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Sure. If you're building a traditional web app. The sort of web app Rails is good at. But if you are constructing an api, you can use ligher and alternate techn

Sure. If you're building a traditional web app. The sort of web app Rails is good at. But if you are constructing an api, you can use ligher and alternate technologies that will get the job done faster and better.

VeejayRampay 14y ago
People keep repeating that like it's some commercial gimmick, but what does it really mean? How is Rails or rails-api not suited for APIs? What's lightweight? What's easy? And more particularly since you seem to know about this, what other option would you favor?
- coenhyde 14y ago
  Well Sinatra seems pretty nice. I'm a node.js developer so I use Restify and Express. But I practically build api's exclusively. I've spent a lot of time cleaning up after terrible Rails applications. Replacing bits that are too slow or difficult to maintain with smaller more nimble node applications.
- grabastic 14y ago
  "what does it really mean?" It means he's a node troll. They take a shot at the dominant frameworks any chance they can get. Node trolls have reached the level of obnoxious arrogance that early Rails developers were once mocked for. Don't feed the trolls.
  - coenhyde 14y ago
    It's about using the right tool for the job. Most developers never seem to understand that. Everyone seems to want the same magic bullet for everything.
uxp 14y ago
Like what? Rails is great for APIs, because APIs, especially RESTful and Hypermedia APIs, can literally be a standard webapp with JSON views instead of HTML. I've never built a SOAP API in Ruby, so maybe Rails wouldn't work with that very well. XML-RPC might also be a little tough, but I honestly can't think of any significant difference between a "traditional web app" and a RESTful API. They're a perfect example of code reuse in MVC (or Model2 if you want to be pedantic).
- hosh 14y ago
  Check out https://github.com/intermodal/intermodal https://github.com/intermodal/intermodal

VeejayRampay 14y ago

People keep repeating that like it's some commercial gimmick, but what does it really mean? How is Rails or rails-api not suited for APIs? What's lightweight? What's easy? And more particularly since you seem to know about this, what other option would you favor?

coenhyde 14y ago
Well Sinatra seems pretty nice. I'm a node.js developer so I use Restify and Express. But I practically build api's exclusively. I've spent a lot of time cleaning up after terrible Rails applications. Replacing bits that are too slow or difficult to maintain with smaller more nimble node applications.
grabastic 14y ago
"what does it really mean?" It means he's a node troll. They take a shot at the dominant frameworks any chance they can get. Node trolls have reached the level of obnoxious arrogance that early Rails developers were once mocked for. Don't feed the trolls.
- coenhyde 14y ago
  It's about using the right tool for the job. Most developers never seem to understand that. Everyone seems to want the same magic bullet for everything.

uxp 14y ago

Like what? Rails is great for APIs, because APIs, especially RESTful and Hypermedia APIs, can literally be a standard webapp with JSON views instead of HTML. I've never built a SOAP API in Ruby, so maybe Rails wouldn't work with that very well. XML-RPC might also be a little tough, but I honestly can't think of any significant difference between a "traditional web app" and a RESTful API. They're a perfect example of code reuse in MVC (or Model2 if you want to be pedantic).

hosh 14y ago
Check out https://github.com/intermodal/intermodal https://github.com/intermodal/intermodal