[Seaside] Comparison of Aida/Web, Seaside and Iliad web frameworks

[Janko Mivšek]

Hi Johan,

S, Johan Brichau piše:

> On 22 Jun 2011, at 06:29, Michael Haupt wrote:
> 
>> Consider this a scientific project. An emotion-free attitude helps. :-)
> 
> A yes/no feature-wise comparison is probably too simple for comparing sophisticated web frameworks.
> 
> Skimming through the feature list, I have the same reactions that others have because some features are just not well defined and others are immediately clear to be filled-out wrong for Seaside. Ramon named some of these.
> And just to be clear: it's not an emotional reaction. I like the initiative because I would like to know more about Iliad and Aida too.
> 
> For building Yesplan, Seaside is a great framework because it offers a good level of abstraction (including over techniques like ajax - via jQuery) while at the same time it offers all the flexibility to implement complex (e.g. non-standard) ways of interacting with the web application. I can imagine that having more techniques and functionality "under the hood" (like standard widgets or the 'tab enter' that was mentioned) seems like a productivity improvement, but in my experience, such "standard components" hardly ever apply in more complex situations. Instead, if you have a flexible environment that offers just that right level of abstraction, you can build really complex applications.

Such a complex situation as you have in Yesplan is actually rare, in 90%
if not 99% you have to make simple apps fast, but still using
techniquest like Ajax, recent real-time web, HTML5 etc. If you have all
this functionality nicelly integrated in a web framework, it is easy to
build those 90% of apps, yet you are up to the time, interactive, etc.
And of course web framework must always allow you to go ahead to the
level of complexity as your Yesplan app is providing, last 10% or 1%
therefore. This is a philosophy behind Aida.

> I guess my bottomline is that feature comparisons tend to miss the importance of the basic design rationale of a framework: level of abstraction, flexibility, extensibility, etc.. 
> I'm not saying that Iliad or aida do bad at those points, just that an exhaustive feature comparison misses that completely. 

Agreed, but current form of comparison is a good start for such more
deep comparison, on the fields as you mention. At least we started :)

> For comparing, it would be really good to have the same application written in the three frameworks by experts and have the experts compare them. Hey, if I find the time (oeps) I would even love to help out on that one.

Agreed! And I'm hardly waiting for someone to come out with an idea,
what to build for such comparison. I have one, but you will for sure
declare me biased again .. :) A so called real-time web example: a
multi-user chat. As that one on GMail, for instance. Another would be a
basic CRUD example, which is so common pattern, filling that 90% of
cases, to show, how the frameworks cover the people's most basic needs.

Best regards
Janko


-- 
Janko Mivšek
Aida/Web
Smalltalk Web Application Server
http://www.aidaweb.si