i want to start server side script. But i dont know the one to choose. Which one do you suggest i should go for. I need ur advice please.

Well, If you are interested in learning php, you can enroll in my free online classroom - www.classes..net
I moved from asp to php - but i think they are both equally good language, but for newbies in this Nigeria, i will recommend PHP.
Yeah i know i may seem biased, but what else would you expect from a PHP expert? But still, i will say that asp.net is better.

ITT is better.

*dhtml:

Well, If you are interested in learning php, you can enroll in my free online classroom - www.classes..net
I moved from asp to php - but i think they are both equally good language, but for newbies in this Nigeria, i will recommend PHP.
Yeah i know i may seem biased, but what else would you expect from a PHP expert? But still, i will say that asp.net is better.

^@*dhtml, infact, I now have respect for you because of the bolded part. Other php users will not say that. I use asp.net (and trying to get used to the razor view engine). I have tried php but have not been able to use it very well. Maybe I will try your class.

@topic, I think it is easier to get help on php than asp.net, especially on Nland. I have asked two questions on nairaland that has to do with asp.net and up till now, no answers to it. Just go for the one you have more resources for but both are good.

Learn both if you can since they both do the same job. It's not easy predicting the future of both languages. Php seem very stable at the moment and works across platforms, while Asp.net is kind of limited to Windows, but rapidly evolving and unpredictable.

they both can do same thing, depends on ur experience with both

i will say php has the largest followers.

Thanks Ojukwu24,

It is for the same 2 reasons above that i said aspx is better, but if you are in Nigeria, you will get help with php more easily.
Between me and webdezzi, we will kill any PHP bug that dares to show his head up.

None is better than the other. They both have strengths and weaknesses. But the strength that PHP has over ASP.net is that it's easier to use and it has a large community of users. Infact, it's the most widely used scripting language. This has made susceptible to attack. On the other hand ASP is more secure considering the fact that some of the loop-holes in this language is kinda still a secret because it does not have the kind of follower-ship that PHP commands. That's why you notice that most serious and big corporations rather go for ASP.net, Coldfusion, JSP and other lesser known scripting languages just to be on the safe side. As for me and my family, we shall follow PHP.

If it were my option and no other, i'll go with asp.net

go for php, no doubts, just go.
Asp is dying.
Checkout the internet.
What percentage of those sites where done with asp?
Bro everything is php.
Everything php is free!
Here u have dreamweaver, there you have phpmyadmin
and up there u have a promising site.
Php is faster than asp, pls google it.
Php is better than asp, pls google it.
Php is more effective than asp, pls google it.
Php is growing faster than asp, pls google it.
I can now create mobile and desktop apps with php, pls ask me!
Pls dont look back, just go for php.

*dhtml:

Well, If you are interested in learning php, you can enroll in my free online classroom - www.classes..net
I moved from asp to php - but i think they are both equally good language, but for newbies in this Nigeria, i will recommend PHP.
Yeah i know i may seem biased, but what else would you expect from a PHP expert? But still, i will say that asp.net is better.

*dhtml:

Well, If you are interested in learning php, you can enroll in my free online classroom - www.classes..net
I moved from asp to php - but i think they are both equally good language, but for newbies in this Nigeria, i will recommend PHP.
Yeah i know i may seem biased, but what else would you expect from a PHP expert? But still, i will say that asp.net is better.

if asp is better
1. Why did u move to php?
2. Became an expert there.
3. Created all your sites in php.
4. Start a php classroom?
Your joomla in php, mambo in php, wordpress, os ticket, zen cart, wiki, drupal, your entirelife . . . And mine too! ?

First of all good peeps, ASP (better known as Classic ASP) is not the same as ASP.NET. They are totally different things altogether.
ASP.NET is as superior to ASP as a Mercedes Benz is to a bicycle.

On the other hand ASP and PHP are in the same group of poor technologies which are no better than JavaScript. Both are based on interpreted languages, e.g, the hideous VbScript for ASP (or even JavaScript --at this point, Beaf vomits--). Why would anyone want to write apps in a scripted language?
The case for PHP is even worse; it is the most insecure technology ever presented with a serious face. All a hacker (even a pimpled kid) has to know is that a site was built with PHP and they can be sure they will cart home the database long before nightfall. Thats what you call, useless technology.

There is no way to compare ASP.NET and PHP, its just ridiculous and annoying to attempt it. A better match would be ASP.NET vs Java or even C++ (for backend code).

Beaf, we're not talking about creating a stand a alone app. I think the poster meant a web app which PHP and ASP.net can handle very well.

afam4eva:

Beaf, we're not talking about creating a stand a alone app. I think the poster meant a web app which PHP and ASP.net can handle very well.

I'm talking about web apps. Both Classic ASP and PHP are damn useless and cannot be compared with ASP.NET. Dude, its like comparing an F-16 with a catapult.

Beaf:

I'm talking about web apps. Both Classic ASP and PHP are damn useless and cannot be compared with ASP.NET. Dude, its like comparing an F-16 with a catapult.

I totally disagree. You might have your reasons for thinking tASP.net is better than PHP. But saying they're incomparable is not only an insult  on PHP but to the thousands of developers who use PHP.

afam4eva:

I totally disagree. You might have your reasons for thinking tASP.net is better than PHP. But saying they're incomparable is not only an insult on PHP but to the millions of developers that call this language their friend.

The truth is bitter. I don't mean to insult anybody, but even if open source is the alure behind PHP, rather than prop up a badly designed and poorly concieved vehicle, PHP devs can migrate to more solid frameworks like python, Ruby, Smalltalk, Java etc.

PHP started as a Perl hack by someone who wanted an easir life with Perl and it still bears all the hallmarks of a hack. All other languages were purposefully designed with set goals and security in mind, even JavaScript. It is PHP's adhoc origins that make it the most hackable framework by far.

waoh, you guys are great. Security is my most concern. from what dhtml and others said i think asp.net can give me what i want but is difficult to get help when you have problem with asp.net than php. Thanks all. Am very greatful.

unclenna:

waoh, you guys are great. Security is my most concern. from what dhtml and others said i think asp.net can give me what i want but is difficult to get help when you have problem with asp.net than php. Thanks all. Am very greatful.

secu-what?
Dont even say that again.
Now lets roll heads.
Paypal - the worlds accepted merchant site was built with php.
Liberty reserve and all the other highly secure money exchange sites- php!
Facebook - built with php.
SMF(the app on which nairaland is running) - built with php.
Phpbb - no need to say, its already on the name.
Joomla - php
drupal(on which US govt website is runniing - php
name them, name them bro.

Now back here:
Beaf's project site - built with php.
All *dhtml's sites - built with php.

I can keep on listing.
@beaf
Go hack facebook, nairaland, paypal make i see.

@OP
bro dont say i didnt warn you.
ASP is bulky, and slower.
Has less community support.
Built buy microsoft (you know what it means? You gon pay pay pay)
i once saw on a site
windows hosting for 35GB is $99 per month!
While linux(for php) is $10!
Guy , no body they use asp now.

@Poster, how about you start by not asking these darn silly questions so many before you have asked and have only come to learn, the hard way, are irrelevant and moronic at best? Their is a place for ASP.NET, PHP, Classic ASP etc out in the market. You just need to learn whichever one you can( best you actually learn the basics of programming languages) so you are best able to adapt and learn whatever language, framework, scripting language you need to help you get the job done.


GOSH!!!! You folks need to stop creating these threads that keep clogging up this section and making it seem this is all programming is about.

Why is the @moderator allowing folks create these threads still? Instead block all news threads of this nature and force these folks to continue on already existing threads on the same exact issue/non-issue.

none is good, just invent your own!

@all, thank you very much oh. Am greatful.

Welll, php and web developers please create your profile of http://developers..net and to learn php visit www.classes..net
This is a very great thread really. And I believe nairaland runs on php too.

omo_to_dun:

@OP

The norm on this site, especially in this section, is that folks will tender their opinions without facts to back them up. But since they are opinions, they actually do not have to provide evidence to support them; however, given that we are programmers and not philosophers or historians, we owe it to others to carefully present our point of view without bias and without sophistry.

The following sites were built using PHP (wherever there is doubt, I'll provide a link)
[list]
[li]Facebook[/li]
[li]Yahoo Source[/li]
[li]Wikipedia[/li]
[li]Flickr Source[/li]
[/list]

The most popular CMS in the world---WordPress---uses PHP. Some other popular PHP-based CMSes---listed in alphabetical order---which are also noteworthy:
[list]
[li]Drupal[/li]
[li]Joomla[/li]
[li]Liferay[/li]
[li]Media Wiki[/li]
[li]Moodle[/li]
[li]Movable Type[/li]
[li]Pligg[/li]
[li]TYPO3[/li]
[/list]

As per security issues, this has more to do with the programmer's negligence or refusal to follow the best programming practices than innate design issues or weakness of PHP. I started learning PHP in August and I have created a site http://www/amebopost.com in PHP without using any CMS or WYSIWYG software. I invite anyone to steal my database or any of those sites listed above. Even nairaland relies indirectly on PHP since it was created using SMF, which in turn was created with PHP.

Professor Beaf has always vehemently denounced PHP, but he has yet to show us the databases of any PHP sites that he has gained unauthorized access to.

I will not say that PHP is better than ASP.net; I am much better than that. Only baby programmers do that. What I will say is that PHP has been tried and tested by programming gurus around the world and it has never failed them nor has it failed me. I will advise the OP to pick either and master it because that is what really matters---mastering a particular language rather than wasting time in arguing about who has the bigger [i]d[/i]ick.

Dude, all of those websites only present PHP as a front; they all run on a mix of other better technologies like Java and C++. PHP is too slow and buggy to even contemplate carrying the sorts of loads those websites come under without servers randomly blowing up before the huge meltdown. Lol!
Lets take facebook as an example, it runs on C++, not PHP:

HipHop for PHP isn't technically a compiler itself. Rather it is a source code transformer. HipHop programmatically transforms your PHP source code into highly optimized C++ and then uses g++ to compile it. HipHop executes the source code in a semantically equivalent manner and sacrifices some rarely used features — such as eval() — in exchange for improved performance. HipHop includes a code transformer, a reimplementation of PHP's runtime system, and a rewrite of many common PHP Extensions to take advantage of these performance optimizations.

http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/358/

The stuff below is even more detailed. Facebook runs on C++:

From various readings and conversations I had, my understanding of Facebook's current architecture is:
•Web front-end written in PHP. Facebook's HipHop [1] then converts it to C++ and compiles it using g++, thus providing a high performance templating and Web logic execution layer
•Business logic is exposed as services using Thrift [2]. Some of these services are implemented in PHP, C++ or Java depending on service requirements (some other languages are probably used, )
•Services implemented in Java don't use any usual enterprise application server but rather use Facebook's custom application server. At first this can look as wheel reinvented but as these services are exposed and consumed only (or mostly) using Thrift, the overhead of Tomcat, or even Jetty, was probably too high with no significant added value for their need.
•Persistence is done using MySQL, Memcached [3], Facebook's Cassandra [4], Hadoop's HBase [5]. Memcached is used as a cache for MySQL as well as a general purpose cache. Facebook engineers admit that their use of Cassandra is currently decreasing as they now prefer HBase for its simpler consistency model and its MapReduce ability.
•Offline processing is done using Hadoop and Hive
•Data such as logging, clicks and feeds transit using Scribe [6] and are aggregating and stored in HDFS using Scribe-HDFS [7], thus allowing extended analysis using MapReduce
•BigPipe [8] is their custom technology to accelerate page rendering using a pipelining logic
•Varnish Cache [9] is used for HTTP proxying. They've prefered it for its high performance and efficiency [10].
•The storage of the billions of photos posted by the users is handled by Haystack, an ad-hoc storage solution developed by Facebook which brings low level optimizations and append-only writes [11].
•Facebook Messages is using its own architecture which is notably based on infrastructure sharding and dynamic cluster management. Business logic and persistence is encapsulated in so-called 'Cell'. Each Cell handles a part of users ; new Cells can be added as popularity grows [12]. Persistence is achieved using HBase [13].
•Facebook Messages' search engine is built with an inverted index stored in HBase [14]
•Facebook Search Engine's implementation details are unknown as far as I know
•The typeahead search uses a custom storage and retrieval logic [15]
•Chat is based on an Epoll server developed in Erlang and accessed using Thrift [16]
About the resources provisioned for each of these components, some information and numbers are known:
•Facebook is estimated to own more than 60,000 servers [17]. Their recent datacenter in Prineville, Oregon is based on entirely self-designed hardware [18] that was recently unveiled as Open Compute Project [19].
•300 TB of data is stored in Memcached processes [20]
•Their Hadoop and Hive cluster is made of 3000 servers with 8 cores, 32 GB RAM, 12 TB disks that is a total of 24k cores, 96 TB RAM and 36 PB disks [20]
•100 billion hits per day, 50 billion photos, 3 trillion objects cached, 130 TB of logs per day as of july 2010 [21]

http://www.quora.com/What-is-Facebooks-architecture

@OP

I recently decided to make a career in programming and web application development, I've learnt (, and still learning) ASP.Net and have done some small projects with it. Currently I’m learning PHP although I’m yet to any project with it but I believe it has a lot of potentials. For my PHP *DHTML has been very helpful, you can check out the PHP classes from his site.

Although I may not be the most qualified to advise you, however, having worked in a number of enterprise environments and now being an entrepreneur, here are a few things I would want to say:

1)  Most (almost all) enterprises in Nigeria (Banks, Insurance companies, Pension companies-PFA's and Custodians, Telecoms, Breweries etc) run a lot of Microsoft based software (i.e.Active Directory, SQL Server, Office Suite, SharePoint, Microsoft Exchange e.t.c) and since ASP.Net is developed by Microsoft, it is much easier to develop web apps that leverage other Microsoft technologies, so often times integrating your ASP.Net apps with other Microsoft technologies is seamless.

For example, I recently built a small application for a PFA, the PFA runs MS Exchange and they've got Active Directory and SQL Server, it was most natural for me to build the application using .Net.

ASP.Net has got inbuilt models i.e. Membership, Role Management, personalization, Site navigation, Configuration, Webhpart and other models which have been designed to work seamlessly with Active Directory and SQL Server and makes your app development much easier. I can't imagine myself or anybody else for that matter building an application authorization and authentication targeted at Active Directory or SQL Server using PHP, that would be a hell of a task and may take days if not weeks to build, however, to achieve the same functionality in ASP.Net, it is just a matter of modifying two lines of code in Web.config or App config files.

So, what am I driving at? If you are building a web application to be used by an enterprise for example, ASP.Net or even Java may be most suitable for it and not PHP.

To drive my point home, InterSwitch, the pioneer transaction switching company in Nigeria has all their web applications (Quickteller, Webpay, Authopay, Paydirect e.t.c) developed with ASP.Net, these apps are powered by MS SQL Server back -end db so .Net is most natural for them to use and these apps have scaled quite well and they are being used by many people.

Another example is Computer Warehouse, re-sellers of Finacle Banking Software in Nigeria, most banks in Nigeria and other West African countries use Finacle and Computer Warehouse develops most web applications that integrate with the Finacle system using Java technology, Finacle is powered by Oracle Database and Oracle owns Java so you see the dependencies. I know we are not talking about Java here but I believe it's still related to the topic


2)  However, if you are developing a web application that is targeted at everybody across the globe, and your app is not going to be dependent on any other proprietary underlying technology, say you are building a Social Networking website that will give Facebook a run for their money, or you are building an online educational portal like *DHTML, Omo_to_dun and other Nairalanders are doing, or you are building a general purpose web portal for Classified ads, property listing, Group coupon, Business listing, photography, blogging e.t.c, then PHP may be a better option over ASP.Net. Enough has been said about all the major sites using PHP, our darling Nairaland is based on Simple Machine framework which is powered by PHP, and above all, the most popular sites in the world have at one point or the other used PHP. I need not say more.

Many reasons for the recommendation have been mention severally by previous posters viz:

PHP is free
PHP is open source
PHP has a large online community
PHP powers more website than ASP.Net
PHP has so many frameworks so you can choose the one best suited for what you want to do and adapt it
PHP is cheaper to host and support so you save more money
PHP seems easier to learn (well I cannot stick my neck on this, but from general opinion here)
PHP Most CMSes are based on PHP
PHP Compatible with more platforms
,
,

I believe there are others.


In conclusion, I'm not biased over one language more than the other, I really think it depends on what you want to do, end users of the application, your proficiency in your language choice amongst others. For me, I know ASP.Net more than PHP, I'm not yet a pro, my knowledge of ASP.Net is still intermediate, but I'm working towards becoming proficient in it. I'm a beginner in PHP and there's a project I plan to embark on soon that will be based on PHP, I know the project can be accomplished using ASP.Net but I do also believe that PHP is more suitable to use than .Net. I have decided to focus on the two languages and master them very well for future projects.


Question: Some people have mentioned that PHP is faster than ASP.Net, please can someone throw more light on this or provide some proof.  Speed is a major consideration when choosing a language over the other I believe?
And please the assertions above are only an opinion and may not be 100% correct, they are based on my little experience, but I they are open to criticism.

And please if you have a good ebook or document on PHP and Mysql for a Beginning, Intermediate and advanced learner, I would be very glad if you would kind enough to send them to success001 [at] yahoo [dot] com. I’m still a beginner but I’m eager to learn.

Thank you.

^^^Thank you very much jare, so people you don hear now, berra join my free PHP classrooms, i am working on adding video casts from youtubes as well to make it more interesting. And there are other web programming courses there as well. - www.classes..net

omo_to_dun:

@ Beaf
You still haven't proven that Facebook wasn't written in PHP. It was, but the more complex part (as per the article by the inventor of Hip-Hop, Haiping Zhao) is ultimately compiled to native code to reduce the load on the server. What about the others? Back it up please. I cannot take your word for it. And which sites have you gained unauthorized access to? I have the source code to the wiki platform---everyone does since it is open source--and it is entirely written in PHP. Have you hacked them? Since I am a newbie in Web development, have you hacked my site? What notable sites use ASP.net? Educate us please.

Do not say, "Dude, all the websites you listed, " and then show us no proof. Yahoo does not run Java, Flickr does not. Wikipedia does not. Where in the world did you get your information? Show us links. Anything please. At least, you did not contest the FACT that the most popular CMSes were entirely written in PHP.

By the way, Facebook started using HipHop in 2010. Before then it was simply PHP without any transformation. I don't need HipHop. Most folks do not since we don't get 400 billion page request per month!
So you see. The programmers at Facebook do not write C++ code. They write it in PHP. Then it gets transformed.

lol! I wish my quote had been released, but the spambot is a biased PHP lover.
Facebook developers make it quite clear that they only use PHP as a templating engine. The engine room is 100% C++ (and Java in a few areas).

I can't put in any links now, cos of that rubbish spambot, you just want me to be banned again . All you need do is google up "facebook web architecture" and all will be revealed. if facebook had been written in Java or C#, it wouldn't have needed any tranformation; those two beasts have the grunt to shoulder the burden, whereas poor lil PHP just buckles.

Before HipHop, facebook PHP talked directly to C++. Facebook has always run on C++ with PHP as a templating engine.

moderatorr:

secu-what?
Dont even say that again.
Now lets roll heads.
Paypal - the worlds accepted merchant site was built with php.
Liberty reserve and all the other highly secure money exchange sites- php!
Facebook - built with php.
SMF(the app on which nairaland is running) - built with php.
Phpbb - no need to say, its already on the name.
Joomla - php
drupal(on which US govt website is runniing - php
name them, name them bro.

Now back here:
Beaf's project site - built with php.
All *dhtml's sites - built with php.

I can keep on listing.
@beaf
Go hack facebook, nairaland, paypal make i see.

@OP
bro dont say i didnt warn you.
ASP is bulky, and slower.
Has less community support.
Built buy microsoft (you know what it means? You gon pay pay pay)
i once saw on a site
windows hosting for 35GB is $99 per month!
While linux(for php) is $10!
Guy , no body they use asp now.

Like I pointed out to Omo to dun, those websites are not running on PHP. They have their backends in proper technologies.
My guy, since I've been a member of NL, it has been hacked quite a few times. I wouldn't do it, cos I love the site.

. . .But here's a little unscientific research anyone could try, do this google search for SMF (which runs NL):

http://www.google.com/search?q=smf security#q=smf+security&hl=en&tbo=1&output=search&source=lnt&tbs=qdr:y&sa=X&ei=d0zbTtKWKoOatwf-mr3sAQ&ved=0CAgQpwUoBQ&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&fp=94ae66b5e87eee2a&biw=1424&bih=757

Then do the equivalent for an equally popular (and badly written) .NET forum software, YAF:

http://www.google.com/search?q=yet another forum security#q=yet+another+forum+security&hl=en&tbo=1&output=search&source=lnt&tbs=qdr:y&sa=X&ei=d0zbTtKWKoOatwf-mr3sAQ&ved=0CAgQpwUoBQ&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&fp=94ae66b5e87eee2a&biw=1424&bih=757

Which of the above links inspires more confidence at first glance?  The only problems you will see with YAF are from CCP replacing the authentication system with their own stuff which is not YAFs fault. With SMF on the other hand, the thing is being patched left right and center, because of security holes.

Paypal job postings always ask for C++/Java. Thats a clear pointer to what runs their backend.

As for Drupal, Joomla etc, those frameworks all have very weak security. Google it and see; anyone can walk into sites built on them.

Now this great thread is degenerating into argument threads again.
smashingmagazine.com is done with wordpress - that gets hacked everyday. It is one of the most popular blogs in the world, and ranks 571 in alexa ranking.
Any site that is not properly done will get hacked, even sites well done, with a good hacker will still get hacked. How many times have naser gotten hacked?
Sony hacked, even facebook self.