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  1. Stackups
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  4. Web Servers
  5. SignalR vs nginx

SignalR vs nginx

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

NGINX
NGINX
Stacks115.0K
Followers61.9K
Votes5.5K
GitHub Stars28.4K
Forks7.6K
SignalR
SignalR
Stacks656
Followers1.2K
Votes146
GitHub Stars9.3K
Forks2.3K

SignalR vs nginx: What are the differences?

  1. Communication Protocol: SignalR uses WebSockets as the default communication protocol, offering real-time bidirectional communication between client and server. On the other hand, Nginx is a web server that acts as a reverse proxy and load balancer, and it operates on the HTTP and HTTPS protocols.
  2. Use Case: SignalR is primarily used for developing real-time web applications, such as chat applications or live data updates. Nginx, on the other hand, is commonly used as a web server to serve static content, reverse proxy, or load balance incoming traffic to backend servers.
  3. Technology Stack: SignalR is often used in conjunction with ASP.NET or ASP.NET Core for building real-time web applications. Nginx can work with various technologies and programming languages, making it a versatile choice for a wide range of web application deployments.
  4. Scalability: SignalR can be scaled vertically by adding more resources to the server, but it may face limitations in horizontal scaling due to its server-centric architecture. Nginx, on the other hand, excels at horizontal scaling by distributing incoming requests across multiple backend servers efficiently.
  5. Caching: Nginx has built-in caching mechanisms that can help improve the performance of web applications by caching responses from backend servers. SignalR does not have native caching capabilities since its primary focus is on real-time data communication.
  6. Security Features: Nginx offers robust security features such as SSL/TLS termination, access control, and rate limiting to protect web applications from various security threats. While SignalR supports SSL encryption for secure communication between client and server, it may not provide the same level of security features as Nginx in terms of web application protection.

In Summary, SignalR focuses on real-time bidirectional communication using WebSockets, while Nginx shines as a versatile web server, reverse proxy, and load balancer with strong security features.

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Advice on NGINX, SignalR

greg00m
greg00m

Mar 9, 2020

Needs advice

I am diving into web development, both front and back end. I feel comfortable with administration, scripting and moderate coding in bash, Python and C++, but I am also a Windows fan (i love inner conflict). What are the votes on web servers? IIS is expensive and restrictive (has Windows adoption of open source changed this?) Apache has the history but seems to be at the root of most of my Infosec issues, and I know nothing about nginx (is it too new to rely on?). And no, I don't know what I want to do on the web explicitly, but hosting and data storage (both cloud and tape) are possibilities.
Ready, aim fire!

766k views766k
Comments
Grant
Grant

Developer at GMS LLC

Sep 5, 2020

Decided
  • Server rendered HTML output from PHP is being migrated to the client as Vue.js components, future plans to provide additional content, and other new miscellaneous features all result in a substantial increase of static files needing to be served from the server. NGINX has better performance than Apache for serving static content.
  • The change to NGINX will require switching from PHP to PHP-FPM resulting in a distributed architecture with a higher complexity configuration, but this is outweighed by PHP-FPM being faster than PHP for processing requests.
  • The NGINX + PHP-FPM setup now allows for horizontally scaling of resources rather vertically scaling the previously combined Apache + PHP resources.
  • PHP shell tasks can now efficiently be decoupled from the application reducing main application footprint and allow for scaling of tasks on an individual basis.
429k views429k
Comments
jlp78
jlp78

May 31, 2019

ReviewonNGINXNGINX

I use nginx because it is very light weight. Where Apache tries to include everything in the web server, nginx opts to have external programs/facilities take care of that so the web server can focus on efficiently serving web pages. While this can seem inefficient, it limits the number of new bugs found in the web server, which is the element that faces the client most directly.

727k views727k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

NGINX
NGINX
SignalR
SignalR

nginx [engine x] is an HTTP and reverse proxy server, as well as a mail proxy server, written by Igor Sysoev. According to Netcraft nginx served or proxied 30.46% of the top million busiest sites in Jan 2018.

SignalR allows bi-directional communication between server and client. Servers can now push content to connected clients instantly as it becomes available. SignalR supports Web Sockets, and falls back to other compatible techniques for older browsers. SignalR includes APIs for connection management (for instance, connect and disconnect events), grouping connections, and authorization.

Statistics
GitHub Stars
28.4K
GitHub Stars
9.3K
GitHub Forks
7.6K
GitHub Forks
2.3K
Stacks
115.0K
Stacks
656
Followers
61.9K
Followers
1.2K
Votes
5.5K
Votes
146
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 1453
    High-performance http server
  • 895
    Performance
  • 730
    Easy to configure
  • 607
    Open source
  • 530
    Load balancer
Cons
  • 10
    Advanced features require subscription
Pros
  • 32
    Supports .NET server
  • 25
    Real-time
  • 18
    Free
  • 16
    Fallback to SSE, forever frame, long polling
  • 15
    WebSockets
Cons
  • 2
    Expertise hard to get
  • 2
    Requires jQuery
  • 1
    Weak iOS and Android support
  • 1
    Big differences between ASP.NET and Core versions
Integrations
No integrations available
.NET
.NET

What are some alternatives to NGINX, SignalR?

Firebase

Firebase

Firebase is a cloud service designed to power real-time, collaborative applications. Simply add the Firebase library to your application to gain access to a shared data structure; any changes you make to that data are automatically synchronized with the Firebase cloud and with other clients within milliseconds.

Apache HTTP Server

Apache HTTP Server

The Apache HTTP Server is a powerful and flexible HTTP/1.1 compliant web server. Originally designed as a replacement for the NCSA HTTP Server, it has grown to be the most popular web server on the Internet.

Socket.IO

Socket.IO

It enables real-time bidirectional event-based communication. It works on every platform, browser or device, focusing equally on reliability and speed.

Unicorn

Unicorn

Unicorn is an HTTP server for Rack applications designed to only serve fast clients on low-latency, high-bandwidth connections and take advantage of features in Unix/Unix-like kernels. Slow clients should only be served by placing a reverse proxy capable of fully buffering both the the request and response in between Unicorn and slow clients.

PubNub

PubNub

PubNub makes it easy for you to add real-time capabilities to your apps, without worrying about the infrastructure. Build apps that allow your users to engage in real-time across mobile, browser, desktop and server.

Microsoft IIS

Microsoft IIS

Internet Information Services (IIS) for Windows Server is a flexible, secure and manageable Web server for hosting anything on the Web. From media streaming to web applications, IIS's scalable and open architecture is ready to handle the most demanding tasks.

Pusher

Pusher

Pusher is the category leader in delightful APIs for app developers building communication and collaboration features.

Apache Tomcat

Apache Tomcat

Apache Tomcat powers numerous large-scale, mission-critical web applications across a diverse range of industries and organizations.

Passenger

Passenger

Phusion Passenger is a web server and application server, designed to be fast, robust and lightweight. It takes a lot of complexity out of deploying web apps, adds powerful enterprise-grade features that are useful in production, and makes administration much easier and less complex.

Ably

Ably

Ably offers WebSockets, stream resume, history, presence, and managed third-party integrations to make it simple to build, extend, and deliver digital realtime experiences at scale.

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