Certainly similar in concept. Other than the server-side language, the biggest difference seems to be how it saves the actual data. AA has file-based exports (csv, json, etc), not seeing a relational datastore (maybe Mongo?) – Directus is built on top of your custom-schema SQL database so it scales with large/complex datasets.

Also, while AA has a good set of simple features, Directus has comprehensive user management ACL, more robust file control, and is generally a bit more full-featured.

AA looks like a good option though, going to check it out in more detail! Thanks...