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PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

codinghorror.com

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Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#21

Post by sanswork »

cageface wrote: post #15
tolliator wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What in the world does language in which the site was made in has to do with success? They were never acquired for technology - in fact, go read about their setup on HA, it's very standard stuff. If you build a product that gets traction and solid user base with some viral aspect in step 2, you will sell - even if your app/site were made in QBasic.

This kind of careless, selfish attitude really pisses me off. If I walked into a doctor's office for an operation, saw a tray full of old rusty instruments, was told by the doctor that they were "good enough" and that I should just worry about the result then I would not only walk out of that office but also file a complaint with the hospital. If you're selling your services as a professional to clients you owe them…

Or your clients find it easier to find suitable PHP developers in which case you are doing them a disservice using anything else.

PHP isn't a good language but it's not so bad to be unusable. I think you're really overstating the problems with it.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#22

Post by it »

The article claims that YouTube is written in PHP. As someone who worked there, I can tell you it's not. YouTube is written mostly in Python plus some Go. Some of it is a mess, but that's beside the point.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#23

Post by [deleted] »

tolliator wrote: post #20
cageface wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of careless, selfish attitude really pisses me off. If I walked into a doctor's office for an operation, saw a tray full of old rusty instruments, was told by the doctor that they were "good enough" and that I should just worry about the result then I would not only walk out of that office but also file a complaint with the hospital. If you're selling your services as a professional to clients you owe them…

Are you serious? PHP is not "tray full of old rusty instruments". Please give me one concrete example what is wrong with a blog running on PHP. Or a small store? How is the END result differ between say Magento or something running on Django? Could you tell the difference? No, you could not. And while the PHP version would have been up and ready, you would still try to figure out how to properly run WSGI server in sh…

[deleted]

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#24

Post by JohnnyFlash »

it wrote: post #22

The article claims that YouTube is written in PHP. As someone who worked there, I can tell you it's not. YouTube is written mostly in Python plus some Go. Some of it is a mess, but that's beside the point.

You should have finished the paragraph

>> (Update: While YouTube was originally written in PHP, it migrated to Python fairly early on, per Matt Cutts and Guido van Rossum.)

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#25

Post by JohnnyFlash »

ngokevin wrote: post #7

Sure, Facebook and Wikipedia are built on PHP, and they serve to very many happy users. But are the developers very happy? PHP works, but for most cases, there are better solutions, and we should strive for better. Just because some sites were successful in doing it doesn't mean 'PHP sucks' isn't a valid argument.

I'm fairly happy as a PHP developer. It pay's the bills... there are times when I am presented with a mess which makes me want to shoot myself in the face. However I am sure such messes can easily be created in other languages. PHP has a history of Spaghetti code and when I was learning it mashing mysql, php and html into the same file was 'the way to do it'.

Today though PHP development revolves much more about OOP frameworks like Symfony and a good application structure.

The thing that bugs me most is inconsistency in core functions. Is it functionname or function_name. Is it ($needle, $haystack) or ($haystack, $needle). However, it is a minor annoyance negated by a decent IDE.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#26

Post by evoxed »

it wrote: post #22

The article claims that YouTube is written in PHP. As someone who worked there, I can tell you it's not. YouTube is written mostly in Python plus some Go. Some of it is a mess, but that's beside the point.

This was actually the reason why I started learning Python for web development. I can't remember how long ago it was, but I had spent months/years burying myself in PHP and hoping to see the light... after having a short affair with rails, Python was the language that called out to me from... eh, usenet probably. It seemed so simple and pleasant, yet with the performance to be powering the 'Tube.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#27

Post by JohnnyFlash »

cageface wrote: post #6
polemic wrote: post #3

Note that this is a response to: EDIT: refer https://twitter.com/#!/codinghorror/status/18957165652253491... - Jeff's 4 year old response is still valid. http://me.veekun.com/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-de... Jeff gets it right - the language is poorly designed, but it hasn't stopped PHP powering many of the biggest most important sites on the internet today. Banging on about the language's flaws [again] is…

This is the wrong way to think about it. Just because people can hop on one leg across the finish line doesn't mean that's a smart way to run a race. Ask yourself this: would the Instagram team have been as successful had they chosen PHP? I think not. Javascript is different because we're stuck with it for historical reasons but there are so many better choices on the back end that there is absolutely no excuse to st…

I would have thought Instagram would have been popular no matter what they used. People liked the product and functionality. They don't give two hoots about what is powering it.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#28

Post by ryannielsen »

Things that don't matter:

  - OS
  - Language
  - Compiler 
  - Runtime
  - Editor
  - Testing process
  - Deployment process
  - Bug management systems
The thing that does matter:

  - Building something successful that people want
Frankly, I don't care what language you used to build it. I don't care what shoddy infrastructure supports it. I don't care what hacks you put into place to scale that infrastructure. You know why? Because your customers don't care. They just care that the thing you built works.

So just build something successful that people want. And do it however you want.

Re: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn't Matter

#29

Post by sandwitch »

evoxed wrote: post #26
it wrote: post #22

The article claims that YouTube is written in PHP. As someone who worked there, I can tell you it's not. YouTube is written mostly in Python plus some Go. Some of it is a mess, but that's beside the point.

This was actually the reason why I started learning Python for web development. I can't remember how long ago it was, but I had spent months/years burying myself in PHP and hoping to see the light... after having a short affair with rails, Python was the language that called out to me from... eh, usenet probably. It seemed so simple and pleasant, yet with the performance to be powering the 'Tube.

do i understand you correctly - you found it harder to learn PHP because its so unorganized and inconsistent ,

and found Python easier to understand and learn than PHP ...

anyone else here with similar experience ?

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