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As another startup in Atlanta trying to hire good PHP developers, I can sympathize entirely with MailChimp on this one. I have been searching for months for loc
by apinstein 15y ago
As another startup in Atlanta trying to hire good PHP developers, I can sympathize entirely with MailChimp on this one. I have been searching for months for local PHP developers with experience doing TDD or other agile/modern practices and it is extremely difficult. If you are one, please feel free to contact me.
I think good TDD/agile/architecture cultures are more prevalent in ruby/python but as those languages have become more mainstream the quality of the average dev in those environments has dropped quickly. A few years ago only really good devs ventured into ruby stuff. Now everyone is trying it as the tools have made the language much more accessible for the average developer. I am seeing more and more programming mistakes in the ruby code I dive into than I used to.
Language choice doesn't matter too much from a technical perspective. It matters from a practical perspective. Consider the jQuery/prototypejs war. Prototypejs was technically superior for a long time, yet due to jQuery's more accessible plugin culture and prettier web site they were over time able to build a more robust community and took the mindshare lead in the js space. I still think one of the core reasons ruby/rails and python/django got big is that for a long time there was only one major framework available for the language and this caused a better community than the php landscape, which pre-dated frameworks by a long time (this happened to perl as well). So there wasn't "one true way" in php to build apps quickly, and this hurt the php community when rails got big. I think as a community we lost a lot of talent to ruby/rails in the last few years.
Bottom line is that accessibility, pervasiveness and low-learning-curve are critical to the initial and continued success of any platform, whether it's a language (ruby > php > perl), OS (ios > android > rim), etc.
Language advances in PHP (circular gc, traits, closures, etc) have brought php's language capabilities forward enough that it's a respectable platform for sticking with. However, you can't fix the community really since it's so fragmented. Fortunately some frameworks are getting enough traction to have rich ecosystems, and that's definitely a great thing for the language and the community.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- simonw 15y ago"Prototypejs was technically superior for a long time" Can you expand on that at all? What made Protoype technically superior?
- mnutt 15y agoThe enumerables prototype took from ruby were really nice. I always liked being able to do things foo.map(function(p) { return p.length; }); jQuery's $.map felt clunky in comparison. (this is all with the understanding that prototype adding methods to standard objects was dangerous...)
- apinstein 15y agoIn addition to the functional programming techniques it offered (which are now handled by underscore in the jQuery landscape) its selector was much more performant than jQuery's for a long time.
- troels 15y agoHave you tried hiring good devs and then let them learn php, rather than narrowing your pool of candidates by only considering good devs who know php well? I mean, the latter may be preferable, but the former will often do.
- apinstein 15y agoI have not yet resorted to that. My concern (which is possibly unfounded) is that it would take significant investment before the productivity gain made it worth it. Then you have the risk that a newly trained person would leave the company as well. Also, I am not sure that a good developer from another language (like ruby/python) would consider using PHP on a day-to-day basis due to the perception of php as a crappy language.
- joshdev 15y agoIt's really not a bad way to go. You may still get reactions like you've come to expect from developers, but a sign of a good developer is whether after having that knee jerk reaction, they start asking about your technology choices and how you've implemented things. Essentially you want a generalist who is technology agnostic and is willing to roll up their sleeves and get to work in any codebase. PHP isn't that different from other languages and after a week spent learning the nuances with a little training help they should be able to be productive.
- mattm 15y ago〉 I have been searching for months for local PHP developers with experience doing TDD or other agile/modern practices and it is extremely difficult. If you are one, please feel free to contact me. I believe I meet your criteria but can only work remotely. I am currently looking so if remote is an option please let me know and I can send you more details.
- randomdata 15y agoThe funny part is that when Rails and Django were rising to fame, it was argued that PHP was the better choice because finding developers to maintain the code in the future will be easier. Now that we are here, it seems it didn't turn out that way at all. Goes to show you should choose technology for technical reasons and technical reasons alone.
- JoeCortopassi 15y agoIf you are looking for developers, how should they contact you?
- apinstein 15y agoPlease reach out to me, I'd love to chat. I'm not sure what is the most proper way to do that in an HN thread. I am apinstein on GitHub or check out tourbuzz.net contact page (feel free to call).
- JoeCortopassi 15y agoEmail sent to your @mac address