<TL; DR;> Creators of CanJS think you should use CanJS.
Honestly; I have a hard time taking this article seriously when they put Backbone & Knockout into the "stagnation" category, but CANjs into the "safe bet" area. Both Backbone and Knockout are continually maintained and have done a good job with backwards compatibility.
> Backbone and Knockout are continually maintained
I don't know for Knockout but Backbone is a zombie. His creator basically says no to any new feature and has very little time to manage the project anyway. See the commit logs for this year ,they are merely "cosmetic". A lot of things could be fixed or added -- a better router(with states and sub states) , composite views , composite models that do not need verbose hand plumbing -- without even breaking backward compatibility , but there is no plan to add anything significant to the core.
I Never tried CanJS though , It looks like an interesting alternative to Backbone.
This is by design. If you want a framework with lots of these features, they exist. Backbone is intended to be a spartan framework for developers who like that. It is very easy to extend or override whatever functionality you want since it is very small and easy to understand. Continuous feature bloat would ruin it.
Yes, and I think we do a decent job of highlighting why.
Backbone/Knockout may be well maintained but their scope is fixed. CanJS has gone from the times of $.widget() to <app-component> while maintaining backward compatibility.
Just the fact that this is a blatant advertorial makes it hard for anyone to take your article seriously. Your arguments are valid and I admire your research but your presentation discounted all the value you provided with your article. If I were you I would have left out your attempt to "sell" your project and just mention it briefly at the end. If people actually agree with you, they would have been interested anyway. But as soon as you started talking about CanJS the credibility fell to 0
Thank you, I get the sense that you're not trying to be overly negative. But I'm also slightly confused. If you can't gain credibility with valid arguments and research, how else can you?
The article as is right now, won't be shared as much as could have been if it had objective tone. What I've seen a lot of people do is make a useful and objective argument about what the message they're trying to convey and then maybe at the end mention their message briefly. That's how people build credibility. Check out all "Crunch Network" posts on TechCrunch. Even though most of the writers behind those articles do have agenda (they all have some stakes in the subject matter), a lot of those articles are useful. Since the content is useful, a lot of people share them and there's no lost credibility.
The article comes across as very biased. Also; the article was posted by Matthew, a pretty significant contributor to CanJS, but this was not disclosed in the submission.
It wasn't until I was 3/4ths of the way through the article that I even caught on that Bitovi is the company that created CanJS since it is not a framework I have personally used or am all that familiar with.
From your own article you highlight these 3 points as describing "longevity"
1) Trust. (The framework shouldn’t break backwards compatibility.)
2) Consistent innovation
3) Proven Track Record
Both Knockout & Backbone have clearly demonstrated both points 1 & 3. Point 2 is dubious at best since depending on your definition of consistent innovation you may well break Point 1 - Trust.
Consistent innovation is also, IMHO, not a necessity of longevity. If I need to turn a screw I need a screwdriver. Tomorrow a screwdriver will still work; maybe it's a faster battery charged screwdriver, but it is essentially the same tool solving the same problem. KnockoutJS is a tool that still solves the same problem.
Honestly; I have a hard time taking this article seriously when they put Backbone & Knockout into the "stagnation" category, but CANjs into the "safe bet" area. Both Backbone and Knockout are continually maintained and have done a good job with backwards compatibility.