Complete Google App Engine + Backbone.js + Require.js Todo list Web App Example

Based on the work of Thomas Davis (http://backbonetutorials.com/) and Jérôme Gravel-Niquet (http://jgn.me).

Presentation and a code walkthrough can be found here: http://www.slideshare.net/ronreiter/writing-html5-web-apps-using-backbonejs-and-gae

Introduction

Here you can find a fully working example of a Todo list web app which uses REST API to communicate with its back end. The app uses:

• Google App Engine (Python) for its back end
• Backbone.js for the MVC framework
• Underscore.js for templating and Backbone.js
• Require.js for modularization
• R.js build script for JavaScript minification & bundling

This web app can teach you a lot just by reading the source code. It's a great boilerplate to start heavy web apps, which require a back end and modularization. For example:

• How to implement a simple Todo model, and a REST API interface using Google App Engine in Python
• How to configure Backbone.js to sync with a back-end
• How to configure Require.js and use Backbone/Underscore/jQuery as AMD modules
• Templating using underscore.js - conditionals and HTML escaping
• Loading text files and using them as templates using Require.js
• MVC programming using Backbone.js
• Building a distributable, minified and optimized app using node.js

Getting Started

To build the app, download node.js from http://nodejs.org, and run the build script under "build/build".

Once this is done, you should download and install the Google App Engine SDK for Python here: http://code.google.com/appengine/downloads.html#Google_App_Engine_SDK_for_Python. After installing the SDK, you can run your app using the Google App Engine Launcher, and later on deploy it to Google.