Horizon vs ably

Overview

Horizon

Stacks22

Followers56

Votes0

GitHub Stars6.8K

Forks348

Ably

Stacks63

Followers98

Votes96

GitHub Stars351

Forks63

Horizon vs ably: What are the differences?

Real-Time Communication Protocol: Horizon uses RethinkDB's changefeeds, which allow real-time updates to be pushed to clients, while Ably uses its proprietary protocol called Ably Realtime. Ably Realtime operates over websockets and ensures low latency and high reliability in delivering real-time messages.
Scalability: Horizon is limited to a single RethinkDB instance, making it suitable for small to medium-scale applications. On the other hand, Ably is designed for massive scalability with support for global distribution, enabling it to handle large volumes of real-time data across multiple regions.
Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) Support: Horizon comes with built-in CORS support, which simplifies handling cross-origin requests in web applications. In contrast, Ably requires manual configuration for CORS, providing more control but requiring additional setup for secure cross-origin communication.
Presence Management: Ably offers a robust presence management feature, allowing developers to track the online/offline status of users in real-time applications. Horizon, on the other hand, lacks native support for presence management, requiring developers to implement custom solutions for tracking user presence.
Mobile SDKs and Platform Support: Ably provides comprehensive SDKs for various mobile platforms like iOS and Android, making it easier for developers to integrate real-time functionality into mobile applications. Horizon lacks extensive support for mobile platforms, focusing more on web applications.
Customizable Authentication and Authorization: Ably offers flexible authentication and authorization features, allowing developers to implement custom security mechanisms tailored to their specific needs. While Horizon provides basic authentication capabilities, it may lack the customization options required for more complex security requirements.

In Summary, Horizon and Ably differ in their real-time communication protocols, scalability options, CORS support, presence management capabilities, mobile SDK support, and customization of authentication and authorization mechanisms.

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CLI (Node.js)

Manual

Detailed Comparison

Horizon	Ably
Horizon provides a complete backend that makes it dramatically simpler to build, deploy, manage, and scale engaging JavaScript web and mobile apps. Horizon is extensible, integrates with the Node.js stack, and allows building modern, arbitrarily complex applications.	Ably offers WebSockets, stream resume, history, presence, and managed third-party integrations to make it simple to build, extend, and deliver digital realtime experiences at scale.
-	Pub/Sub Channels API: built-in user presence, message history, token auth, guaranteed message ordering, stream continuity; Protocol Adapters API: stream data over open protocols like WebSockets, MQTT, SSE, and more; Reactor API: link your other systems to Ably so you can use your existing compute to queue and consume high volumes of realtime messages in bulk, transform or filter messages by executing functions on them, or pass messages on to other systems for onward processing; A unified API to provide native push notifications using APNS and GCM; Data Stream Network: Ably's cloud network of 16+ datacenters and 175+ PoPs.
Statistics
GitHub Stars 6.8K	GitHub Stars 351
GitHub Forks 348	GitHub Forks 63
Stacks 22	Stacks 63
Followers 56	Followers 98
Votes 0	Votes 96
Pros & Cons
No community feedback yet	Pros 10 WebSockets 9 Highly reliable 8 Massive scalability 8 SSE 8 Great technical support
Integrations
RethinkDB GraphQL JavaScript	PHP Java Objective-C React Native Swift Unity Ruby Node.js JavaScript .NET

What are some alternatives to Horizon, Ably?

Firebase

Firebase is a cloud service designed to power real-time, collaborative applications. Simply add the Firebase library to your application to gain access to a shared data structure; any changes you make to that data are automatically synchronized with the Firebase cloud and with other clients within milliseconds.

Socket.IO

It enables real-time bidirectional event-based communication. It works on every platform, browser or device, focusing equally on reliability and speed.

PubNub

PubNub makes it easy for you to add real-time capabilities to your apps, without worrying about the infrastructure. Build apps that allow your users to engage in real-time across mobile, browser, desktop and server.

Pusher

Pusher is the category leader in delightful APIs for app developers building communication and collaboration features.

SignalR

SignalR allows bi-directional communication between server and client. Servers can now push content to connected clients instantly as it becomes available. SignalR supports Web Sockets, and falls back to other compatible techniques for older browsers. SignalR includes APIs for connection management (for instance, connect and disconnect events), grouping connections, and authorization.

Syncano

Syncano is a backend platform to build powerful real-time apps more efficiently. Integrate with any API, minimize boilerplate code and control your data - all from one place.

NATS

Unlike traditional enterprise messaging systems, NATS has an always-on dial tone that does whatever it takes to remain available. This forms a great base for building modern, reliable, and scalable cloud and distributed systems.

SocketCluster

SocketCluster is a fast, highly scalable HTTP + realtime server engine which lets you build multi-process realtime servers that make use of all CPU cores on a machine/instance. It removes the limitations of having to run your Node.js server as a single thread and makes your backend resilient by automatically recovering from worker crashes and aggregating errors into a central log.

deepstream.io

Scalable Server for Realtime Web Apps with JSON structures that can be read, manipulated and listened to, messages that can be sent to one or more subscribers, and request response workflows, between two clients or servers.

8base

A cloud service designed to power enterprise-grade web and mobile applications that require support for large numbers of users, complex data and transactional requirements, comprehensive role-based security and a modern look-and-feel.

Related Comparisons

Horizon vs ably: What are the differences?

Real-Time Communication Protocol: Horizon uses RethinkDB's changefeeds, which allow real-time updates to be pushed to clients, while Ably uses its proprietary protocol called Ably Realtime. Ably Realtime operates over websockets and ensures low latency and high reliability in delivering real-time messages.
Scalability: Horizon is limited to a single RethinkDB instance, making it suitable for small to medium-scale applications. On the other hand, Ably is designed for massive scalability with support for global distribution, enabling it to handle large volumes of real-time data across multiple regions.
Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) Support: Horizon comes with built-in CORS support, which simplifies handling cross-origin requests in web applications. In contrast, Ably requires manual configuration for CORS, providing more control but requiring additional setup for secure cross-origin communication.
Presence Management: Ably offers a robust presence management feature, allowing developers to track the online/offline status of users in real-time applications. Horizon, on the other hand, lacks native support for presence management, requiring developers to implement custom solutions for tracking user presence.
Mobile SDKs and Platform Support: Ably provides comprehensive SDKs for various mobile platforms like iOS and Android, making it easier for developers to integrate real-time functionality into mobile applications. Horizon lacks extensive support for mobile platforms, focusing more on web applications.
Customizable Authentication and Authorization: Ably offers flexible authentication and authorization features, allowing developers to implement custom security mechanisms tailored to their specific needs. While Horizon provides basic authentication capabilities, it may lack the customization options required for more complex security requirements.

Horizon vs ably

Overview