Comments on: A pro-PHP Rant

By: janebush08

janebush08 — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 09:40:59 +0000

Truly, exceptional post, nicely written.. thanks... php application development

By: ambien

ambien — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 00:35:53 +0000

Article Opinion

By: HatoriHanzo

HatoriHanzo — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 15:27:05 +0000

php guys please read this true:spaghetti-code is a result of spaghetti-mind also true: i cannot understand the features of a "better" language, so i stay with my spaghetti (Sapir-Whorf) true:java needs more memory than php not true: java is slow look here ask yourself: why is php so easy to learn?

By: Optimus

Optimus — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 10:04:10 +0000

balzac’s got it – I just got through finding out that the PEAR string translation / internationalization module doesn’t support CJK if you’re using a database with it. Despite scanning through hundreds of pages of (mostly auto-generated, of course) documentation, Googling, and spelunking through the code of the package itself, doing all my due diligence, somehow that didn’t seem to get mentioned. Sure, it’s still in beta (though that’s quite de-emphasized too – I didn’t find out until I went to install it, and it’s the only package of this kind mentioned in the PEAR Manual) but “Oh, by the way, the Internationalization support leaves out a third of the world’s population” would have been nice to know.

And as Faruk Ates said in response to Tim Bray’s root article there, “…a lot of skilled PHP coders have become incredibly elitist and rude.” If so it comes from the top – PHP.net, not a single web-based forum or even a link to a web-based forum? All discussion is done through USENET newsgroups. Not too welcoming to the newcomer, if you ask me – not only is it a pain in the butt to go dig up a newsreader, but of course for the rare individual these days of what the USENET is, there no explanation whatsoever. Much less a screencast or anything like that, God forbid. Keeps the rabble out, you know.

But oh, the news server does convert your smilies into little gif images when you post. Gee, thanks guys.

By: Levar Berry

Levar Berry — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 19:22:52 +0000

.. Geez o pete’s. What a a bunch of cry babies in here.

Let’s get real here…. how many of you have ever release a product that had bugs, that you had to come and fix later. I bet everyone on this list has made mistakes and/or fighting some right now. No fault of what Lang you’re using but just honest mistakes or situtions you didn’t test for. Why get all worked up over what Zend, Sun, or Microsoft puts out if it doesn’t work in YOUR situation.

GET OVER IT!

If ASP.net works for you… so be it. If you think Java is faster, who the freak cares! All of this talk is subjective and has many variables… and many of you make very vague statements that have no meaning.

For example.. many of you say PHP is good for smaller projects. Define small! Is small in the number of features, is small the user base, is small the number legacy or remote systems it must depend on? 50K users with a small feature set is still a good PHP setup. 20users on a HUGE feature would still be a good for PHP. I’ve been on a lot of projects… and 9 out 10 times… The IT department or Tech lead makes the project more complex than it should be.

And about Unicode in PHP6, yet another .. who the freak cares… about 1% of you have to worry about other non-english chars. If this is problem… Don’t use PHP its just that simple. I don’t understand why smart people have such a hard time figuring out simple problems. Everybody here knows more than one language… and this is why!

Bottom line.. the point of the article is to Learn to use the RIGHT tool. Don’t be a moron and complain about something in Lang A that works well in Lang B. USE Lang B then ya loon!

By: balzac

balzac — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 18:54:14 +0000

I find the PHP documentation to have a lot of errors, or stuff like PEAR is just plain buggy.

For instance, I needed form data validation. I used ereg and it failed. Hmmm. I took an example from and tried another from php.net with the same result. So, I tried the latest PEAR Validate module. The email validation randomly failed. Yes, random. WTF? I also made a logger which reported an error in the module. Great testing, thx!

So, I go back to ereg for naother round and discover IT WILL NOT WORK WITH DOUBLE QUOTES. Yup. The docs show expressions in double quotes, but it FAILS to evaluate. Single quotes? Worked.

I find a lot of this type of crap in PHP and other strange behaviors, and it’s unacceptable.

If the core runtime can’t be fully trusted( sorry, 95% stability doesn’t cut it in my world ) and the code from supposedly top notch places like PEAR can’t be trusted, then perhaps it explains why PHP’s detractors feel as they do.

By: Geoffrey

Geoffrey — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 02:33:33 +0000

Well many arguments to and against PHP, what really sucks the most is that most of the arguments against PHP, can be played agains most other languages.
As a PHP, Java and Delphi Programmer. Delphi is good for enforsing structure, and is clean, and great with plug ins with a fast GUI environment. and people may use it as an argument to say that PHP code is messy, unstructured etc, but mark my words, Crap programing, messy structures in not a fault of the Language, it is a fault of the programmer or development process and procedures. I have seen and Debugged other peoples code in many languages, and seen some real crappy implementations, but not always the Programmer fault, usually the fault of the Busines modals, who get new programmers to add or change functionality in code wrote by another Developer in the past, and not allw time for the new developer to learn how it is structured, and do it write.
So those idiots who are Against PHP, are in most cases the cause of most of the bad code in all Languages.

By: q2x1k3JQNn

q2x1k3JQNn — Thu, 06 Jul 2006 01:59:33 +0000

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By: Anurag Misra

Anurag Misra — Tue, 04 Jul 2006 18:16:56 +0000

Nice article and some nice comments. In my opinion, all languages tend to borrow syntax and features from their counterparts every now and then. PHP borrowed from languages like Perl, C, C++ and others. Java borrowed a lot from C++. However its because of innovation why these languages are surviving. PHP introduced inline code which was later used by JSP, ASP and most other languages. Allaire Coldfusion used tags for scripting, which was either incorporated or supported in most languages.

PHP doesnt have the extensive frameworks or templating engines like Java or .Net has. However, its not because PHP is incapable of producing such frameworks, but because they aren’t the elegant solutions that the majority of developers want. In fact, I find these extensive frameworks to have a higher learning curve than the programming language itself.

Maybe until a simple solution comes out for the simple problems of code separation and scalability, we’ll keep arguing over petty template engines and frameworks.

By: PeterK

PeterK — Fri, 19 May 2006 14:29:22 +0000

Good article but the conclusions are a bit exaggerated. Best database access layer in PHP? Well, have you seen Hibernate? Best framework for WEB? Maybe PHP’s templating systems are good, but Java is not worse with Struts, Cocoon, Tapestry or Velocity. PHP5 object model? It’s just like Java without some features – generics and annotations. Are there any business rule engines for PHP like Drools? Can you have database connection pools, remote objects, object cache without implementing it all by yourself? Have you got any support for unit testing? Can you easily implement IOC concept in your application with any of PHP tools?
How do you manage to maintain a 1000+ files application written by 10 persons without packages/namespaces/modules or anything like that? Can you make a PHP webapp that runs anywhere, without a need to have a webserver (by using embedded webserver)? What about security? Can you run PHP in a sandbox and control exactly what it is allowed to do and what not?

One of the biggest advantage of PHP is its simplicity and easy learning curve. Great for beginners and small sites. I don’t think it sucks. But when you get more experienced, you realize there are lot of things in the world around you do not have in PHP. I don’t see any reasons why use PHP if I am already experienced in Java/C++/.NET.