Python or Node for Chat Application

Question

I intend to start off a new chat web application which allows users to join a chatroom and participate in the chat. I've heard a lot about how Node.js will be perfect for this. Plus, there are a lot of tutorials online that demonstrate building a Node + socket.io chat application. Personally, I have never given Node a shot. I know javascript well enough to work with Jquery and Backbone but I've been avoiding Node due to my preference for Python for web development. What do you guys suggest? Should I try the app in Python ( I have no idea where to get started) or should I spend some time and learn Node?

Thanks a lot!

Answer 1

I'm personally not a big fan of writing Python, and while I love Node and would recommend giving it a shot sometime, if you already know Python there's no reason you can't use it for this task; you may be interested in checking out Twisted or Tornado.

I will say that one of the big plusses for using Node.js for evented programming (as compared to doing it in other languages) is that all I/O is asynchronous by default in Node.js. In other environments, you need to make sure you only use non-blocking libraries.