I'm using Strawberry Perl, and in most cases I'm not using anything too complex or too UNIX-ish on Windows, at maximum I'm using fork. As for database, it's often SQLite DB (using Mojo::SQLite), there was once a project with database in DBF files, and now I'm writing a project with Firebird SQL server as a database (using DBD::ODBC and Firebird ODBC connector). Frontend is always some flavour of Vue.js.

To make things more like it's done on Windows, I'm using two files, START.CMD for starting whole project, which is:

@echo off
set PATH=perl;%PATH%
perl -Iperl\lib start_on_windows.pl "script/project"
pause
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Here's project structure:

[lib]                 
[perl]                 
[public]              
[script]
[templates]           
[uploads]
db.sqlite             
db.sqlite-shm
db.sqlite-wal         
init.sql
START.CMD             
start_on_windows.pl   
project.conf
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Here you see that I rewrite %PATH% variable. It's my Electron-like application harness, in perl dir there's a stripped Strawberry Perl with modules to run on other Windows machines.

Then there is starter perl script, start_on_windows.pl:

#!perl
use Mojo::Base -strict;

use Mojo::Server::Morbo;
use Mojo::Util qw(extract_usage getopt);

my $morbo = Mojo::Server::Morbo->new;

my $pid = fork();

if ($pid) {
    # PARENT
    $morbo->daemon->listen(["http://*:3000"]);
    $morbo->run(shift);
} else {
    # CHILD

    use Socket;

    my $host = 'localhost';
    my $port = '3000';
    my $timeout = 30;


    my $started = 0;
    while (not $started) {
        sleep 1;
        $started = portAlive();

    }
    system("start http://localhost:3000");

    exit; 

    sub portAlive {
        my $proto = getprotobyname('tcp');
        my $iaddr = inet_aton($host);
        my $paddr = sockaddr_in($port, $iaddr);

        socket(SOCKET, PF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, $proto) || warn "socket: 
+$!";

        eval {
            local $SIG{ALRM} = sub { die "timeout" };
            alarm($timeout);
            connect(SOCKET, $paddr) || error();
            alarm(0);
        };

        if ($@) {
            close SOCKET || warn "close: $!";
            print "$host is NOT listening on tcp port $port.\n";
            return 0;
        }
        else {
            close SOCKET || warn "close: $!";
            print "$host is listening on tcp port $port.\n";
            return 1;
        }
    }
}
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When Morbo server started, script will start browser with URL of project, and voila. Also, there could be no black CMD.EXE windows at all with wperl.exe + WebSocket + Mojolicious trick:

    $r->websocket('/bus' => sub {
            my $self = shift;
            $self->inactivity_timeout(1000);
            #$log->debug(sprintf 'Client connected: %s', $self->tx);
            my $id = sprintf "%s", $self->tx;
            $clients->{$id} = $self->tx;
            $self->on(message => sub {
                my ($self, $msg) = @_;
                for (keys %$clients) {
                    $clients->{$_}->send({json => {message => $msg}});
                }
            });

            $self->on(finish => sub {
                #$log->debug('Client disconnected');
                delete $clients->{$id};
                Mojo::IOLoop->timer(10 => sub {
                    my $loop = shift;
                    if (not scalar keys %{ $clients }) {
                        #$log->debug('No clients! exiting!');
                        exit;
                    } else {
                        #$log->debug('Have clients! not exiting!');
                    }
                });
            });
        }
    );
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When last client disconnects from WebSocket (browser window/tab with project closes) - server exits.