DrupalCon Portland 2013: MAKING DRUPAL THE BEST REST SERVER FOR SINGLE-PAGE APPS
With Drupal 8, we're not just an HMTL CMS anymore. We're a fully capable REST server that can organize and deliver data for applications of all kinds. We already seeing a huge push toward "single-page apps" that communicate with the server entirely by JSON over HTTP and Web Sockets. This push has driven some formerly enthusiastic Drupal users and contributors away from Drupal and toward solutions like Node.js and Python's WSGI frameworks.
My goal is to ensure the Drupal remains a valuable tool for Web Application Developers in a world where page reloads aren't tolerated.
To accomplish this, I think we need to continue the trends in Drupal 8 toward decoupling the theme layer and implementing all Drupal objects as Entities that can be delivered via RESTful services. We also need to make sure all content and user related data can be stored in a Document-oriented database so that we can partner fully with Node.JS instead of competing with it. I also believe that we need to ship Drupal 8 with a "single-page" theme, and add to core any additional javascript libraries needed to support this.
My goal is to ensure the Drupal remains a valuable tool for Web Application Developers in a world where page reloads aren't tolerated.
To accomplish this, I think we need to continue the trends in Drupal 8 toward decoupling the theme layer and implementing all Drupal objects as Entities that can be delivered via RESTful services. We also need to make sure all content and user related data can be stored in a Document-oriented database so that we can partner fully with Node.JS instead of competing with it. I also believe that we need to ship Drupal 8 with a "single-page" theme, and add to core any additional javascript libraries needed to support this.