[HacktionLab] Recommendations for modern web dev environments

[Charlie Harvey]

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On 25/06/13 12:08, Mike Harris wrote:
> Hi List,
> 
> We sort of covered some of this when discussing alternatives to
> Wordpress or static HTML prior to BarnCamp, but I thought I'd throw this
> out there again to any of you programmers out there.
> 
> I'm looking to re-write a hotpotch system, written in mySQL+Perl+JS with
> some Jquery and some PHP, in a new platform/framework.
> 
> We need to link in with 2D real-time drawing tools, have CRM-style
> management, have a full invoicing and billing system, a shopping cart,
> graphical and numerical reporting and hierarchical user role/permissions
> management.  We also have complex forms and need to be able to save and
> restore form states, possibly on the client to then send to the server
> 
> There are some pretty good JS based stuff out there for doing the 2D
> stuff, in native HTML5 SVG and Canvas support, but what components or
> programming environment would you choose, what can you recommend that
> balances power with learning curve with being cutting edge, but a stable
> enough API.
> 
> So far I've looked at the possibility of hanging it off Drupal + Drupal
> Commerce + CiviCRM and glueing that together to something like the
> backbone.js stack and the 2D drawing stuff.
> 
> But I'm not convinced about that, as Drupal Commerce and Civi do not
> seem to glue together very well, and Civi is very non-profit orientated
> and therefore doesn't have support for sales and invoicing - although we
> could obviously write that module and contribute it.
> 
> I'm wondering if it's entirely possible to do it all in JS, or mostly in
> JS, and if that's wise.  Am thinking some kind of stack like Marionette
> + Underscore + Backbone + JQuery communicating with Node.js on the back
> end.  I've briefly glanced at Coffeescript, Require.js, Ember.js,
> Handlebars.js, and then there's Rhino, etc, there's so much to choose from.
> 
> What would you do?  What would you recommend?

Hi,

The whole js stack thing is /apparently/ do-able, but if it was me I'd
be looking for systems with good APIs that I could glue together and
concentrate my effort on that bit. Because its mostly gluing bits you
probably want something more lightweight than the framework I know best,
catalyst.

Maybe SugarCRM is worth a look instead of Civi?

Magento works pretty well for the sorts of shopping sites we do
(http://foeshop.co.uk, http://amnestyshop.org.uk,
http://shop.newint.org/uk/); its got a REST API, though we mostly use
XML. You can make custom modules for it (in php) or you can pay someone
to do it for you. It can be tricky to scale but its got a very flexible
architecture.

I've heard good things about mojolicious (which is a lightweight perl
realtime framework), and might work well for your perl guys, but
node.js, or django or whatever would do the job. You basically don't
need it to do anything other than move data between your main systems,
and maybe provide a front end for your users.

We're looking to redo our site architecture this year[*], so be
interested if you fancy sharing your findings...

Well that's my 0.5pworth

Cheers,

[*] We're looking at Yii (php), Django (python), Node (js), Catalyst
(perl) and Drupal (php) IIRC

> Before you suggest it, all learning Java is not within the time-frame. 
> Ideally PHP and JS would be what we'd like to use, Ruby is a possibility
> though, perhaps Plone/Zope/Python, and of course there's always Perl.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Mike.
> 


- -- 
Charlie Harvey
IT Manager
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