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Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

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Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#41

Post by nuclear_eclipse »

jrockway wrote: post #37
edw519 wrote: post #20

"What do you do when you can't stand PHP anymore?" Reevaluate what's really important to you. I love to program, but it's NEVER about the language. I know many of them, and AFAIC they all have their pros and cons. I suppose that if I was a "language-snob", I'd be "immensely bored" too, no matter which language I was using. So if it's not about the language, then what is it about? You already answered your own questio…

He's not being a language snob. It's just plain hard to write good code in languages like Java and PHP. You spend so much time fighting the language and tools that you barely have time to think about solving your client's problems. That gets boring and tedious, so I can understand why the OP is bored. (The fact that some people have tolerance for this stupidity is not worth arguing about. Some people enjoy digging di…

If you're fighting with PHP to create a webapp, PHP's best demain, then you're doing it the wrong way. I've been writing PHP apps for a few years now, and I contribute to multiple PHP webapp projects, and I'm never fighting the language. PHP is capable of doing just about anything that any other language can do; you just have to work with PHP and stop trying to make it act like Ruby or Python.

PHP has an absolutely enormous library, which makes just about anything possible in a webapp without needing much in the way of external libraries. Templating is a core feature of the language, and with a small bit of planning and a knowledge of how to employ PHP's strengths, you can get a lot done really quickly. Perhaps the biggest stumbling block is inconsistent naming and parameter schemes for the core library, but even that is just a simple lookup in the excellent php.net documentation.

If you're fighting your tools in their strongest domains, you're not using the tools correctly...

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#42

Post by tptacek »

jcapote wrote: post #40
tptacek wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Delivering work for paying clients in a vanity language because you're bored of PHP sounds pretty close to malpractice.

Not really. If you don't like working with a particular tool, any work that you do with that tool will be fundamentally substandard. So if the same results could be achieved with a better tool, then your work should also be better.

First, the difference between professionals and amateurs is that professionals stand behind their work even when they don't enjoy doing it.

But that's neither here nor there. If you can't stand behind doing work in a mainstream language, don't take those jobs, and accept that you're going to earn a fraction of what your peers do.

However, when you deliver product to people in a language nobody else uses, and implicitly recommend they deploy code in that language, and you do it because you're bored with PHP, and you pick the language you move to deliberately to mask the costs of using a less popular language by compiling it down to PHP, you're coming pretty close to screwing over your clients.

Happy to be wrong about this, though. I'll stop here.

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#43

Post by warhammerkid »

What framework are you using for your PHP work? If you aren't using a framework (because your work doesn't need one), then switching languages probably isn't going to change much, but if you are, there are several good, fun PHP frameworks out there. The best PHP framework I've used is Symfony (http://www.symfony-project.org/), which is actively developed, fun to work with, and really powerful.

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#46

Post by johns »

keefe wrote: post #23
vyrotek wrote: post #2

Asp.net MVC

What is the motivation for locking yourself into the micro$oft stack? Why not use Java with a javascript (jquery/yui/ext etc) front end or even (shudder) JSPs? Spring framework? Anything but .net lock in...

Can we grow up and stop using $ when referring to Microsoft?Most of us here are in business to make money, but no one is calling this site Hacker New$.

Now in regards to lock in. How is it different from any other stack? If I build something with ASP.NET MVC (which has the source available under the MS permissive license) I can run it on Windows or any machine running Mono.

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#47

Post by Zak »

tptacek wrote: post #31
juliend2 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that it's Exactly what i was looking for! Thanks a lot. I will definitely look at it! :)

Delivering work for paying clients in a vanity language because you're bored of PHP sounds pretty close to malpractice.

It does, but using haXe based on its merits isn't. It's not hard to find good reasons to avoid PHP as an implementation language; PHP is popular mostly because it's as easy platform for deployment. If a superior language[0] allows targeting that platform, it's a win-win situation. The obvious counterargument is that it makes finding developers harder, but I don't think that's the case. The Python Paradox applies here, and there are likely dozens of developers available who would jump at the chance to get paid to use haXe.

[0] I am not, at this point arguing that haXe is a better language than PHP. I don't have enough experience with haXe to make that claim, but it's not an especially high bar to clear.

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#48

Post by juliend2 »

warhammerkid wrote: post #43

What framework are you using for your PHP work? If you aren't using a framework (because your work doesn't need one), then switching languages probably isn't going to change much, but if you are, there are several good, fun PHP frameworks out there. The best PHP framework I've used is Symfony ( http://www.symfony-project.org/ ), which is actively developed, fun to work with, and really powerful.

I use mainly CodeIgniter. I tried CakePHP. I heard about symfony, though. If it's fun then i will take a look. Thanks.

Re: Ask HN: I can't stand PHP anymore. What else can I choose?

#50

Post by radu_floricica »

jrockway wrote: post #38
wooby wrote: post #24

If you're comfortable with Linux, an option for you is running a Linode or Slicehost ($20/month) and hosting your clients on it. This will give you total control of the hosting environment, and a residual income. You'll have plenty of horsepower for Rails or whatever else you want to use, and as you grow, you can buy more nodes. Beware, though: when you put on a system administration hat you're taking on a lot of new…

A basic $20/month Slicehost or Linode is probably going to be good enough for 2 "real" applications and maybe a few CGI pages, but not much more. The limiting factor is memory -- modern languages like to use a lot of it.

Remember the 80/20 rule. Most of the sites only have a couple of clicks per day. Right now we have around 15 sites and two rather heavy apps on a 512 slice. We always intended to upgrade it, but it turned out not to be the case. On a 256 slice we had all the sites confortably.

As for the few sites which get a lot of traffic... they should also generate a bit more income and an upgraded slice.

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