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I think a lot of this (this being people like the person asking the question (probably)) comes down to the low entry bar for creating things with PHP. It's popu

I think a lot of this (this being people like the person asking the question (probably)) comes down to the low entry bar for creating things with PHP. It's popular because it's everywhere (I can't think of a shared hosting provider without it), and because it's popular I think it's where most newbies tend to gravitate to, I mean really who doesn't want to be with the "popular kids"? And that's not to say there are not some awesome PHP developers and PHP based projects out there, because there certainly are. But I think the fact that you can easily slop together some PHP code into a single PHP file and slap it on a shared web host and see your work in action very easily leads to the large number of new web developers using it. Which in turn continues the endless churn of more and more people choosing to try to pick up the language over something else that may be more suitable for what they're trying to accomplish. In the end I feel it just comes down to ease of deployment, low entry bar to getting something to work (even if it may not be the best way), and the large source of example code out there.

jmcdonald-ut 13y ago
A bit off topic: I agree that a lot of newbies tend to gravitate towards PHP. When I was 14 I wanted to program, and PHP had such a low barrier to entry that I was able to get coding without any configuration. No working in the shell, just writing a file and uploading it to a shared host. To be honest, starting with PHP and just going was a really effective way to get me hooked to programming. Eight years later, and I've worked with C++, Ruby, Java, and C# to solve various problems. After seeing what else is out there, and understanding that different languages solve different problem sets, I don't think I'll ever gravitate back towards using PHP if I can help it. Occasionally it's fun to look at some of my old code and cringe. I'm sure if I could find some of my old questions on various forums they would look a lot like the question that user asked.
ErikAugust 13y ago
That is also DHH's argument as well. I would add also that WordPress and Drupal being PHP based also drives the popularity of the language - almost making it the de facto language of the small business freelancer.
antidaily 13y ago
"popular kids" use rails. maybe "most popular among kids".
- JoshGlazebrook 13y ago
  PHP is Abercrombie, and Ruby is JCrew. Be popular!
  - scarmig 13y ago
    And Haskell is... the hair shirt?

jmcdonald-ut 13y ago

A bit off topic: I agree that a lot of newbies tend to gravitate towards PHP. When I was 14 I wanted to program, and PHP had such a low barrier to entry that I was able to get coding without any configuration. No working in the shell, just writing a file and uploading it to a shared host. To be honest, starting with PHP and just going was a really effective way to get me hooked to programming. Eight years later, and I've worked with C++, Ruby, Java, and C# to solve various problems. After seeing what else is out there, and understanding that different languages solve different problem sets, I don't think I'll ever gravitate back towards using PHP if I can help it. Occasionally it's fun to look at some of my old code and cringe. I'm sure if I could find some of my old questions on various forums they would look a lot like the question that user asked.

ErikAugust 13y ago

That is also DHH's argument as well. I would add also that WordPress and Drupal being PHP based also drives the popularity of the language - almost making it the de facto language of the small business freelancer.

antidaily 13y ago

"popular kids" use rails. maybe "most popular among kids".

JoshGlazebrook 13y ago
PHP is Abercrombie, and Ruby is JCrew. Be popular!
- scarmig 13y ago
  And Haskell is... the hair shirt?