Described is the history and evolution towards this architecture and the reasons that it is superior to previous efforts. Also provided is an overview of the most popular web application frameworks, covering their architecture and use. Numerous frameworks exist, but trying to evaluate them is difficult because their documentation stresses their advantages but hides their deficiencies. Here, the same application is built in six different frameworks, providing a way to perform an informed comparison. Also provided is an evaluation of the pros and cons of each framework to assist in making a decision or evaluating a framework on your own. Finally, best practices are covered, including sophisticated user interface techniques, intelligent caching and resource management, performance tuning, debugging, testing, and Web services.