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Python

Posted by Kei Emb
Kei Emb
3,929 Points

Another Social Network Question!

Hello all!

I would like to reach out to our treehouse community and ask the teachers and amazing coders a question.

I've been planning a site build for a Social Network that will involve a database for user uploaded content, chat, inbox messaging, likes, comments, profile pages, print, photo gallery, and a digital book that will contain user uploaded content. And eventually adding in videos.

A lot for a beginner! So I plan to start with the main features of the web application and focus on the core social network features, profiles, CMS, UX and UI design, content upload form and photos. I would like to build the site so that it is stable enough for a dynamic build with over 50,000 plus members in time.

So to the question at hand.... What languages should I focus on to build this core and what should I learn along with it to add the desired features and functions?

So far I have started a Ruby Rails path, but I've recently seen that Treehouse is going to bring a course live this Feb. building a social network using flask and I'm guessing that it goes hand in hand with Python. Does python offer a better long term advantage than ruby rails?

In advance, thank you for any and all of your responses!

-Kei

2 Answers

Ricky Catron
Ricky Catron
13,023 Points
Ricky Catron
Ricky Catron
13,023 Points

As someone who has worked with a lot of Flask and a little Django I would recommend Django over Flask for this project if you chose Python. I love Flask and will champion it until the day I die but an important part of programming is choosing the right tools for the project. Django is a much heavier and fuller Framework then Flask and in being such has far more built in features. It is about equal to Rails and I would highly recommend it.

This is a large project you will be taking on. I would also consider the database. Should it be SQL based like SQL lite, MySQL, PostgreSQL. Good link comparing them here.

Goodluck! --Ricky

Kei Emb
Kei Emb
3,929 Points

Thanks for the advice Ricky! I going to check out the comparisons for the Database as well. This has been a big help!

Colin Marshall
Colin Marshall
32,861 Points
Colin Marshall
Colin Marshall
32,861 Points

I don't have a good answer for you as far as Python goes, but I do know that one of the big advantages of a Ruby on Rails app is that it is good at handling scaling. So if you do get those 50,000 members a Rails app could handle something like that.

After a brief google search, it looks like the Django framework for Python is good with scaling too.

Kei Emb
Kei Emb
3,929 Points

Thanks Colin! I appreciate your answer sir!!!