AppFog vs Heroku: What are the differences?
What is AppFog? Simple PaaS for Java, Python, Node, .Net, Ruby, PHP, MySQL, Mongo, and PostgreSQL. AppFog provides the infrastructure web developers need to build apps without worrying about IT tasks or having to wait days to get servers ready for writing code. AppFog’s web application technologies include PHP, NodeJS, Ruby, Python, Java, .NET, MySQL, and PostgreSQL.
What is Heroku? Build, deliver, monitor and scale web apps and APIs with a trail blazing developer experience. Heroku is a cloud application platform – a new way of building and deploying web apps. Heroku lets app developers spend 100% of their time on their application code, not managing servers, deployment, ongoing operations, or scaling.
AppFog and Heroku can be categorized as "Platform as a Service" tools.
Some of the features offered by AppFog are:
- Launches fast, runs fast- Varnish Cache and op-code caching run applications with less server load and accelerated performance.
- Reduces ops work- No more configuring servers, firewalls, Apache, security, or installing frameworks.
- Plays well with any SCM- Versioning is critical. AppFog is compatible with code management systems like git, svn, and mercurial.
On the other hand, Heroku provides the following key features:
- Agile deployment for Ruby, Node.js, Clojure, Java, Python, Go and Scala.
- Run and scale any type of app.
- Total visibility across your entire app.
"The basic plan is free" is the primary reason why developers consider AppFog over the competitors, whereas "Easy deployment" was stated as the key factor in picking Heroku.