With the rapid expansion of the software development industry and technology stacks, determining the best approach to web application development has become one of the most difficult challenges. Many technologies and programming languages have come and gone over the years, but JavaScript has not only maintained its position but has also influenced software development companies to produce high-end applications.

What is Node.js? 

Node.js is not a language, library, or framework. It is a cross-platform, open-source, and single-thread runtime environment used to create fast and scalable server-side and networking applications. JavaScript execution needs a Javascript runtime environment which includes Javascript Engine (like Google v8), APIs & Event Loop. If we want to execute JS on any device, it only needs a Javascript runtime environment. Hence, Node.js also has a Javascript runtime environment to execute javascript on the server. 

It is built on a JavaScript V8 engine which is google’s open-source high-performance javascript engine. Developers today choose Node.js over other alternatives primarily because it is lightweight, efficient, and uses push technology over web sockets. 

Let’s dive deeper and take a look at some major reasons to choose Node.js for web application development.

1. Powerful, Robust Technology Stack

JavaScript has been an undisputed leader among popular programming languages. Using Node.js for backend automatically offers you all the benefits of full-stack JS development, such as: 

•     Better efficiency and overall developer productivity
•     Faster speed, performance, and data processing
•     Easy code sharing and reuse
•     Easy information sharing within a team
•     Large number of free resource libraries, guides, and an active  community

Moreover, it is a part of a popular MEAN tech stack – a combination of MongoDB, Express.js, Angular, and Node.js, that handle all crucial aspects of web application development. 

2. Fast processing and event-based model

Node.js is fast; yes it is true! Here are a couple of reasons for Node.js fast processing:

V8 Engine

Chrome’s V8 engine is the best engine out there. Originally, it was developed for Chrome, but it was re-adapted by the Node.js team to compile JavaScript functions into machine code at an impressive speed. Thanks to Google for improving V8’s speed and performance with every new update and enabling Node.js to extract the benefits out of it. 

Non-blocking Input/Output and asynchronous request handling

Node.js is an efficient data handling tool. While most languages follow synchronous processing where requests are placed in a thread and wait to be processed one by one, Node.js follows an asynchronous approach for handling requests, ie. no request blocks another one, rather requests are processed simultaneously.

Due to its asynchronous, non-blocking, single-threaded mechanism, Node.js has become a popular choice especially for building online gaming, video conferences, chats, and other applications that need real-time data. 

3. Scalable Technology for microservices

This enables you to add more microservices on top of the existing ones and show different versions of the app to various users based on their age, location, interest, language, etc. Hence, it is rightly said that Node.js scalability is superior to other backend development solutions.

4. Seamless JSON support

Another advantage of the node.js environment is that it communicates seamlessly with the main data transfer standards. While popular backend technologies like PHP, Ruby on Rails also utilize JSON format for communication, Node.js can use it without converting between binary models. This feature is especially beneficial when you are building RESTful APIs for NoSQL database support such as MongoDB.

5. Control Flow Features

Many developers see asynchronous nature as one of both disadvantages and advantages of Node.js web app development. In Node.js each time a query is executed, it sends a callback. As the number of requests increases, the number of callbacks increases, ending up in a situation known as callback hell.

However, Node.js has a way out. It lets you use frameworks that map requests and sort through callbacks by automatically connecting similar functions. This means, no need to scroll through the callbacks as it simply finds the necessary features by searching.

Conclusion

The aforementioned reasons imply that Node.js is a perfect technology to develop scalable web applications. By using Node.js, you will be able to decrease the turnaround time and improve the performance. It enables both developers as well as users to use the web application to its core ability and produce beneficial business results. 

At BigStep Technologies, we have a team of professional Node.js Developers that implement the best Node.js practices. If you want the top-notch Node.js service for your organization and project, connect with us by dropping an email at info@bigsteptech.com.