Question

Does scalatra use circumflex behind the scenes (or vise versa)? What are the key differences between them, and which one would you use?

Both frameworks are inspired by Sinatra and from a glance look identical.

Request routing with scalatra:

class ScalatraExample extends ScalatraServlet {

get("/date/:year/:month/:day") {
  <ul>
    <li>Year: {params("year")}</li>
    <li>Month: {params("month")}</li>
    <li>Day: {params("day")}</li>
  </ul>
}

Sample code in circumflex:

class Main extends RequestRouter {

get("/posts/:id") = "Post #" + uri("id")

}
}

Answer 1

Ross A. Baker, one of the Scalatra developers, has recently commented on the difference between Circu,flex and Scalatra:

They are superficially very similar,
though I think each has its strengths.
Here are some differences that I see:

Templating: Scalatra integrates with
Scalate, Circumflex integrates with
Freemarker.

Routing: Circumflex has nicer sugar
for header matching, but Scalatra lets
you match on arbitrary booleans (i.e.,
global flag for site maintenance)

ORM: Circumflex has one, Scalatra
doesn’t. I know of Scalatra users
using Squeryl, Querulous, Scala-Query,
ORMBroker, and, yes, Circumflex-ORM.
These integrations are trivial, and I
assume would also be trivial with
Circumflex.

Auth: Scalatra has an auth module in
its latest snapshot, Circumflex does
not.

i18n: Circumflex has sugar for message
bundles, Scalatra does not.

Testing: Scalatra also includes a nice
DSL for testing; I’m not aware of
anything similar for Circumflex.