Express

Express is an alternative to the rails new command that generates a slimmed-down, lightweight Rails application.

One of the primary goals of the merger between Merb and Rails was to make Rails more modular, so that developers could easily pick and choose the pieces they want to use.

It's become popular lately to lambaste Rails for its lack of modularity and for being "bloated." Few developers seem to realize the extent to which Rails 3's goals towards modularity were in fact achieved. This application will show you some of what's possible.

Unless you want to help out, you probably shouldn't use it yet. It's not entirely done.

But if you insist, just install the gem and run express new <your app name>.

You can then run your generated app with rails server, rackup, or shotgun, like any other Rack app.

Express:

$ time rails runner '1+1'

real  0m1.079s
user  0m0.915s
sys 0m0.147s

$ time rake test

real  0m1.878s
user  0m1.635s
sys 0m0.225s

Rails 3.2.2

$ time rails runner '1+1'

real  0m1.912s
user  0m1.610s
sys 0m0.273s

$ time rake test

real  0m7.786s
user  0m6.801s
sys 0m0.956s

• Express is Rails - it doesn't add anything new. It just generates a slimmed-down Rails app.

• Express-generated apps can be upgraded to a full Rails app later if you want. You'll just need to commit your app to SCM, run rails new, and resolve some minor conflicts. Express uses the exact same file and directory structure as any Rails app, so this should be fairly easy.

• Express is geared towards content-oriented sites. If your site is largely content oriented, but is too complex to comfortably generate with something like StaticMatic or Jekyll, then Express may be for you. For a similar project focussed on using Rails apps as an API server, see LightRail.

• Routing, with one wildcard route for GETs and one controller.
• View rendering
• Unit/Functional testing
• Whatever else you decide to add to your app.

This library was inspired by a chapter in José Valim's "Crafting Rails Applications," and by recent discussions on Twitter.

Copyright (c) 2012 Business Vision S.A.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.