Ask HN: Best technology stack for my web project?

2 points by dnayal 14y ago ↗ HN

I am not a developer but know Java/JSP/Servlets from my previous life. So when I wanted to put a prototype/MVP together for my own web initiative, Java/JSP was the language of choice; however, I have now got stuck into a dilemma. The problem is that my webpages are a mixture of server-side code (JSP) and HTML, and I need to get the webpages redesigned, but it is very difficult nowadays to find good front-end designers/developers who work on JSP.

As I understand I have the following options to move forward. Can the HN community please provide some suggestions?

1-- Continue with JSP (front-end) and Java (back-end) - Keep looking for front-end developer/designer. Server side language should not be a problem.

2-- Migrate the application to Ruby on Rails - I have read/heard it is a great framework for web development

3-- Migrate the application to PHP - Seems to be the language of choice for web development nowadays

4-- Migrate the application to Python - As I understand it is not easy to find good front-end Python guys either, but I have read/heard good things about Python as a language

*5-- Remove server-side code from front-end so that I have - HTML/Javascript with template engine such as handlebar.js/CSS (for front-end) and REST-based Java API with JSON output (for backend) - Are there are any disadvantages of going ahead with this approach. I can imagine that having a stable language as Java for backend is good from performance perspective.

Advice please?

Cheers, Deepak

2 comments

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mindcrime 14y ago ↗

If you already know Java, then Wicket[1] is a good choice in that it does a nice job of separating the HTML from code. You can let a designer have at it and work on layout and what-not, and seamlessly tie that into your Java code.

As a side note, though, it should be perfectly possible to use JSP as a view layer with fairly minimal bleed-through of Java "stuff." If you stick to JSTL tags and absolutely, totally and completely avoid scriptlet code in your JSPs (write a custom tag if you have to) it's possible to have JSP pages that a web developer can work with, without excessive difficulty.

[1]: http://wicket.apache.org/

dnayal 14y ago ↗

Thanks. I will explore Apache Wicket