Advantages & Limitations of Node.js

Advantages of Node.js

The following are the advantages of Node.js:

• Open Source
• JavaScript as Programming Language
• Scalable
• Better Performance
• Caching Support
• Lightweight and Extensible
• REST API Support
• Unit Testing
• Server Development
• Community Support

Open Source

Node.js is open-source, which means it is free to use and does not require a license. Node.js also supports a wide range of open-source modules.

JavaScript is a programming language

It uses JavaScript as a programming language for both the front and back ends, which boosts programmer productivity and code reuse.

Scalable

You may grow your Node.js application in two ways: horizontally and vertically, allowing you to boost application performance.

• Horizontal scaling allows you to add extra nodes to an existing system.
• Vertical scaling allows you to add more resources to a single node.

Better performance

It improves performance because Node.js I/O operations are non-blocking. It also uses the V8 JavaScript engine to run JavaScript code. The V8 engine translates JS code directly into machine code, making it faster.

Caching Support

Node.js enables module caching. As a result, the first time a Node.js module is requested, it is cached in the application's memory. Thus, further calls to load the same module may not result in the module code being executed again.

Lightweight and extensible

Node.js is based on JavaScript and can be executed both on the client and server side. It also allows for the sharing of data in JSON format, which JavaScript can readily consume. This makes it lightweight as compared to other frameworks.

REST API Support

You can easily create RESTful service APIs with Node.js.

Unit Testing

It supports unit testing out of the box. You can use any JS unit testing framework, such as Jasmin, to test your Node.js code.

Server Development

Node.js provides built-in APIs for creating many server types, including HTTP, DNS, and TCP servers.

Community Support

Node.js has a large development community around the world. They are actively developing new modules or packages to enable various sorts of application development.

Limitations of Node.js

Limitations of Node.js are as follows:

• Lack of Multi-threaded Support
• Constraints with High Computational Tasks
• Queueing of Requests during Long Tasks
• Suitability for Synchronous and CPU CPU-intensive tasks

Lack of Multi-threaded Support

Node.js runs on a single thread, which limits its ability to use multi-threaded programming to improve performance.

Constraints for High Computational Tasks

Node.js may struggle with operations that require significant processing resources, resulting in performance bottlenecks.

Queuing Requests during Long Tasks

Because Node.js is single-threaded, long-running tasks might cause incoming requests to queue up while they wait for execution to complete.

Suitable for synchronous and CPU-intensive tasks

While Node.js is excellent at completing synchronous tasks, particularly those involving I/O operations, it may not be optimal for CPU-intensive jobs.