AppJet is a new hosted application framework that’s part code editor, part persistent storage repository, part hosted application company. It roles all of these components into one, providing a complete end-to-end solution for would-be app developers.

Via the AppJet Introduction page:

An AppJet app is a server-side JavaScript program that runs when a request is made to the app’s domain (app-name.appjet.com).

Though AppJet is a server-side environment, the “core” JavaScript language is the same as you may be familiar with from the browser — the same strings, objects, arrays, dates, and so on.

Beyond the core language is our set of libraries, which make it easy to build a simple web app.

The example application is a Shoutbox which you can see live at shoutbox.appjet.com.

Another handy AppJet feature is the ability to “clone” an app. This allows you to bootstrap your own application from someone else’s code.

Facebook AppJets

The Compliment Machine is a complete Facebook application written entirely in JavaScript, running as an AppJet. You can see the source here.

After sneaking a peek at some AppJet source code, it’s a bit much to comprehend for the uninitiated. It would seem the most obvious first target for AppJets would be experienced developers (especially those familiar with JavaScript) who’d like to tinker around with a new framework such as this.

Before something like AppJet becomes the “Visual Basic for Webapps“, my initial reaction is that the syntax (JavaScript) might need to be tamed a bit, perhaps by some sort of Domain Specific Language (a la Rails). Video tutorials for JavaScript newbies would also go a long way.

It would also be interesting to see if some sort of Model-View-Controller pattern could be applied to AppJet code. As it stands now, most of the examples are contained entirely in one file of JavaScript. It will be interesting to see how AppJet evolves, especially as people begin to push the limits of the framework.