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Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

jacquesmattheij.com

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Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#41

Post by pron »

tikhonj wrote: post #17

I (naturally) think that the article's summarily dismissing Haskell is unfortunate. It's probably just the result of poor PR on Haskell's part. Haskell is not only for surpassingly intelligent people, or even optimized for them. If anything, it's the opposite: one of its core tenants is that we're not smart enough to reason about our programs in most languages. Much of the design work focuses on unloading complexity…

I think Haskell underestimates people's intelligence when it comes to things like mind-simulating state change in simple subroutines, and overestimates it when it comes to understanding lazy evaluation and monads. Humans had built useful structures long before they've been capable of rigorous abstract thought. How? By trial and error. Most people find it easier to learn how to catch a ball by practicing rather than by calculating its trajectory. I'm not saying that is always the right approach, but it does come more naturally to the human brain.

Haskell discounts the very useful choice of reasoning about your code after it runs, favoring, instead, all-upfront reasoning, often at the expense of facilitating the former. There are some domains where figuring everything up front is very important. Others, where trial and error is far more productive.

Trying unfamiliar things is very good advice, but not for an important project you want done relatively quickly, and which you'd have to maintain for years to come.

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#42

Post by psibi »

campezzi wrote: post #37
tikhonj wrote: post #17

I (naturally) think that the article's summarily dismissing Haskell is unfortunate. It's probably just the result of poor PR on Haskell's part. Haskell is not only for surpassingly intelligent people, or even optimized for them. If anything, it's the opposite: one of its core tenants is that we're not smart enough to reason about our programs in most languages. Much of the design work focuses on unloading complexity…

Do you recommend any framework for Haskell web development? I really liked toying around with the language, but I hit a brick wall when trying to build something "real" with it - it's hard to find decent guides that made the jump between the basics of writing functions, using recursion, etc and using the language on a full-on application. Given I have been working with web development in Ruby and PHP for years, I wou…

I have been using Yesod in my day job with great success.

It also comes along with a free online book: http://www.yesodweb.com/book

Other popular alternative is Snap framework.

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#43

Post by lmm »

jacquesm wrote: post #36
lmm wrote: post #34

I don't know what "MVC" means to this guy, but Wicket's approach is much, much better than any other framework I've used; you build your web pages out of objects, your component hierarchies out of object hierarchies, with actual encapsulation, reusability and composability. If that's not MVC then I don't want to be MVC.

Hi, I'm 'that guy'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_application_f... has a big fat 'no, modular event driven' in the 'supports MVC' column.

Well, I guess the question then becomes: what does MVC mean to that Wikipedia editor? And what is it you want to be able to do that you're trying to figure out by reading that column?

Once again, Wicket's approach is head and shoulders above every other web framework I've ever used. It's good enough to make me not mind using Java (I dearly wish I could find a framework with the same level of encapsulation in other languages). I urge you to examine it more closely rather than dismissing it based on this one line.

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#44

Post by coldtea »

CmonDev wrote: post #4

"I still haven’t forgiven Microsoft for their countless misdeeds so Asp/C#/F# are all right out." So Xamarin is Microsoft now? Better tell them, because they don't know it yet. Clojure is a .NET language as well by the way.

Talk about pedantic distinctions.

First, Xamarin might not be Microsoft, but those languages are developed and controlled (feature wise) by Microsoft, and are best used and more mature with the MS ecosystem. Plus, Xamarin works professionally with MS for quite some time (and a complete acquisition/acqui-hire isn't even that far fetched).

Second, Clojure is not used in .NET by anyone but 10 people. That port is if not abandoned, very near it. And even if it was, most Clojure/JVM software is rendered unsuable on the CLR. For all intends and purposes Clojure is 99.9% a JVM language first (and Clojurescript which is also not .NET).

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#45

Post by kanwisher »

lmm wrote: post #34

I don't know what "MVC" means to this guy, but Wicket's approach is much, much better than any other framework I've used; you build your web pages out of objects, your component hierarchies out of object hierarchies, with actual encapsulation, reusability and composability. If that's not MVC then I don't want to be MVC.

From users if most other modern mvc frameworks rails, django, asp mvc, spring. Mvc. I would say wicked is such a different paradigm and it's such a programmer centric view of web dev. Most websites aren't a set of components, unless you constantly make admin screens. Most of the major sites I've worked on have visual designers and they aren't so cookie cutter or recently they are single page apps that are more soa and rest oriented

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#46

Post by biokoda »

Saying you are on your own figuring things out with Erlang is false. The community on the erlang mailing list and IRC channel is extremely helpful, especially for people starting out.

Finding Erlang programmers is admittedly more difficult, but finding someone willing to learn Erlang is not too big of a problem. It's also not a big deal to learn Erlang, because the language is simple.

As someone writing Erlang code for years, the good parts of using Erlang far outweigh the bad parts.

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#47

Post by jacquesm »

lmm wrote: post #43
jacquesm wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, I'm 'that guy'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_application_f... has a big fat 'no, modular event driven' in the 'supports MVC' column.

Well, I guess the question then becomes: what does MVC mean to that Wikipedia editor? And what is it you want to be able to do that you're trying to figure out by reading that column? Once again, Wicket's approach is head and shoulders above every other web framework I've ever used. It's good enough to make me not mind using Java (I dearly wish I could find a framework with the same level of encapsulation in other la…

Ok, point taken, I'll add Wicket back in. This thread is a goldmine of good information so far, I spent a full 2 days researching all this and it would have been absolutely impossible to evaluate all framework/language combos by writing a test app so I had to take some shortcuts. Apparently that caused a good framework to be thrown under the bus for all the wrong reasons so I'll revive it and we'll see how it does in the real world. Thank you!

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#48

Post by citricsquid »

jacquesm wrote: post #39
radio4fan wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laravel isn't going away, even if Taylor gets hit by a bus. There's a huge and active Laravel community, it's just that Taylor is the benevolent dictator. If Taylor was hit by a bus, there would be plenty of others who would be willing and capable to take up the baton. Seems to me pretty remarkable to rule out Laravel on this basis, yet keep CakePHP, ignoring all its other flaws.

Excellent input, thank you!

fwiw http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=Laravel%2C%20symfony%...

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#49

Post by Joeboy »

biokoda wrote: post #46

Saying you are on your own figuring things out with Erlang is false. The community on the erlang mailing list and IRC channel is extremely helpful, especially for people starting out. Finding Erlang programmers is admittedly more difficult, but finding someone willing to learn Erlang is not too big of a problem. It's also not a big deal to learn Erlang, because the language is simple. As someone writing Erlang code f…

> Finding Erlang programmers is admittedly more difficult

Presumably if you are an Erlang programmer, that is a plus point.

Re: Choosing a Web Framework/Language Combo for the Next Decade

#50

Post by porker »

timdev2 wrote: post #26
porker wrote: post #16

The other consideration needs to be "How did this mature framework evolve?". Symfony dumped all symfony1 users up s * creek when Symfony2 came out; Zend framework 2 is an entirely different beast to ZF1... Are these mature frameworks any more stable than the new ones, or are they new frameworks, phoenix-like in assuming the name of the old one?

As far as those two frameworks, it's mostly about retaining brand recognition. On the other hand, major version releases are when you make such dramatic departures from what's come before. At least in ZF, they got a lot a lot of things more-right. I moved a (pretty complex, line-of-business transactional-type) project from ZF1 -> ZF2, and I'm happy I did. Some things changed a lot (dispatch, routing, forms), while ot…

With the OP looking for a framework where he doesn't have to rewrite the code every few years (or more frequently, hello Drupal), major version upgrades matter.

I'm glad that transitioning your project from ZF1 to ZF2 was worth the effort and relatively easy. I have a number of clients still on symfony 1.4 because although unsupported and a 'dead' system, without a straightforward migration path to Symfony2 it doesn't make economic sense for them to do so - not when the whole web system (CMS, order management, the rest) is written using symfony 1.4 and Doctrine 1.2. Until it stops working, as it's going to be a new build either way.

I think that kind of framework dead-ending is fairly irresponsible; certainly some of my clients thought I was irresponsible to have chosen Symfony when their 1-2 year old systems needed to be rewritten...

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