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Electron

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Electron vs Sails.js: What are the differences?

## Introduction
In this segment, we will explore the key differences between Electron and Sails.js.

1. **Technology Stack**: Electron is a framework used to build cross-platform desktop applications using web technologies such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, while Sails.js is a web application framework for Node.js optimized for building custom, enterprise-grade Node.js applications.

2. **Purpose and Use Case**: Electron is primarily used for developing desktop applications with a focus on providing a native-like experience to users, whereas Sails.js is ideal for building web applications and APIs with a strong emphasis on efficiency and scalability.

3. **Deployment Flexibility**: Electron applications are deployed as standalone desktop applications that can run on multiple platforms like Windows, macOS, and Linux, whereas Sails.js applications are deployed as web services typically hosted on servers to serve clients over the internet.

4. **User Interface Development**: Electron provides tools and libraries for building rich user interfaces with features like menu bars, system tray icons, and native dialog windows, while Sails.js focuses on server-side logic and API development with limited support for front-end user interface components.

5. **Community Support and Ecosystem**: Electron has a large and active community with an extensive ecosystem of plugins and tools to enhance development capabilities, while Sails.js has a smaller but dedicated community that focuses on improving the core framework and providing support to developers.

6. **Learning Curve**: Electron can be easier for web developers to pick up due to its similarity to web development technologies, whereas Sails.js may have a steeper learning curve for beginners unfamiliar with server-side development concepts like MVC architecture and routing.

In Summary, the key differences between Electron and Sails.js lie in their technology stack, purpose and use case, deployment flexibility, user interface development, community support and ecosystem, and learning curve for developers.

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Pros of Electron
Pros of Sails.js
  • 69
    Easy to make rich cross platform desktop applications
  • 53
    Open source
  • 14
    Great looking apps such as Slack and Visual Studio Code
  • 8
    Because it's cross platform
  • 4
    Use Node.js in the Main Process
  • 49
    Data-driven apis
  • 47
    Waterline ORM
  • 37
    Mvc
  • 32
    Easy rest
  • 25
    Real-time
  • 21
    Open source
  • 19
    Service-oriented architecture
  • 18
    Scalable
  • 10
    Convension over configuration
  • 9
    Rails-like asset pipeline
  • 9
    Node machines and machinepacks
  • 7
    Easy route/controller generation
  • 6
    Ruby on Rails basic stuff for JS devs
  • 3
    CLI for scaffolding project pieces
  • 3
    WebSocket support
  • 1
    Supportive community

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Cons of Electron
Cons of Sails.js
  • 19
    Uses a lot of memory
  • 8
    User experience never as good as a native app
  • 4
    No proper documentation
  • 4
    Does not native
  • 1
    Each app needs to install a new chromium + nodejs
  • 1
    Wrong reference for dom inspection
  • 5
    Waterline ORM
  • 4
    Defaults to VueJS
  • 0
    Standard MVC

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What is Electron?

With Electron, creating a desktop application for your company or idea is easy. Initially developed for GitHub's Atom editor, Electron has since been used to create applications by companies like Microsoft, Facebook, Slack, and Docker. The Electron framework lets you write cross-platform desktop applications using JavaScript, HTML and CSS. It is based on io.js and Chromium and is used in the Atom editor.

What is Sails.js?

Sails is designed to mimic the MVC pattern of frameworks like Ruby on Rails, but with support for the requirements of modern apps: data-driven APIs with scalable, service-oriented architecture.

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What companies use Electron?
What companies use Sails.js?
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What are some alternatives to Electron and Sails.js?
Photon
The fastest way to build beautiful Electron apps using simple HTML and CSS. Underneath it all is Electron. Originally built for GitHub's Atom text editor, Electron is the easiest way to build cross-platform desktop applications.
React Native Desktop
Build OS X desktop apps using React Native.
React Native
React Native enables you to build world-class application experiences on native platforms using a consistent developer experience based on JavaScript and React. The focus of React Native is on developer efficiency across all the platforms you care about - learn once, write anywhere. Facebook uses React Native in multiple production apps and will continue investing in React Native.
React
Lots of people use React as the V in MVC. Since React makes no assumptions about the rest of your technology stack, it's easy to try it out on a small feature in an existing project.
JavaScript
JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.
See all alternatives