Web development is a constantly evolving field. There are confusing tech stacks and tons of languages to choose from. All these things are beneficial and have their own set of upsides, but they can look quite intimidating for a new user or developer.
As a beginner web developer, everyone knows javascript, HTML, CSS. So it is better to build upon these languages to have a solid career. Moreover, it is easier to keep moving forward in the same direction, rather than changing languages and tech stacks every now and then.
That’s why NodeJS is here. In this article, you’ll learn why startups and even established businesses are choosing this language over all the other programming languages and also looking to hire node.js developer on a large scale these days.
Let’s start with a brief overlook of the language.
What is Node JS?
Node js is a framework developed in JavaScript language that helps developers to use javascript code on servers.
Using node js, you can benefit significantly from using javascript on the backend as well as frontend. Node js is used to develop APIs and servers that work exceptionally well with frontend javascript frameworks like angular, react, and vue. It was released in 2009, and since then, its versions have been developed and governed by the OpenJS foundation.
Coming to the central part of this post, let’s begin to gander at the benefits of Node js.
Benefits Of Node JS
Backed By JavaScript Community
As node js runs on the chrome v8 javascript engine, its underlying structure is of javascript only. Due to this, everyone knows the language well, and it’s easier to understand. If you are stuck with anything, the javascript community is pretty active to get you through. This can be a great benefit while developing applications, as it can speed up your development.
Node js is the sixth most popular language, and due to this, there are plenty of resources for everything about node.
Ready To Use Modules From NPM
Node js benefits from the node package manager largely. The NPM is an online repository of tools, modules, and packages that can be used directly inside the code. These packages are aimed to make development easier in Node js projects.
Moreover, with the wide variety of modules and packages, code repetition and writing things from scratch becomes obsolete choices. This way, developers can ship products faster because they don’t have to write every functionality from scratch.
JavaScript Everywhere
All developers, whether they are frontend or backend, know javascript. Everyone starts with this only, so they understand this language well. Though javascript was used in the frontend alone, the introduction of node js changed this. Now it is used in the backend server-side, and there are many benefits of this.
You can build full-stack javascript-based applications using node js and any other frontend frameworks. Moreover, you can benefit significantly from this as you won’t need unique developers for backend development. Anyone with a good grip on javascript can do the job.
Easy To Learn
Anyone with a good grip on the latest javascript topics can learn node js. Learning node js is relatively easy compared to other backend technologies. There are enough courses and documents to help you learn every topic in the language.
Also, with some experience in backend languages or terminologies, the learning process can be simplified to a great extent.
Superfast Scaling
Node js’s actual benefits are realized during the times of scaling. It employs microservice architecture, and with that in place, you can scale your applications effortlessly. A node js application can go from supporting one hundred users to one lakh users in a matter of time, just because of its efficiency and speed.
It is used at all product-based startups that forecast a surge in their demand.
As we advance, let’s examine some distinguishing features of Node Js that help you choose this framework.
Features Of Node JS
Node Package Manager
Node js comes with the node package manager, which is one of the largest package repositories for any language. NPM makes it easy to develop applications with ready-to-use code packages that can be used in source code.
There are tons of different packages and libraries that can be used in node js development. The npm repository houses packages from categories like security to automation and UI enhancements.
Superfast Performance
There are many technical aspects underlying node js that make the framework superfast. Firstly, it relies on the chrome v8 javascript engine that is quite powerful and using this platform, the execution of node js code is done, which is why it gets executed in significantly less time.
Node js’s speed is so high that it has outnumbered industry leaders like Java and C in terms of program execution. It has found its way in real-time applications and streaming service applications which require near-to-light program execution speeds.
Microservices And Single-threading
Node js is based on the concept of microservices and APIs. So all the applications using node js follow this concept, and they can be scaled limitlessly. Moreover, with the microservices approach, any change can be made in the program structure without affecting the whole program. This provides excellent benefits for code reusability and modularity.
Single-threading means that all the requests of the application are processed using a single thread. To keep the execution speed high, node js maintains a queue of requests internally and processes them one by one. If any process requires IO operations, the thread is not blocked, and the execution continues by delegating IO resources to the process.
AWS Support
AWS is the largest public cloud services provider, and it is better if you have an inbuilt integration in the framework for the cloud. Node js is one of the few languages that have inbuilt support for cloud services and providers like AWS.
Using the AWS Software development kit, you can easily play with all the AWS services right from your code. Moreover, you can even use AWS to host node js APIs and microservices in a simple manner.
All these benefits and features are enough to make a decision. Hope this article provided you with the required answers you should give when anyone asks you why you chose node js for web development. If you are an outsourcing node js development company, this article will help you explain your clients why they should include node js in their tech stack.
