Node.js for mobile developers

Quick and dirty Node.js overview given to the mobile team at Tumblr on 4/30/2014. This doesn't have anything to do with mobile per se, but centers on why developers who rarely have time to do web development would be well suited to pick up Node.js for the times that they do.

These slides were creating using Deckset (http://www.decksetapp.com), and the source can be found here: https://gist.github.com/irace/ec0ce0faaadf00ccaddb

Transcript

1. Node.js for mobile
   developers
   Bryan Irace
   

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2. What is Node.js?
   A platform built on Chrome's JavaScript runtime for
   easily building fast, scalable network applications.
   Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model
   that makes it lightweight and efficient, perfect for
   data-intensive real-time applications that run across
   distributed devices.
   

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3. Not a web framework or
   language
   

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4. Components
   4 V8 (Google's JavaScript engine)
   4 libuv (platform Independent I/O bindings)
   4 Core libraries (networking, modules, REPL, streams,
   logging)
   4 OpenSSL, etc.
   

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5. What's it good at?
   4 I/O
   4 Command line tools
   4 Not CPU-bound work
   

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6. Everything is asynchronous
   

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7. JavaScript
   4 Easy to learn
   4 Powerful
   4 Runs everywhere (you need to know it anyway...)
   4 Always getting faster
   4 Improving pretty rapidly
   4 Lots of good libraries
   

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8. NPM
   ~70K modules
   

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9. package.json
   {
   "name": "lunchr",
   "version": "1.0.0",
   "dependencies": {
   "express": "3.4.3",
   "request": "2.27.0",
   "underscore": "1.6.0"
   }
   }
   

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10. Importing
    var request = require('request');
    var _ = require('underscore');
    var qs = require('querystring');
    var express = require('express');
    

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11. Modules
    4 jQuery
    4 Underscore
    4 Express
    4 Async
    4 Request
    

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12. Express
    var express = require('express');
    var app = express();
    app.get('/', function(req, res){
    res.send('Hello, world');
    });
    app.listen(3000);
    

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13. Async
    async.parallel([
    function (callback) {
    ywa('1519698779', 'BOOKMARK_10135', callback);
    },
    function (callback) {
    play('com.tumblr', callback);
    }
    ], function (err, results) {
    if (err) {
    callback(err);
    }
    else {
    var ywa_data = results[0]
    , play_rating = results[1]
    // TODO
    }
    }
    

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14. Request
    request({
    url: 'https://rink.hockeyapp.net/api/2/apps/' + app_id + '/statistics',
    headers: {
    'X-HockeyAppToken': '61c40d6b6fac43d880e97c0bd22b4903'
    }
    }, function (err, response, body) {
    if (err) {
    callback(err);
    }
    else {
    var versions = JSON.parse(body)['app_versions'];
    // TODO
    }
    }
    

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15. jQuery
    $('tr.stathead').remove();
    $('tr').removeAttr('align').removeAttr('class');
    $('tr:first').find('td').replaceWith(function () {
    return $('')
    .html($(this).contents())
    .attr('data-week', index_of($(this)));
    });
    

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16. Underscore
    _.chain([1, 2, 3, 200])
    .filter(function(num) {
    return num % 2 == 0;
    })
    .map(function(num) {
    return num * num
    })
    .value();
    

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17. shell.js
    require('shelljs/global');
    if (!which('git')) {
    echo('Sorry, this script requires git');
    exit(1);
    }
    // Copy files to release dir
    mkdir('-p', 'out/Release');
    cp('-R', 'stuff/*', 'out/Release');
    // Replace macros in each .js file
    cd('lib');
    ls('*.js').forEach(function(file) {
    sed('-i', 'BUILD_VERSION', 'v0.1.2', file);
    sed('-i', /.*REMOVE_THIS_LINE.*\n/, '', file);
    sed('-i', /.*REPLACE_LINE_WITH_MACRO.*\n/, cat('macro.js'), file);
    });
    cd('..');
    // Run external tool synchronously
    if (exec('git commit -am "Auto-commit"').code !== 0) {
    echo('Error: Git commit failed');
    exit(1);
    }
    

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18. Hosting
    4 Easy to install
    4 Windows
    4 OS X (just a .dmg file)
    4 Easy to host
    4 Heroku
    4 Windows Azure
    

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19. Debugging
    4 node-inspector
    

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