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1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. 2. Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain. 3. Nonsense. You might

by tych0 14y ago

1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. 2. Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain. 3. Nonsense. You might as well say that everyone should use C because it was the first language with a TCP socket API. 4. Nonsense. You can fuck up royally in any language. 5. Irrelevant. The only framework that matters is the one you end up using. Pick a good one and stick with it. 6. For some valuation of "best". Other popular web frameworks and languages also have very good documentation. I'll give PHP the benefit of the doubt on this one, since I don't really know. 7. Again, lots of blogs for other languages too. Also, many PHP blogs are full of shit code (as are many other blogs). Generally, you know what you're doing or you don't. Unless you're reading a type theory blog, you're not going to magically become a good programmer by reading blogs. 8. No experience with PHP's community, but again, lots of other languages have good communities. 9. Lots of other languages integrate with everything too. These last four bullet points aren't really "PHP is good" but just "popular languages have lots of libraries", i.e. tautologies. 10. Heh. 11. So does everything else. Not a strong point in PHP's favor. Color me unconvinced.

skylan_q 14y ago
The documentation for PHP is great. But in order to do many useful things in PHP, you really, really need the documentation. FWIW, I don't find other solutions hinging their success on documentation as much as PHP.
streptomycin 14y ago
> 1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. Or use the one that Facebook open sourced.
MichaelGG 14y ago
For performance, not even Facebook levels. If you're having "scaling" issues that benefit from fast executing code (as opposed to a massive dataset management issue), PHP isn't really that fast at all. So why would you want to throw away CPU cycles when there are expressive languages that have a fast compiled representation, too? I value dev productivity over performance in most cases, but it's silly to try to make a performance argument for PHP.
- Kudos 14y ago
  Couldn't the same be said of any interpreted language.
dglassan 14y ago
1. Pretty sure Facebook is the only one hitting Facebook levels. Facebook is an outlier, don't use this as an example to invalidate his entire point. 2. There are great PHP programmers...just because you're writing something in PHP doesn't mean your code sucks. There is a ton of crap PHP code, but not all. Ruby and python also have their fair share of terrible developers and shitty code.
Domenic_S 14y ago
> 1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. Facebook levels of load would be a great problem to have. Until then, who cares? > 2. Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain. Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable. > 3. Nonsense. You might as well say that everyone should use C because it was the first language with a TCP socket API. You missed the point. Writing a web app with a language that's basically tied to the web makes sense. It's not the most important point, but it isn't 'nonsense'. > 4. Nonsense. You can fuck up royally in any language. He said as much in that point. Did you bother reading and thinking about the article, or just trip over your own drool racing to the comments section? I'm just going to stop here. Color me unimpressed.
- argv_empty 14y ago
  Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable. An unmaintainable codebase makes it hard to deliver working software in the future.
  - slantyyz 14y ago
    So programming in PHP means that your code base will be unmaintainable?
    - argv_empty 14y ago
      You'll have to talk to tych0 about that. I'm just responding to the idea of setting aside maintainability in order to produce working code.
    - chc 14y ago
      No, deciding not to hire good programmers means that your codebase will be unmaintainable. Next time, maybe try reading the thread before commenting? Here's the discussion up to this point: OP: "If the event that my new ventures grow and I need to hire on more programmers I do not need the best and brightest to get the job done." tych0: "Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain." Domenic_S: "Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable." argv_empty: "An unmaintainable codebase makes it hard to deliver working software in the future." You: "So programming in PHP means that your code base will be unmaintainable?"

by tych0 14y ago

skylan_q 14y ago

The documentation for PHP is great. But in order to do many useful things in PHP, you really, really need the documentation. FWIW, I don't find other solutions hinging their success on documentation as much as PHP.

streptomycin 14y ago

> 1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. Or use the one that Facebook open sourced.

MichaelGG 14y ago

For performance, not even Facebook levels. If you're having "scaling" issues that benefit from fast executing code (as opposed to a massive dataset management issue), PHP isn't really that fast at all. So why would you want to throw away CPU cycles when there are expressive languages that have a fast compiled representation, too? I value dev productivity over performance in most cases, but it's silly to try to make a performance argument for PHP.

Kudos 14y ago
Couldn't the same be said of any interpreted language.

dglassan 14y ago

1. Pretty sure Facebook is the only one hitting Facebook levels. Facebook is an outlier, don't use this as an example to invalidate his entire point. 2. There are great PHP programmers...just because you're writing something in PHP doesn't mean your code sucks. There is a ton of crap PHP code, but not all. Ruby and python also have their fair share of terrible developers and shitty code.

Domenic_S 14y ago

> 1. Until you hit facebook levels and have to write your own interpreter. Facebook levels of load would be a great problem to have. Until then, who cares? > 2. Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain. Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable. > 3. Nonsense. You might as well say that everyone should use C because it was the first language with a TCP socket API. You missed the point. Writing a web app with a language that's basically tied to the web makes sense. It's not the most important point, but it isn't 'nonsense'. > 4. Nonsense. You can fuck up royally in any language. He said as much in that point. Did you bother reading and thinking about the article, or just trip over your own drool racing to the comments section? I'm just going to stop here. Color me unimpressed.

argv_empty 14y ago
Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable. An unmaintainable codebase makes it hard to deliver working software in the future.
- slantyyz 14y ago
  So programming in PHP means that your code base will be unmaintainable?
  - argv_empty 14y ago
    You'll have to talk to tych0 about that. I'm just responding to the idea of setting aside maintainability in order to produce working code.
  - chc 14y ago
    No, deciding not to hire good programmers means that your codebase will be unmaintainable. Next time, maybe try reading the thread before commenting? Here's the discussion up to this point: OP: "If the event that my new ventures grow and I need to hire on more programmers I do not need the best and brightest to get the job done." tych0: "Sure, but your code will also suck and be hard to maintain." Domenic_S: "Doubtful, but this isn't even a good point. Working software is the important deliverable." argv_empty: "An unmaintainable codebase makes it hard to deliver working software in the future." You: "So programming in PHP means that your code base will be unmaintainable?"