Comment by macleginn
4 hours ago
"A modern web application typically puts a web server like nginx in front and reverse-proxies to an application server written in another language like Ruby, Python, Go, or Rust. That always felt a bit strange to me: you essentially have two web servers, and one of them is also responsible for your business logic." -- Is the fundamental difference here that the business-logic binary is not always running but gets spun out with each request? This looks like a relatively minor thing, to be honest.
I meant to express the layers of abstraction feel strange to me in a typical setup.
A typical setup today looks like:
nginx -> puma/unicorn/gunicorn/etc -> your code
With cgi that middle layer is gone. It's just:
nginx -> your code
The layer reduction is nice when it comes to things like debugging. You don't have to guess if the middle server is removing a header, failing to forward a header, etc.
It's obvious who does that with cgi.
Yes, this makes sense. Although you will probably have to implement at least some of the middle layer's functionality, which means (at least for me) roughly the same level of debugging complexity when coming back to your own code later.