What is Node.js?

Node.js is an open-source server side runtime environment built on Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine. It provides an event driven, non-blocking (asynchronous) I/O and cross-platform runtime environment for building highly scalable server-side application using JavaScript.

Node.js can be used to build different types of applications such as command line application, web application, real-time chat application, REST API server etc. However, it is mainly used to build network programs like web servers, similar to PHP, Java, or ASP.NET.

Node.js was written and introduced by Ryan Dahl in 2009. Visit Wikipedia to know the history of Node.js.

Node.js official web site: https://nodejs.org

Node.js on github: https://github.com/nodejs/node

Node.js community conference http://nodeconf.com

Advantages of Node.js

1. Node.js is an open-source framework under MIT license. (MIT license is a free software license originating at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).)
2. Uses JavaScript to build entire server side application.
3. Lightweight framework that includes bare minimum modules. Other modules can be included as per the need of an application.
4. Asynchronous by default. So it performs faster than other frameworks.
5. Cross-platform framework that runs on Windows, MAC or Linux