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> somehow gets rid of the undeserved reputation That reputation is a competitive edge for companies and people who embrace PHP. They get shit done for the busi

> somehow gets rid of the undeserved reputation That reputation is a competitive edge for companies and people who embrace PHP. They get shit done for the business and grow revenue while the rest of the tech community is rewriting basic tooling for the 50th time in Rust on a Kubernetes-powered back-end with a React front-end powered by a GraphQL API layer.

keanebean86 6y ago
But the new stack is 12% faster!!!!* *We didn't re-run benchmarks after fixing edge cases
johnnycerberus 6y ago
I understand what you are trying to say but Kubernetes and React complement services written in PHP, the former can deploy and orchestrate them while the latter offers an option for SPA apps written in PHP. Also, Rust when written where it should be written, can enhance PHP services that require fast and secure components. But yes, trying to replace what PHP is good at (serving content) with Rust is not really the best thing to do.
- chrisweekly 6y ago
  "SPA apps written in PHP" huh? that sounds like a contradiction in terms.
  - johnnycerberus 6y ago
    You can have a PHP server rendered page that can hold multiple SPAs written in React, imagine a portal like Liferay where each portlet is its own React app. Or imagine Steam shop that is using React for some of its components, like its new chat system which is a SPA integrated into Steam network. * Yes, I should have said "integrated" in PHP instead of "written".
  - jagger27 6y ago
    Definitely a weird thing given PHP’s heritage. Of course it’s totally possible to write JSON API endpoints in PHP.
ratww 6y ago
I understand the sentiment, but historically there has been a lot more web-framework churn in PHP compared to other languages. The “framework du jour” and the set of best practices have changed way more often in PHP than in any other language, perhaps as much as, or more than Javascript.
- hu3 6y ago
  > I understand the sentiment, but historically there has been a lot more web-framework churn in PHP compared to other languages. That has not been my experience. When I used to work with that tech stack, the major framework choice only ever had 3 options: Zend Framework, Symfony and Laravel. From what I hear Laravel is the industry leading and there's no sign of that changing. Sure there are other less popular frameworks just like in other languages. > The “framework du jour” and the set of best practices have changed way more often in PHP than in any other language, perhaps as much as, or more than Javascript. PHP have had a published standard specification for framework and component interoperability for long time now: https://www.php-fig.org/psr/ https://www.php-fig.org/psr/
  - ratww 6y ago
    > That has not been my experience Sure, but this is not about personal experience, but rather about history. Maybe it just happened before your time? Also, please read my reply in context. Pretty much every other language that's similar in purpose and popularity is provenly more stable regarding framework popularity than PHP. Sure it feels great to bash Rust and Kubernetes or whatever like the GP poster did, but PHP suffered from the same problems until very recently, whereas Python, Ruby, Java and C# among others did not. Even Javascript has been historically more stable in the backend than PHP: it's been pretty much just Express from almost the beginning, and other contenders never reached much popularity.
ptero 6y ago
PHP allows folks without a strong background to solve some simple business problems which, in general, is a good thing. But once the project exceeds a certain complexity threshold (which I admit many business problems never do), this approach hits a wall: things break and fixing it breaks more things and it is an uphill battle to move in the right direction. Adding a significant new capability -- forget it. To make things worse, this cannot easily be fixed because the implementation is a hodge-podge of ideas and functions. You cannot find good architecture people who want to work in PHP to clean it. It cannot easily be re-architected because it captures a lot of business wisdom. And business people (rightly) suspect pitches for a new built-from-scratch solution: sure, it will be fast and maybe it will be reliable; but will it solve their problem? will employees need to be re-trained? etc.
- new_guy 6y ago
  That's not the languages fault, it's the incompetence of the people trying to use it.
  - ssalazar 6y ago
    Ah, “you’re holding it wrong.” Good languages make it easy to build and maintain robust, scalable, and secure solutions to problems.
- altdatathrow 6y ago
  Facebook ($750B), Slack ($15B), and Etsy ($15B) would beg to differ. But whatever, your arrogant, gatekeeping and elitist mentality is primarily a roadblock for your own career growth.
  - ptero 6y ago
    Wow, chill. I do not know what part of my post you reacted to, but to clarify, I do not mean that professional software engineers working on PHP are unskilled. What I meant was that PHP and its frameworks allow business person to solve simple problems without hiring a good software developer. Which is OK in many cases, but when this fails to work, it fails hard in a way that is both painful and difficult to quickly address.

keanebean86 6y ago

But the new stack is 12% faster!!!!* *We didn't re-run benchmarks after fixing edge cases

johnnycerberus 6y ago

I understand what you are trying to say but Kubernetes and React complement services written in PHP, the former can deploy and orchestrate them while the latter offers an option for SPA apps written in PHP. Also, Rust when written where it should be written, can enhance PHP services that require fast and secure components. But yes, trying to replace what PHP is good at (serving content) with Rust is not really the best thing to do.

chrisweekly 6y ago
"SPA apps written in PHP" huh? that sounds like a contradiction in terms.
- johnnycerberus 6y ago
  You can have a PHP server rendered page that can hold multiple SPAs written in React, imagine a portal like Liferay where each portlet is its own React app. Or imagine Steam shop that is using React for some of its components, like its new chat system which is a SPA integrated into Steam network. * Yes, I should have said "integrated" in PHP instead of "written".
- jagger27 6y ago
  Definitely a weird thing given PHP’s heritage. Of course it’s totally possible to write JSON API endpoints in PHP.

ratww 6y ago

I understand the sentiment, but historically there has been a lot more web-framework churn in PHP compared to other languages. The “framework du jour” and the set of best practices have changed way more often in PHP than in any other language, perhaps as much as, or more than Javascript.

hu3 6y ago
> I understand the sentiment, but historically there has been a lot more web-framework churn in PHP compared to other languages. That has not been my experience. When I used to work with that tech stack, the major framework choice only ever had 3 options: Zend Framework, Symfony and Laravel. From what I hear Laravel is the industry leading and there's no sign of that changing. Sure there are other less popular frameworks just like in other languages. > The “framework du jour” and the set of best practices have changed way more often in PHP than in any other language, perhaps as much as, or more than Javascript. PHP have had a published standard specification for framework and component interoperability for long time now: https://www.php-fig.org/psr/ https://www.php-fig.org/psr/
- ratww 6y ago
  > That has not been my experience Sure, but this is not about personal experience, but rather about history. Maybe it just happened before your time? Also, please read my reply in context. Pretty much every other language that's similar in purpose and popularity is provenly more stable regarding framework popularity than PHP. Sure it feels great to bash Rust and Kubernetes or whatever like the GP poster did, but PHP suffered from the same problems until very recently, whereas Python, Ruby, Java and C# among others did not. Even Javascript has been historically more stable in the backend than PHP: it's been pretty much just Express from almost the beginning, and other contenders never reached much popularity.

ptero 6y ago

PHP allows folks without a strong background to solve some simple business problems which, in general, is a good thing. But once the project exceeds a certain complexity threshold (which I admit many business problems never do), this approach hits a wall: things break and fixing it breaks more things and it is an uphill battle to move in the right direction. Adding a significant new capability -- forget it. To make things worse, this cannot easily be fixed because the implementation is a hodge-podge of ideas and functions. You cannot find good architecture people who want to work in PHP to clean it. It cannot easily be re-architected because it captures a lot of business wisdom. And business people (rightly) suspect pitches for a new built-from-scratch solution: sure, it will be fast and maybe it will be reliable; but will it solve their problem? will employees need to be re-trained? etc.

new_guy 6y ago
That's not the languages fault, it's the incompetence of the people trying to use it.
- ssalazar 6y ago
  Ah, “you’re holding it wrong.” Good languages make it easy to build and maintain robust, scalable, and secure solutions to problems.
altdatathrow 6y ago
Facebook ($750B), Slack ($15B), and Etsy ($15B) would beg to differ. But whatever, your arrogant, gatekeeping and elitist mentality is primarily a roadblock for your own career growth.
- ptero 6y ago
  Wow, chill. I do not know what part of my post you reacted to, but to clarify, I do not mean that professional software engineers working on PHP are unskilled. What I meant was that PHP and its frameworks allow business person to solve simple problems without hiring a good software developer. Which is OK in many cases, but when this fails to work, it fails hard in a way that is both painful and difficult to quickly address.