How is Scala working for you guys? I am learning the language and trying to get it to catch on at my company (which uses a lot of Java but has really smart people who could pick up Scala easily IME).
Having almost finished Odersky's book, I've reached the conclusion that Scala is somewhere between (a) the best language out there, and (b) at risk of getting into over-complex C++ territory. I'd have to take it to 25,000 lines at least before I could have a reasonably useful opinion on it. It looks fun, though.
MongoDB: what are the advantages of it? How does that work out for you? "NoSQL" is interesting to me because I've never used any of those products. I worked at a company that tried to use sharded MySQL, which is pure hell if you want (a) anything more than a key-value store (because you're multi-sharding and have to keep consistency) and (b) performance at the same time.
Scala has worked out very well for us. We introduced a similar stack (Scala services backend "data switches" with various front ends using the APIs. For your Java team Scala will be a snap to pick up, and undertaking to master. But the nice thing about is everyone can be fully productive as more and more advanced techniques find their way into code. Scala code can be made overly complex in the wrong hands. So can Ruby and Python :)
A lot's been written about why Mongo, what are problems it is singularly suited to solving. At Bookish, we're using Mongo for a use case clearly not well-suited to a relational structure, where the ability to query by elements other than document key are essential. So far so good.
Bookish is hiring Scala and Rails engineers to work on a project that puts Reading Rainbow to shame.
Lots of interesting work around recommendations, big big data, ereading, and everything in between.
http://www.startuply.com/Jobs/Software_Engineers_Scala_Ruby_...