2013 Intro to Sails (v0.9.8)

In this talk, I give a brief introduction to Sails.js, a realtime, server-side MVC framework for Node.js. I’ll point out some of the problems that Node.js developers face when trying to build apps from scratch, and show how Sails helps solve them. I’ll also live-code examples of some tasks that are simplified by Sails.js.

Sails is an open-source framework built on top of Express, Socket.io, and other industry-standard node modules. It is designed to resemble the MVC architecture from frameworks like Ruby on Rails, but with support for the more modern, data-oriented style of web app development. It’s aim is to make Node.js practical for production applications, by providing a familiar structure for an app’s back-end while remaining unopinionated about the front-end as well as database-agnostic. It’s especially good for creating realtime features, such as chat.

(Updated:)
other topics covered:
+ High-level look at associations in Sails v0.10
+ Plugins (generators, hooks, adapters, blueprints, custom responses)

Transcript

1. sails.js realtime MVC framework for Node.js
2. who am i? @mikermcneil
3. We design and develop javascript apps for enterprise and startup customers. i have a startup called balderdash
4. love at rst sight circa 2011 Node.js...
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6. route& first* philosophy opt&in* framework* structure “smalltalk* ethics” UML “javascript* ethics” servlets mvc spring,* et.*al. rails enterprise* java ruby module system (npm) noSQL (mongo/ redis) async* flow* control from*the* front&end: generators (yeoman) node.js convention* over* configuration event*loop ORM
7. Can we use Node.js for, like, everything? i wondered...
8. Can we use Node.js for, like, everything? i wondered... maybe.
9. Realtime used to be kind of hard XMPP Comet Reverse AJAX Long polling Flash sockets WebSockets Server-sent events
10. A lot easier now
11. Programming realtime apps was still not trivial. Socket.io and Express messages/requests have to be handled independently, which leads to separate code bases for realtime and traditional server code.
12. Programming realtime apps was still not trivial. Socket.io and Express messages/requests have to be handled independently, which leads to separate code bases for realtime and traditional server code. Socket programming is a new paradigm for many modern web developers
13. Socket.io and Express messages/requests have to be handled independently, which leads to separate code bases for realtime and traditional server code. Socket programming is a new paradigm for many modern web developers Questions about scalability Programming realtime apps was still not trivial.
14. Express wasn’t “structured enough” Authentication has to be rolled from scratch
15. Express wasn’t “structured enough” Authentication has to be rolled from scratch No standard, implementation-agnostic method of working with datastores
16. Express wasn’t “structured enough” Authentication has to be rolled from scratch No standard, implementation-agnostic method of working with datastores Low level and free-form -- not a lot of guidelines for teams used to convention-over-con guration frameworks
17. Lots of different kinds of projects There weren’t really any simple and reproducible patterns for structuring complicated Node.js aplications top to bottom
18. Lots of different kinds of projects There weren’t really any simple and reproducible patterns for structuring complicated Node.js aplications top to bottom Could be working with an existing client, or writing a new client for a mobile web browser, an automobile, a toaster, or god knows what
19. Lots of different kinds of projects There weren’t really any simple and reproducible patterns for structuring complicated Node.js aplications top to bottom Could be working with an existing client, or writing a new client for a mobile web browser, an automobile, a toaster, or god knows what Lots of different 3rd party proprietary services to deal with on the back-end -- there was no standard way to integrate new systems
20. too bad. we went with Node anyway.
21. so Sails.js was born
22. MVC structure Sails.js is modeled after the same convention-over-con guration philosophy you’re used to from frameworks like Rails, Grails, Symfony, and Zend. Controllers are just Express middleware Views are ejs by default, but you can use jade, etc. We rarely use them since we’re normally making single page apps with client-side templates.
23. Lightweight ORM Kept querying semantics dead-simple and adapter-agnostic whenever possible Pulled the best of Active Record, Hibernate, and Mongoose Made it easy to add purpose-built adapters at the app level
24. Policies Policies are just more Express middleware They can be chained together to “protect” or preprocess requests for controllers E.g. access control, storage quotas, or anything else you’d want to use middleware for
25. Socket.io Express interpreter Translated incoming socket.io messages into Express requests Translated res.send(), res.json(), and res.view() to respond via the socket, as well as allowing for streams Added res.broadcast() and req.join() methods for pubsub Normalized con guration
26. Blueprints Instead of something like Rails HTML scaffolds, by default, when you generate a model and controller, Sails serves an API Built-in search, sort, pagination, and complex queries Authentication/access control can be built on top using policies
27. Other cool stuff CLI tool REPL Custom adapters Optional server-side coffee support Automatic asset bundling (LESS and coffeescript les are compiled, merged with css and js, and injected into the DOM, mini ed in production mode)
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34. let’s code things now OK
35. CURRENT STATUS (V0..) Community is growing (almost 5000 stars, over 400 forks on github, active IRC channel and Google group)
36. Community is growing (almost 5000 stars, over 400 forks on github, active IRC channel and Google group) My company and most of our customers are using Sails in production CURRENT STATUS (V0.9.)
37. My company and most of our customers are using Sails in production Oldest running production Sails app has been up for nearly 2 years CURRENT STATUS (V0..) Community is growing (almost 5000 stars, over 400 forks on github, active IRC channel and Google group)
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43. Want to get involved? Contribute to an adapter
44. Want to get involved? Contribute to an adapter improve the documentation
45. Want to get involved? Contribute to an adapter improve the documentation Write tutorials
46. Want to get involved? Contribute to an adapter improve the documentation Write tutorials Blog about Sails
47. Contribute to an adapter improve the documentation Write tutorials Blog about Sails Play with Sails and come up with more cool shit Want to get involved?
48. Questions?
49. Thanks! @mikermcneil mike@balderdash.co