Thanks.  I have been working on a system that allows editing of RDF in web
forms, creating linked data connections in the background, publishing to
eXist and Solr for dissemination, and will eventually integrate operation
with an RDF triplestore/SPARQL, all with Tomcat apps.  I'm not sure it is
possible to create, manage, and deliver our content with node.js, but I was
told by the project manager that Apache, Java, and Tomcat were "showing
signs of age."  I'm not so sure about this considering the prevalence of
Tomcat apps both in libraries and industry.  I happen to be very fond of
Solr, and it seems very risky to start over in node.js, especially since I
can't be certain the end product will succeed.  I prefer to err on the side
of stability.

If anyone has other thoughts about the future of Tomcat applications in the
library, or more broadly cultural heritage informatics, feel free to jump
in.  Our data is exclusively XML, so LAMP/Rails aren't really options.

Ethan

On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 10:03 AM, Nate Vack <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 10:17 PM, Ethan Gruber <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > It was recently suggested to me that a project I am working on may adopt
> > node.js for its architecture (well, be completely re-written for
> node.js).
> > I don't know anything about node.js, and have only heard of it in some
> > passing discussions on the list.  I'd like to know if anyone on code4lib
> > has experience developing in this platform, and what their thoughts are
> on
> > it, positive or negative.
>
> I've only played a little bit, but my take is: you'll have more parts
> to build than with other systems. If you need persistent connections,
> it's gonna be neat; if you don't, it's probably not worth the bother.
>
> The Peepcode screencasts on Node:
>
> https://peepcode.com/screencasts/node
>
> are probably worth your time and money.
>
> -n
>