Ask HN: Question about rewriting my app in NodeJS

[brandoncordell]

I've been developing a "pinterest style" app (for lack of a clearer explanation) in Rails recently. I've been focused on learning Rails (I'm a PHP developer) the past few years. There is a ton of talk about Rails and MVC altogether being eventually phased out for stacks like Node and Backbone, etc. While I doubt the Rails/MVC style will be gone anytime soon, I want to future-proof my career. I don't want to stick with PHP forever, I just don't get the same joy anymore that I used to when I write code in it.

What should I look into learning in NodeJS/Backbone to rewrite my "pinterest style" Rails app. I'm probably still going to release the Rails version just because I feel comfortable with the code I've written and the Node/Backbone rewrite is mainly for learning the technology.

Are there specific Node paradigms/patterns/modules that I should look into for a site like this?

[dhaivatpandya]

If you want to learn Node, go ahead write in Node, there's not much you can lose.

If not:

Is it realtime? Does it need the speed? Is scaling important?

If not to all of them, don't rewrite.

[brandoncordell → dhaivatpandya]

The reason I'd like to rewrite for now is the fact that what I'm building in Rails is a "typical" app that I work on. So by rewriting this in Node (after finishing the real app, and not releasing the Node version) I'm learning the Node flow to the "typical" apps I'd be working on. If that makes sense.

[k00k → brandoncordell]

Are you a freelance/contractor? Are you looking to add to your skill set in general? Do you know Javascript at all? If you answer yes to one or more of those, I'd say it can't hurt to learn Node.js.