Timeline of Key Events

• 2009
  • Node.js created by Ryan Dahl (initially on macOS & Linux)
  • Initially used SpiderMonkey (Firefox’s JS engine) but later switched
  • Adopted V8 (Google Chrome’s JavaScript engine) for performance
  • Introduced Non-blocking I/O model
• 2010
  • Launch of npm (Node Package Manager)
• 2011
  • Added Windows support
  • Backed by Joyent and Microsoft
• 2012
  • Project lead passed to Isaac Schlueter (creator of npm)
• 2015
  • Node.js merged with io.js (a community fork)
  • Formed the Node.js Foundation
• 2019
  • Node.js Foundation merged with JS Foundation
  • Formed the OpenJS Foundation under the Linux Foundation
• 2020+
  • Node.js added stable ES Modules support
  • Major improvements in performance, diagnostics, and developer tooling
• 2023–2024
  • Active LTS releases (Node.js 18, 20)
  • Focus on better performance, security, and WebAssembly support

🔧 Why Node.js Was Created

• Traditional web servers like Apache HTTP Server use blocking I/O.
• Ryan Dahl wanted an environment with:
  • Non-blocking I/O for faster performance
  • Lightweight handling of concurrent requests
• Created web.js to demonstrate building a web server using JavaScript

⚙️ Core Components in Early Node.js

• V8 Engine: Executes JavaScript code at high speed
• libuv (not shown in image, but important): Handles the non-blocking I/O using event loop and thread pool

🧠 JS on Server