Is Firebase an all-purpose database?

Question

I've been reading about Firebase and playing with it for a short while. The idea (BAAS) and implementation are impressive, and having programmed with Javascript it seems a viable choice. Not having to deal with scaling and other server side concerns makes it even more attractive.

My question is: generally speaking, is Firebase a first class back-end candidate for any average data-based application? e.g. billing, CRM, e-commerce, social, location based, etc. I do not include super light or heavy extremes such as a basic chat, or a nuclear plant monitor...

The answer may not be a clear yes/no, but was it built to support the general application space, or just stand out as a real-time read/write data service?

Would appreciate answers based on experience and existing production applications.

Thanks

Solution 1

Yes, Firebase is intended to be a first class back-end for any data based Web, iOS or Android application. The service offers real-time data reads and writes, but also comes with a powerful and flexible security system that allows you to write secure client-only apps, without needing any server code to enforce data boundaries.

There are several apps in production listed on the front page as customer and on the app showcase page on https://firebase.google.com/customers/

Solution 2

Firebase is now more capable and is considered as a full stand-alone back-end, especially after the introduction of cloud function. https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/

Solution 3

Firebase may not have support for transaction spanning multiple business objects. e.g. When a sales order is booked then it needs to update inventory for multiple items, update billing in receivables, give sales credit to multiple sales persons etc. Firebase team is supposed to come up with a database trigger option which will make all these happen.

Comments

[brescia123]

But if my app doesn't have to be real-time it make sense to use firebase? Thanks @anant

[Anant]

It may still make sense to use Firebase if you'd like a simple way to persist data from apps / web pages without having to write a lot of backend code. The real-time-ness is just a bonus, but you don't have to rely or use that part of it.

[Bhargav Bhanderi]

@Anant : we are planning to build market place system using firebase as back end, so just wanted to know is it good idea to go with firebase OR NoSQL will be good choice instead.

[KarolDepka]

Update on this: multi-path atomic writes were recently added: firebase.com/blog/2015-09-24-atomic-writes-and-more.html