PHP is wonderful as a thin layer of glue between your database and the web browser. It's when you write a thick middle layer that PHP gets unwieldy. Business l

PHP is wonderful as a thin layer of glue between your database and the web browser. It's when you write a thick middle layer that PHP gets unwieldy. Business logic: Don't write it in PHP. Write it in PostgreSQL. Authentication: Don't write it in PHP. Use Apache 2.4's mod_auth_form. Replace hundreds of lines of PHP code with a few lines of Apache config. When it gets to your PHP script, all that's left to do is read $_SERVER['REMOTE_USER']. Authorization: Don't write it in PHP. Use one of Apache's modules (LDAP, DB, or even file) or if possible make your users all very restricted database users and use database permissions more. Don't need a database? Then why not handle it all on client-side JavaScript? I'll admit that my advice fits well with CRUD web apps. If you're doing something else, PHP may be gross. But really, my goal in programming (don't always reach it) is for PHP to just make a simple database call and wrap the result in HTML. If you're doing 123 == '123foo', can you move that up into the database or down into the browser? If you're writing elaborate class hierarchies in PHP, I think you're doing too much in PHP. I write a few functions, if needed, but mostly move all data processing to the database or browser.