The use of Node.js to build web applications is growing like gangbusters, so it’s time it had a big-boy application performance monitoring tool. And that’s what NodeFly Systems says it’s bringing to the table. Node. js is a server-side, event-driven programming language popular among developers — especially JavaScript developers because it lets them use their existing skills to write server as well as client code.
Phenomenal growth rate aside, Node.js “doesn’t have a ton of great monitoring tools, and as the ecosystem matures, enterprises need these kinds of tools to look at all the layers of software,” said Glen Lougheed, CEO of the Vancouver, BC-based startup told me. “We’re trying to provide devops with the visibility they need to understand what’s happening with their applications — there’s really no great user-friendly tools for that.”
Admittedly, there are some good one-off tools that Node.js devotees have open-sourced. To get to a full APM system, though, developers would need to “Frankenstein a solution together and most people don’t want to do that,” Lougheed said. Businesses are in the market for a more polished and integrated monitoring suite, he said.
NodeFly just put its APM solution — built from the ground up for Node.js specifically — into open beta so developers can try it out. Other APM suites support multiple languages but may not offer the best full-on support for Node.js itself, NodeFly said. New Relic is working on a Node.js agent.
NodeFly this week netted $ 800,000 in seed money from some pretty choice backers including Issac Roth, the man behind the Makara Platform as a Service, which has morphed into Red Hat OpenShift. Roth also spent time at Wily Technology, a leading APM provider acquired by CA — so he knows the market.
Shasta Ventures led the funding round which also netted contributions from Irfhan Rajani of Appneta, Paul Rochester of Sun Microsystems and Layer 7, and Dimitri Sirota, also of Layer 7.
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