with a light path.js or sammy.js for your url. I use json with a standard Visual Studio MVC ( which can return Json) as the backend.
I am still not done with the project but so far so good. It's lightning fast, elequent and lightweight.
Stay away from the frameworks. Get a look at the standard libraries: how they are written; You can learn a lot of JavaScript that way. Finally debug with chrome or explorer developer tools.
Good luck
I'd like to create something similar to a family tree online app (like geni.com). I'm unsure what languages I should use to build it with. My IT strong points aren't in programming and this project is going to require me to sit down and learn some languages. My problem right now is that I don't know what languages I should use.
So with the idea of a family tree online app in mind here are some of the specifications.
- I do not want to use flash.
- The app needs to be zoomable and scrollable (sort of like google maps)
- The app needs to be able to add content without reloading the page. Perhaps there's a little "+" sign and when I click it, I can add a tag/title/description/picture
- The app needs to be able to save your work for that user to retrieve later on.
- The layout that a user is able to create in is sort of widget based where the user can add a new bubble and then in that bubble they are able to add text or content.
I started programming this with HTML5 canvas and Javascript, but I'm stuck on creating a connection to the database that isn't directly from Javascript (because that seems very insecure to me). But I'm not just stumped on how to interact securely with the database (I don't even have a database picked out), but also I'm concerned that I won't be able to build out the app with just javascript and may need something else like ajax or something but I'm unfamiliar with what each language does nowadays.
If you are starting from scratch, then the best language to use is the one you are most comfortable with. Alternately, if you don't plan to be developing the whole thing yourself and you already have some other interested parties on board then the best language to use is the one that the majority of you are comfortable with. If it's just you and you do not yet have any favorites, then look around and play with a few - it's the only way to find out if you will actually like / be effective with them.
That being said, a few of the more likely candidates these days are:
JavaScript: Long gone are the days when this language was simply a way to put the D in DHTML. These days JavaScript is a viable client and server-side language. (Others here have already recommended Node.js -- I'd also recommend NPM (node package manager) to handle your dependencies). With a little bit of planning you can reuse most of your application code on both the client and the server side. On the downside, most of the server side technology is very new (only a few years old at most) and so you may find yourself implementing tools for use in your application rather than your application itself. Finding servers that support it will also be harder, again on account of it's age.
Perl: At the opposite end of the spectrum of age, we find Perl - the first commonly deployed language used to make web applications it still powers a great variety of useful websites out there (include new ones such as Pinboard.) The tools that are popular on CPAN have been vetted under fire. The good news is that it is not going anywhere anytime soon. The bad news is, you might have to search a little harder to find a module that supports [that newest, baddest thing that just came out yesterday].
PHP: The BASIC (or Perl, depending on who you ask) of the modern web, PHP was designed from the ground up to do one thing - make building dynamic web pages easier. Its popularity means that there is quite a lot of server support (PHP + Apache + MySQL is the Model T Ford of web servers -- everyone can afford one) and an enormous amount of pre-built code available for perusal. However, like BASIC, PHP's strength is also its greatest weakness. Almost anyone can write something that works in PHP ... how well it works depends on who wrote it. The caveat emptor that applies to all code snippets found on the web applies in spades to snippets of code written in PHP.
Python: The language that made programing fun again (at least for those who can see past the significant whitespace and lack of blocks / anonymous functions and overlook < 3.x's issues with non-ASCII out of the box.) It's a general-purpose, flexible and multi-paradigm language with quite a substantial standard library (but without .NET or Java's incredible bloat). In addition, quite a large amount of work has been done in it, so there is a good chance that what you need has been already developed by somebody else. Plus, it can make you fly.
Ruby (with or without Rails): The language that made the web fun, coupled, if you so desire, with the framework that made MVC cool. There is lots of documentation out there, and a great community, with many prebuilt tools (called gems) from which to pick and choose - free and cheap servers are not as common as their PHP counterparts, but they are likely to be of higher quality (when chosen at random).
All that being said, they are all great languages for web development. What matters is not what we think you should use ... but what you are most likely to be effective with. All of the languages listed above are mainstream (or will be in the next two years), easy-to-learn and easy-to-write languages. You cannot go wrong, no matter what you choose to start off with.
Alternately, if you want something a little more difficult, or less mainstream ... I am working with .NET applications at work, and with Lisp (SBCL)-based services in my spare time. I have heard great things about Lua and Java too ... there are at least two C++ web frameworks out there ... and I'm sure that there is somebody is having fun building a web service in COBOL with a FORTRAN backend. ;-)
As someone has already pointed out, you will need to work with a server side language as well. (Ruby, Python, PHP) You are exactly right there you should not be attempting a database connection via javascript in the browser.
You'll need to build out a server side application to handle the basic operations of your application.
I'd strongly recommend reading up on the MVC design pattern, and possibly looking into Ruby on Rails as your backend framework, it plays very nicely with ajax like features, and has a somewhat shorter learning curve, I believe, than some other frameworks / languages.
You will need server side scripts in a language like PHP or Ruby on Rails to interact with a database.
If you're already familiar with HTML5 and JavaScript, may I recommend using Node.JS? It's about the closest you'll get to what you already know with browser development. It can also hook in with database systems which are closer to the HTML5-suggested IndexedDB.
with that in mind...
If you're inexperienced with programming and programming languages, then the app you describe will involve a pretty big learning curve. While Flash and Flex have really nice interfaces to build apps with click-and-drag, the tools for HTML5 are much less mature.
That's not saying it's not possible with HTML5. Just that there's still some time to wait before people create tools to bring the app building process closer to what Adobe provides.
I am developing a web based multi-player board game and wondering what the best language for the UI would be? Its a board game similar to Go but a lot simpler.
I have two options flash or the much touted HTML5 with JS. I have to learn both though I have basic knowledge of JS.
The problem with flash is I have to pay for the server component but the UI development could be easier and have a richer look and feel to it. With HTML5 + JS there is no cost involved but the UI development I feel will be clunky and not smooth. This I am not sure. Any experienced devs out there care to give some advice? Are there any particular issues to worry about, look into?
EDIT: Thanks for the comments. I will go with HTML5/JS.
As far as the server side goes, I have not yet decided what to use but want to look into node.js. May be I need to post it to programmers.stackoverflow.com about how it handles load and concurrent users.
Thanks,
Pav
Go with HTML and JS, you said your game was similar to GO, well check out http://govsgo.com/.
The site is written in JavaScript, well there's not much on the front end, the backend is based on Ruby on rails, check out Railscasts #237 (http://railscasts.com/episodes/243-beanstalkd-and-stalker) for some background info on the Ruby part.
You can even do really heavy stuff these days in JavaScript, like multiplayer asteroids (http://bonsaiden.github.com/NodeGame-Shooter/), so a "simple" game like you want to build, shouldn't be problem at all.
HTML5/JS will be less compatible with your audience. A lot of people still have non-compliant browsers.
That being said, HTML5/JS would be more fun I think. :)
http://html5readiness.com/ Provided by Robert Pitt
Is your game meant to be used on the iPhone? If yes, Flash is a no-go, as it is not available on the iPhone.
My vote: HTML5/JS.
Why? Consider:
Flash is fading away. On the other hand, you will enjoy a growing audience for your game (including iPhone, iPad and Android).
Flash is more expensive.
I am confident that you can create any UI in HTML5 that you can in Flash. In fact, and presumed limitations of HTML5 may actually force you to refine your UI in a positive way.
Have you seen Grooveshark since they recreated their entire application in HTML5 instead of Flash? Check it out as a proof of concept.
HTML5/JS is easy.
Flash requires a third party plugin, HTML5 only requires an up to date browser- which requirement is better for the user? Personally, I'd rather update my browser than install a third party plugin.
Since your making a multi-user game flash is the way to go. Multi-user stuff is possible with html5/js but as Chuck says its not available in all the browsers. For the multi-user side of things you can use Red5 (which is free) or SmartFox which is not free if you have more than 100 concurrent users. I built a big project with SmartFox awhile back and I found it really easy to work with. Depending on the simplicity of your game you could roll your own socket server code with a language of your choice.
Flash is pretty hard to learn unless you know Java or classic OO (I could add a lot to that comment). I would go with JS/HTML/CSS. As Chuck said, it would be more fun.
The server is only an issue if you plan to use Flash Interactive Server which is pricey. There are open source alternatives. But you say that as if JS has this built in - it doesn't. If you want real time updates, you'll need a CometD server and those are not easy to implement. I'd go with a short poll regardless of whether it's Flash or JS.
I recently became quite interested in developing an adobe air application, and just had a few questions that maybe some more experienced air developers could answer.
Firstly, what is the average time-frame required for an air project. Mainly I'm planning a somewhat ambitious project of porting a specific forum framework over to an air app. How long would you estimate this would take me to do personally? I want something more than just the standard browser inside an app, more along the lines of built in controls/features for all the standard functionality.
Secondly, can apps be done completely with javascript/html/xml? I'm quite proficient with these 3 technologies, but have no real experience with flex/flash. This includes making the chrome as well. Do specific features require specific languages to be involved?
Finally, any good books/articles you would recommend? Preferably more advanced books/resources that lay the groundwork for making professional quality applications.
Any additional tips or insights on what you think may be useful are very much welcomed.
Start reading Adobe AIR for AJAX Developers, particularly the Getting Started section
Without knowing your skill level how would we know how long it will take you personally?
I have built and released apps in one week in my spare time, doesn't mean your project or your skillset for this project will be comparable.
Adobe Air development is fast and easy in general.
Don't reinvent the wheel making button and menu classes, leverage what's already out there.
Take a look at MadComponents: http://code.google.com/p/mad-components/ for UI
Other than that there are several robust tweening and graphics libraries out there.
There's also stage3d and frameworks to support 2d and 3d development for almost near native performance.
You can find a python script that will do it here:
http://code.google.com/p/flashcommand/
More info here:
http://www.mikechambers.com/blog/2008/05/02/flashcommand-for-os-x-updated-to-work-with-flash-cs3/
Basically, this just uses the JSFL API in Flash Pro to automate the compilation from the command line. However, it requires that Flash Pro be installed (and the script will launch it).
There is no a way to compile FLAs without using Flash Pro.
mike chambers