From: goodieboy <goodieBoy@...>
Date: 2008-08-19T13:07:24+09:00
Subject: when are web frameworks needed?

Hi,

With the recent birth of Phusion Passenger (and Rack), I'm wondering
if all of the Ruby web frameworks are as important as they used to be?
I mean, you can now create a simple web app using ruby, AND easily
deploy it, without a framework! I've been waiting forever to do this.

My question is, what app requirements make it so that using a
framework such as Rails/Merb is a good choice?

What kind of app would do better as a standalone Rack/Passenger?
(still using great gems like DataMapper, Hpricot etc. of course)

As an example, I have a simple ecommerce site I need to develop. I'm
thinking of using Passenger, DataMapper, ActiveMerchant and Erb. Would
it be so terrible to whip up my own lightweight router and controller
scheme for something like this? I can't imagine the code to support
the app would be more than a few hundred lines?

Matt