OT: Java vs PHP

Sun Jan 20 23:36:45 MST 2013

I was the one that mentioned waterfall and must disagree with some of what
you said.

I have seen many programs try and use java using agile methodologies, never
one that ended up being highly maintainable over the long haul.  Java's
strict typing and poor to mediocre introspection makes agile programming
almost impossible to pull off.

If you want to use an iterative style, you need a language that can support
it.  Both PHP and Java are very bad in this aspect.  Python is good, Ruby
is excellent.  Both languages allow you to properly inspect your objects
and extend them dynamically.  Java requires much too much plumbing to pull
this off.  Python will allow dynamic inspection of your apis and adjust to
changing conditions, but only Ruby allows you to extend a class to add
functionality without subclassing it.  It is these features that make
agile, TDD, and BDD programming possible.

I stick to earlier guns.  As you said, Java is great at the big commercial
project.  And your absolutely correct... that is why the big guys use it.
They have the staff to maintain it.  But looking at the OPs specs, I feel
that it will be far too much tool for what he is ready for.  Rails and
Django are frameworks that will have is project up and running quickly.

There was also someone who said Rails does not scale horizontally..  ummm
you know twitter is a rails app right?  And Puppet?  That comment was silly
and very inaccurate.

I have programmed for many years in PHP as well as Java.  I use both and
recommend them often.  The specs given by the OP though causes me to not
recommend this.  Rails and Django will make this project happen, and be
maintainable for the long haul given the environment he describes.  I lean
to rails because I like and am more comfortable with Ruby.  But Django is
also a fine tool that should work equally well if you are more Python
orientated.

If you have equal discomfort with Ruby and Python, Ruby borrows more
heavily from Small talk and Perl (like PHP) than Python does and therefore
may be easier for a PHP programmer writing programs in a OO and MVC style.

Kevin
On Jan 20, 2013 11:06 PM, "Bryan O'Neal" <
Bryan.ONeal at theonealandassociates.com> wrote:

> I am in agreement with Joseph
> On Jan 20, 2013 6:32 PM, "Joseph Sinclair" <plug-discussion at stcaz.net>
> wrote:
>
>> A little nervous jumping into the perennial language/platform
>> discussions, but here goes. (and please understand these are opinions,
>> based on my experience, nothing here should be interpreted as an invitation
>> to argue if X is better than Y; it isn't and it's not worth arguing about)
>>
>> There are more Java programmers than any other language or platform, at
>> least for the past few years.  Every college program I know of uses Java as
>> the language of teaching, so new grad programmers almost all can work in
>> Java (perhaps not very well, but they know the language and platform).
>>
>> If you're working on something quick, go with what you know.  It seems
>> that PHP is what you know already, so go with that.
>>
>> If you're building a larger system, then, if possible, start with
>> something open-source and modify to suit.
>> If you cannot start from an open base, then (given the options you
>> present) build in Java for a web application and use some of the thousands
>> of open libraries to help (the maven build tool does a great job of
>> managing dependencies).  There are many good reasons that Amazon is built
>> almost entirely on Java, as are many (if not most) other large commerce
>> sites and services.
>>
>> Be aware that, coming from a small-project background, you should expect
>> everything to take 5-10 times longer than you would normally estimate.
>>  You'll be building something bigger than what you're used to, and building
>> a large system to be high quality and maintainable requires a lot more time
>> and effort than a small project.  Also, if building in Java, get a real
>> expert in the platform (and I don't mean a "Spring expert") to provide
>> technical leadership; like any large platform there are many ways to do
>> things, and some will be far more maintainable down the line than others.
>>
>> I, personally (with exceptions, of course), tend to lean towards Java for
>> web-based systems (particularly if the domain lends itself best to a REST
>> SOA/ESB type architecture), C++ for locally-installed applications or
>> system-software, Python or Groovy to script things together, Javascript for
>> in-browser interaction, Scala or Erlang for high-throughput event-driven
>> and asynchronous MPI systems (e.g. AMQP services), and a grab-bag of other
>> tools when needed.
>>
>> ==Joseph++
>>
>> One final note (at the risk of starting a two-front ideology war). I saw
>> someone recommending Waterfall as a development methodology. This is a
>> recipe for failure, as proven over, and over, and over (in academic papers,
>> peer-reviewed scientific studies, and commercial results too numerous to
>> list) during the past 30 years. There are exceptions, but you're not
>> building a life-critical embedded system, you're building a web system.
>> Avoid Waterfall methodologies and start with a well-used agile methodology
>> (e.g. Scrum, Kanban, XP, etc...), try to stick to the methodology as much
>> as possible for the first year of using it.
>>
>>
>> On 01/20/2013 12:24 PM, keith smith wrote:
>> >
>> > Hi,
>> >
>> > I am in the process of planning a web project.� I'm thinking possibly
>> using Java.� To this point I have done all my web projects using PHP.� I
>> know there will be a learning curve.
>> >
>> > My main question is the availability of Java programmers.� It seems
>> there is a lot of PHP talent available for PHP projects.� I like that there
>> is a lot of availability of PHP programmer because that makes my apps
>> supportable if I move on or am otherwise not available.�
>> >
>> > I have not met a lot of Java programmers, so I assume they are not
>> available the same way PHP programmers are.� In other words I think I can
>> visit Gang Plank HQ and find a hand full of PHP programmers that I would
>> fee good about pulling into a project.� I'm not sure I can say the same
>> with Java programmers, however I have not paid much attention when it comes
>> to Java programmers.�
>> >
>> > You thoughts are much appreciated!!�
>> >
>> > ------------------------
>> >
>> > Keith Smith
>> >
>>
>>
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