I was thinking about backend development with javascript. I came across several options like express, koa, sails, hapi, adonis and many more.
I have experience working with Django and Rails so I prefer something like sails.js which require minimum boilerplating yet has amazing community and support? Has anyone figured it out yet?
I tried Koa, Hapi, Restify but finally came back Express. It has the most mature community and is very robust.
Depends on what you want to achieve. There is no "one solution fits all". Go ahead and give some of the options a try! Then make a decision based on your project.
Personally, though, I do not see much merit in a simple HTTP/MVC wrapper + router, like express. It's just as easy to write the VanillaJS. I even came across some statistics which show just how slow express really is (I wrote about it in my HNO). That's why I work on a custom solution which fits me and my needs, namely tooling, security and scalability.
I think Zend framework is best. The reasons for that are:
Its a long-awaited update to a venerable part of the PHP ecosystem.
Although Zend libraries are too big, we can call only those we need to in order to avoid load on project.
Class names map with the file path.
Have many components to use
Integrate with anything you want (eg Doctrine)
Meteor