What Is Node.js, And Why Should You Use It?

[Participant @chinomnso]

In recent years, there have been lots of discussions about Node.js in the software development community. But there seems to be as much confusion about Node.js as there have been discussions. This article explains exactly what Node.js is and why you may want to use it. Please note that I will be using Node and Node.js to refer to the same thing.

So, what exactly is Node.js?

Node.js is a free, open-source server environment built on Chrome’s JavaScript V8 engine for building fast and scalable network applications. It uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it efficient and great for data-intensive, real-time applications.

Previously, JavaScript could only run in a browser. But Node was born when developers made it possible for JavaScript to run right on your machine as a process of its own. This means that applications can now be created with JavaScript outside the context of the web browser.

Obviously, JavaScript’s features were limited to the capabilities of a web browser – responding to clicks, manipulating the DOM, front-end form validation – basically visual stuff and front-end related logic. With Node, JavaScript now has features similar to other languages like Python, Java or PHP. Node enables developers to carry out core programming tasks like accessing and manipulating filesystems, creating web services and even accessing databases.

Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine takes JavaScript code and compiles it into machine code, making it super-fast. Machine code is low-level code that your computer can run directly, without needing an interpreter. Your machine cannot run JavaScript or PHP code without an interpreter.

What can you do with Node?

The growing popularity of Node in recent years is surely not without reason. Big companies like Netflix, Uber and Walmart use it. The demand is huge, and it’s steadily on the rise. Front end developers use it to compile their applications and back-end engineers use it for the business logic of their applications.

Node’s model is an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that ensures it is lightweight and really efficient. In case you do not know, I/O is something applications do all of the time: input/output. This could be a database read and write request, or it could be writing to a file or reading from it. It could even be making a request to an API on another server. The truth is that I/O takes time.

The non-blocking I/O model is great because one process would not block another. This means that when one user is requesting a URL, a file or any other resource, other users can be making requests for those same resources concurrently without any of them hindering or “blocking” the delivery of the other.

Blocking I/O system calls do not return until the I/O process is complete. In non-blocking I/O system calls, the reverse is the case. The system call returns once it is made, then the process is notified once the call is complete. To illustrate this, imagine you want to boil rice and your room needs to be cleaned. Putting the rice in the cooker and waiting for it to be cooked, doing nothing, is similar to the blocking system. But leaving it in the cooker and cleaning your room, then taking it off the cooker when it is cooked is illustrative of the non-blocking system.

According to Nodejs.org, Node’s package ecosystem, “npm is the largest ecosystem of open source libraries in the world”. This means that it has a huge community around it with volunteers developing libraries that carry out everyday programming tasks including serving up real-time data using sockets, creating servers and validating objects.

This means that you can really focus on creating your application and writing real code without having to bother about building the software infrastructure that supports it. If you’re trying to build something that is somewhat generic, you will likely find a solution in npm that has been built by someone else. So, suppose you want to validate an object, you can simply google “npm validate object” and you will see lots of results for that. You can simply download or install the package, tweak to align with the specifics of your project, and you’re ready to run.

I have pointed out that you may want to use Node because of its speed which is made possible by its non-blocking model. Another advantage of Node is its package ecosystem, which provides solutions to many common programming tasks. Node.js sure has its advantages over other technologies, just as other technologies and languages have theirs over Node.

In the area of web technologies, one of Node’s biggest rivals is PHP. Read this article to see why PHP is not going away anytime soon.

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