I'm probably too cynical, but I think a big reason for node's popularity these days is the same as it was for rails 5-6 years ago - greenfield projects.
If I'm doing node now, it's not maintaining some legacy crap from 5 years ago - it's straight up new development. I get to do what I want. I don't think that factor comes in to the equation enough when people are talking about efficiencies and productivity metrics and such.
I still do a fair amount of PHP - my productivity maintaining PHP apps written by other people 5-10 years ago is pretty different from PHP I write from scratch, getting to use modern tools/libraries/techniques.
Yes, atmosphere is pretty cool - I'm looking at adding it to a project this fall. grails install-plugin atmosphere ;)
If I'm doing node now, it's not maintaining some legacy crap from 5 years ago - it's straight up new development. I get to do what I want. I don't think that factor comes in to the equation enough when people are talking about efficiencies and productivity metrics and such.
I still do a fair amount of PHP - my productivity maintaining PHP apps written by other people 5-10 years ago is pretty different from PHP I write from scratch, getting to use modern tools/libraries/techniques.
Yes, atmosphere is pretty cool - I'm looking at adding it to a project this fall. grails install-plugin atmosphere ;)