How Basecamp Next got to be so damn fast without using much client-side UI
This is all fascinating ... but does it feel like a sustainable approach going forward, or more like a turbo-charged horse and buggy?<p>Developer happiness aside -- there are plenty of folks who like JavaScript just as much as Ruby -- and assuming that we're talking about an non-public-facing app (like Basecamp Next), is there still an argument that can be made in favor of doing your UI on the server side?<p>Even just in principle, it can't possibly be close to as fast (client-side can render optimistically, where possible), and it can't be close to as flexible (you don't have a model of state on the client to perform logic with).<p>I think that the truth of this is already admitted in that the really fancy bits of UI are being implemented in JS: <a href="http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3094-code-statistics-for-basecamp-next" rel="nofollow">http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3094-code-statistics-for-base...</a>