Design and development are two crucial parts of the whole SDLC, or Software Development Life Cycle, as we know it. The fact that they are also interconnected in a lot of aspects adds to the need to get the right set of tools and frameworks to ensure that things don’t go downhill. Everything needs to come together and deliver what customers expect of you- a perfect, user-friendly product.
It all comes down to code and design- the right code will give a good design, while a bad design can ruin the best of codes. This is where an enterprise software development company should choose the framework that makes everything sorted and easy. Recently, Ruby on Rails has been one such framework.
Ruby on Rails Web Development – A Short Brief
Ruby is the name of an open-source software tool that creates some of the most amazing web applications around. Written in the Ruby programming language, it’s a web app development framework at the back-end scheme of things.
Given the number of 8945 programming languages in the world out there, most of the ones we see today have evolved at a breakneck pace, giving them the lead they have today, and Ruby on Rails is among them. One of the biggest advantages of Ruby on Rails is that it combines with other languages like JavaScript, CSS, and HTML to deliver excellence and ease.
Today, choosing Ruby on Rails for web development allows you to go ahead with custom web app development adept in Agile methodology to deliver apps that are quick to market and work with speed.
Read more: Complete Guide to Hiring Ruby on Rails Developers in 2022
Benefits of Ruby on Rails as a Development Framework
Ruby on Rails-based web applications have a lot of things going for them, and here are a few of them given below:
- Model-View-Controller (MVC) Architecture:
- Ruby on Rails MVC architecture allows a web app to have three different layers that are interconnected in nature. While the model consists of code that operates on application data, it also establishes a centralized nature of logic to work around and manipulate the available data.
- The controller, on the other hand, facilitates communication between views and models. Once a request is received from a browser, this controller processes it with the aid of models and then coordinates with the view on how to display it to the user.
- Highly Flexible:
- The world is becoming more connected each day, and interoperability is regarded highly.
- This is where Ruby on Rails for web development becomes a promising option, as it can work with Angular, Java, and more with relative ease, making too much investment in newer technologies illogical.
- The Large Community Size:
- With time, Ruby on Rails has become more than a development tool- it has become a large community of dedicated developers where all members keep sharing their tools and experiences and collaborate extensively.
- Other than that, this community also offers a lot of information on the available jobs, meetups, conferences, as well as startups, to name a few.
- This community presence is one of the most potent benefits of Ruby on Rails.
- Availability of Multiple Free Plugins:
- In the context of Ruby on Rails, there are a lot of free plugins, also referred to as gems, that make customizing your website as per your needs very simple and hassle-free.
- To top it off, everything done with these plugins is completely secure as well, so no worries there too.
- Such benefits of Ruby programming language rightly make it as popular as it is.
However, it’s not all about the benefits
Before your Ruby on Rails development company goes ahead with developing your requisite product, it’s also crucial that you know a few limitations that this framework has. Have a look:
- Hosting Limitations:
- Ruby on Rails web development sadly suffers from a few hosting limitations, as development with this framework is more resource-intensive than the usual PHP-based websites. To cut through this, there are a lot of other hosts and servers like EngineYard, Rackspace, or Amazon EC2 ‘that serve their purpose pretty well.
- Popularity is Still Not the Best:
- While the number of Ruby developers is increasing with each passing day as they make the switch from other languages, the bitter truth is that Rail-based web applications are still not the most popular choice.
- This can be mostly because of the fact that it is more difficult to learn as compared to other traditional programming languages.
- Lack of Abundant Documentation:
- With the gems on which Ruby on Rails operates, it can turn out to be a very difficult task for libraries. In such cases, many developers end up taking notes from test suites, considering them as the relevant documentation to figure out the behavior of written codes.
- While getting into the test suite is not a problem, diving into the code to figure out the road ahead can be pretty difficult, as compared to the availability of the right documentation. Ruby on Rails web development can, in such a situation, be a problem.
- Slow Runtime:
- One of the other concerns with Ruby on Rails web development is its very slow runtime speed. Despite its positives, there is no denying that other frameworks are a little quicker than Ruby on Rails.
- While it’s not a deal-breaker, replacing and making tweaks becomes a difficult process.
Checkout our Successful Case Study of eCommerce Marketplace Fashion App Built with Ruby on Rails
Summing Up
RoR is a great development framework; there is no denying it, and given a large number of features, it has truly become the framework to go for. These were some of the Ruby on Rails advantages and disadvantages, and keeping them in mind will sort out your Ruby on Rails web development requirements without a doubt.
If you are looking for an enterprise software development company that could help you leverage the best aspects of Ruby on Rails, then look no further than BoTree Technologies, where its team of expert web app developers makes use of the positives of RoR to give well-standardized products.
Contact us today for a FREE CONSULTATION.