7 eye-catching features of Meteorjs

When Node.js hit the market, it was quickly adopted by a large community of individual developers and large-scale companies as a viable development technology. It is because of the fact that it allowed the implementation of JavaScript on the server side. Node.js gave a huge boost to mobile and web app development.

Previous developers had to continually switch contexts between JavaScript and a server-side language like PHP. It caused a lot of problems as similar functions had different names in JavaScript and PHP. Node.js put an end to this by providing a platform to use JavaScript everywhere. Since then, many Node.js frameworks such as Sails.js, Geddy.js, Total.js and others have been developed and released. Although these frameworks are very useful, they lack some modern features and learning resources.

Thus, the Meteor.js framework was born which meets much of the requirements of modern developers. Meero.js not only provides advanced features, but also has good documentation and learning resources.

Today, Meteor.js is a robust and complete JavaScript platform for developing real-time web and mobile applications. It is built on top of Node.js and is written in JavaScript. MEAN.js and MEAN.io are also quite powerful, but they are no better than Meteor.js and we will describe some reasons why this is so. So, let’s take a look at the 7 amazing features of Meteor.js.

1) Complete solution:

The MEAN stack is just one instance of using a combination of technologies (MongoDB, Angular.js, Express.js, and Node.js) and cannot be called a framework. When using the MEAN stack, developers need to sync between Node.js and MongoDB, as well as between Express.js and Angular.js.

On the other hand, Meteor offers a complete solution for developing and deploying web applications. Meteor comes with several built-in features such as reactive templates, automatic CSS and JS minification on the production server, and live code reloading. Its cloud platform, Galaxy, is quite powerful for deploying, scaling, and monitoring client applications. It also offers useful client-side technologies, including templates, wizards, and events.

2) Development ecosystem:

Meteor.js is more than just a JavaScript development framework. It is an open source Isomorphic Development Ecosystem (IDevE). Meteor.js allows you to build real-time web applications from scratch. Contains all the necessary front-end and back-end components (such as frameworks, libraries, configuration tools, databases, and more) that help developers throughout the entire application development lifecycle, from setup to development until implementation.

3) Isomorphic JavaScript code:

Meteor allows you to use the same code on the front-end and back-end, as well as for mobile and web applications. It saves developers from having to install and configure different libraries, module managers, APIs, drivers, and more.

Additionally, with Meteor, developers can harness the power of JavaScript while reducing code length and complexity. This saves developers a lot of production time, since they don’t need to make context switches between the server language and JavaScript.

4) Front solution:

Meteor offers Blaze.js, a front-end development framework. Although it is not an advanced framework, it does offer some good features. But, Meteor also integrates with modern and popular front-end frameworks like Backbone.js for better results.

Meteor offers isomorphic APIs that communicate between the front-end and the back-end. This allows developers to handle client-server management and server session management with ease. Data communication between client and server happens automatically without having to write any boilerplate code.

5) Database integration:

One of the drawbacks of Meteor.js is that it only supports MongoDB for now. So you can’t use Meteor if you need to include NoSQL database support for your applications. But the Meteor ecosystem offers the MongoDB database, as well as a front-end representation of MongoDB called Minimongo, which is written entirely in JavaScript. Meteor has a Mongo API that seamlessly integrates MongoDB on the back end and Minimongo on the front end. This results in faster page reloads and updates, which mitigates latency.

6) Live Recharge:

Another standout feature of Meteor.js is its built-in live browser reload. Whenever there are development changes to be made on the front-end, the live web page is automatically reloaded. Live reloading also allows updating only the required DOM elements on the web page without having to reload an entire page despite any dependent data changes on the back-end or front-end.

7) Custom Package Manager:

NPM modules (over 98,000 modules) can be used with Meteor, but it also has its own custom Package Manager that provides the necessary NPM functionality and some additional functionality. The official Meteor repository of Meteor packages called atmosfera.js has over 2600 smart packages.

Meteor has a built-in package to handle pre-processing and custom user authentication for email, Facebook, Twitter, Google, and more. Furthermore, it also comes with the necessary packages for popular frameworks like Backbone.js, Bootstrap, and jQuery.

Conclusion:

With so many exciting features in its kit, Meteor.js will soon become an ideal JavaScript development platform. Furthermore, it is supported and funded by a large community of developers who are committed to improving the functionality and features of Meteor to optimize its performance. Along with it, you can also find different online sites that provide you with a platform to learn Meteor.js.

Although its server side runs on top of Node.js, it uses synchronous-style coding. It uses the Fibers JavaScript library to avoid the asynchronous callback style, which is fundamental to Node.js. This results in an easy to read code structure and a linear execution model that is quite suitable for server code in a Meteor application.

Mobile development with Meteorjs offers application support through the Cordova phonegap integration. You can easily develop and deploy Android and iOS apps.

In short, the Meteor ecosystem has an isomorphic API (application programming interface) that links all components within the Meteor ecosystem and integrates with third-party packages, tools, and managers. Also, you have the option to deploy Meteor applications using Meteor or any other service provider. You can also deploy your Meteor apps on your own server.