Ask HN: PHP as your secret sauce?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=785764

by icey • 17 years ago

5 5 17 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I was exchanging email with the founder of a somewhat notable startup yesterday and discovered they did most of their work in PHP. It was a little surprising for me to hear, given how much hand-wringing seems to go on about ever using PHP versus Ruby, Python, Erlang, Clojure, or really any other language.

But then I started thinking about it, a huge number of startups have gotten big using PHP. Facebook and Digg immediately come to mind.

I haven't used PHP since 1998, so I don't know the significance of the changes it's gotten over the past decade... but is it possible that PHP can be some kind of secret sauce?

Maybe simpler is somehow the key to getting things done faster?

PHP junkies - is it worthwhile to pick the language back up even today? Or is the momentum shifting to more modern languages?

vdibart3• 17 years ago

Ooo, this is total flame war bait.....You're making a lot of assumptions about what a "modern" language is here, but I wont' dwell on that : ) Suffice it to say you should give PHP another look, particularly in the context of some of the PHP frameworks that are popular these days (e.g. CodeIgniter, Zend, CakePHP, etc.)

I develop in Java for my full-time job and develop in PHP for my side projects. I enjoy PHP much more than Java. It's a tool, and as with every tool you need to understand how to use it effectively. Some people don't have the mindset that makes this possible, but for those that are willing to let their instincts take over (as opposed to the compiler) can find PHP to be very productive. That being said, I can't for the life of me understand how something as big as Facebook can be done in PHP, but I'm willing to assume those guys are smarter than I am.

icey• 17 years ago

Ack, I am sorry if this came off as flamebait in any way at all.

My point was just that I've fallen into the common trap of focusing on languages that are currently in the limelight; and maybe it's time to think about putting PHP back in to my toolbelt.

vdibart3• 17 years ago

Yes, I think that's fair and appropriate. PHP isn't necessarily sexy to many developers for a number of reasons (not a small part of it is the echo chamber effect), but it can be rewarding, productive, and performant. If nothing else, you'll have something else to put on your resume.

planck• 17 years ago

The language a website is written in is insignificant to its success. Outside of AND and OR, it's all syntax anyway.

vdibart3• 17 years ago

Agreed for the most part. It drives me crazy when people make absurd comments like "PHP doesn't scale". Besides the fact that there are plenty of examples of PHP sites that have scaled, it exposes a basic ignorance of modern software development. That being said, I wouldn't want to sit down and try to do all my development in Pascal because it also has AND and OR, but I think we all get the point.

Ask HN: PHP as your secret sauce?

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