Ask HN: What are the best web tools to build basic web apps as of October 2016?

If you're really unpatient, I'll click on the first link for you[0]...which reveals the popular frameworks. This is based on real data since it's a survey, not just one or two comments on HN.

[0] http://stateofjs.com/2016/introduction/

If you're building simple CRUD apps for a business audience both Rails and Spring Boot would be good choices for instance.

In terms of front-end development I'd suggest vanilla JavaScript and HTML5. Keep things simple. A basic web app doesn't need any complex framework.

That said Angular, React.js and Vue.js are equally valid choices for building complex applications but each of them is way beyond a 'basic web app' scope in my opinion.

For backend, I prefer Play + Scala over Ruby/Python because of the static typing.

If not, I would still go with Rails. Its massively productive, batteries included... and forces you to learn some practices that you can later take to other frameworks (migrations, asset pipeline, etc).

I dont know of any other framework that forces you to adopt these. On HN, you will find a lot of rhetoric against that - which may be true for experienced programmers.

But for sheer productivity from someone new to all this... Rails really cannot be beaten.

In the JS world, you will spend atleast a couple of days figuring out Requirejs vs AMD vs commonjs vs webpack vs browserify vs npm vs yarn.

I'm not so sure if it is worth it...unless learning JS frameworks was your goal all along.

One great thing about this architecture is that it can scale as the app gets more complex, since you can just add more components to the UI, and more fields to the GraphQL schema, without needing to re-structure anything.

I work on Apollo, a set of tools to make it easy to create and use a GraphQL API, and we have a hello world client [0] and server [1]:

[0] https://github.com/apollostack/frontpage-react-app [1] https://github.com/apollostack/frontpage-server

* Frontend examples: https://github.com/tastejs/todomvc

There is (in my opinion) no reason not go with TypeScript. It's strictly better than ES6. React and MobX because of their simplicity.

Backend: Go

No particular reason to choose Go other than it's fun. TypeScript with Node is also a good choice.

Edit: I am talking about SPAs.

The documentation for beginners is top notch as well: https://www.meteor.com/tutorials https://guide.meteor.com/

There's plenty of options, too. You can throw together a few files and have a simple app going in a very short time (an hour or two), or build highly modular apps with a React or Angular front-end.

For database Postgresql is your best bet.

If you want just Templating and always open connections for building backend site builder tools then PHP is your language.

If you want free and scalable with as little code as possible with building files you never have to write again then Python Django restful API and angular2.

If you plan for this to be worked on indefinitely and it'll be customized every day and you know the greatest will stay with you with high risk, then vanilla js and nodejs.

If you want as quick as possible but with a scalable price then reactjs and firebase.

My advice is that there is no clear winner. Each technology serves a spectrum of needs, some better than others. If you're experienced enough to know what you need, then vet each technology in terms of what they offer to solve your problem. If not, my advice is to pick something that appears reasonable and go with it; you'll learn a lot, and eventually you'll arrive at the conclusion that all of these things are just tools--your own experience is the strongest thing you bring to the table.

Haskell + Elm or PureScript + Postgres

The best part about it is that it helps you catch many errors at compile time, instead of having your app crash at run time.

For keeping your Haskell and Elm data types in sync while maintaining sanity, I recommend elm-export [0], which will automatically generate the Elm types and JSON decoders from your Haskell code, using GHC Generics. Watch the author talk about it [1].

Choosing Elm over JS already gives you a head start, but you might hit a productivity wall at some point, and PureScript gives you all that extra power with its advanced type system. Some related discussion here [2].

Check out Matt Parsons' blog [3] for more on Haskell, Elm and PureScript.

Lastly, for database you can use Persistent [4] which gives you a type-safe API for data modelling and data store, and can automatically generate and perform migrations for you.

[0]: https://github.com/krisajenkins/elm-export

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sh4H8yzXnvw

[2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/haskell/comments/569cax/

[3]: http://www.parsonsmatt.org/

[4]: https://hackage.haskell.org/package/persistent

P.S. Do take my suggestions with a grain of salt as I don't have much experience with any of the fancy JS frameworks.

"No one really knows."

For backend: Go with anything that you are proficient with. If you aren't familiar with anything I recommend starting with RubyOnRails/Sinatra/Django/web2py/Phoenix.

2. Yes - http://bestof.js.org/ See also http://stateofjs.com/2016/introduction/ ,

Backend: F# or Elixir

I liked how easy it was to learn Redux. It teaches you functional principles, not only useful for your specific web app but also for your career as a programmer.

React has one of the gentler learning curves of the front end frameworks, but it's still a lot more work than just rendering everything server-side and adding whatever minimal effects you need with jQuery.

I second sandGorgon's recommendation to use Rails. PHP is another good option. It's absolutely amazing how many successful new software companies are being built off of WordPress and/or Laravel.

I say this as someone who was using React in February 2014 and who loves to geek out over newer more powerful technologies. The thing is, your users don't care. Groupon was launched as a crappy WordPress site + a mailing list, built way past its breaking point, migrated to Rails, broke again and was a $5B company in 5 years. Many, many startups with harder-core technologists started years earlier still haven't reached where they are now even with a perpetual string of problems and failures from their IPO until now. Teespring started on Rails long after that was cool and they're a juggernaut.

Use something productive and ship it.