What is Nest js and should I use it?

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Overview

I am currently working on a Nest js project for a large enterprise company. Before using Nest I used Java for all of my web services. After experiencing Nest, I feel that it is superior to my old Java ways and want to share my reasons why. By the end of this article, you will have a 10,000-foot view of what Nest js is and if it is right for your next project. Let's get started:

Nest was developed by Kamil Myśliwiec and was designed as a framework to rapidly build server-side applications. Myśliwiec was heavily inspired by Angular and it shows in the structure of a Nest application. The Angular inspiration can be seen with its use of controllers, providers, modules, and pipes. All of these fit into a folder structure that looks similar to how an Angular application would look.

Pro’s of Nest

A beauty of Nest is that it has positioned itself at a unique crossroad of front end and mid-tier development that many languages have struggled to find. For any Java Spring developers Nest will feel great out of the box. The framework is very annotation-driven with everything from endpoints to Swagger documentation being generated from them. A lot of the nasty Node.js and ugly JavaScript has been hidden by these annotations and the results are delightful. The annotations don’t just benefit migrating mid-tier developers though, front-end developers will be surprised at how clean endpoints look compared to Node and the annotations make developing simpler all around.

The folder structure in Nest is heavily based on Angular. This allows for minimal downtime when first designing a Nest service. Components get their own folders, with an application module and main file residing in the root(plus some extra configuration files). This structure is as simple as it sounds and allows more attention to be paid to the design of endpoints and their consumers, instead of application structure.

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As the cherry on top, Nest uses the latest and greatest version of TypeScript. The use of TypeScript helps ensure that Nest will remain relevant in the rapidly changing JavaScript…