php vs coldfusion vs asp?

matteorr

So what is the difference between coldfusion and php and asp?

mzanimephp

First off, all three of these server-side languages have one simularity. They can operate embedded within HTML, also the author can jump between HTML and ASP/PHP/Cold Fusion along with a database to create dynamically generated web sites.

-- ASP -- (Active Server Pages)

ASP is the Microsoft version of server-side scripting. Usually, pages with .asp extension have some dynamically generated areas within their content, or backend. ASP pages utilize ActiveX scripting, or VB script, inorder to function.

When a browser requests an ASP page, the Web server generates a page with HTML code and sends it back to the browser. So ASP pages are similar to CGI scripts, but they enable Visual Basic programmers to work with familiar tools.

-- PHP -- (PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor)

Most scriptors will tell you that PHP is the UNIX euivalent of ASP. PHP is more widely used, because it supported by multiple platforms, and MANY databases. Also, unlike Microsoft's ASP, PHP is completely free, and MUCH easier to use, in my opinion. (To use ASP, you have to BUY it, plus it only works on Windoze servers.)

In more detail, PHP script (similar syntax to that of Perl or C ) is enclosed within special PHP tags. PHP can talk across networks using IMAP, SNMP, NNTP, POP3, or HTTP.

-- ColdFusion -- (ColdFusion MX)

ColdFusion was originally developed by Allaire Corporation (now merged with Macromedia) that includes a server and a development language designed to integrate databases and Web pages. This is about all I know.

I'm not sure what the advantage is by using ColdFusion over PHP, but perhaps someone else does?

coditoergosum

ASP sucks, coldfusion is better, but not great, PHP is the closest thing to greatness that we have right now.

ASP is bloated and slow. To do the same thing in ASP, than with PHP, you're going to write about 3 times as much code... especially if you're doing database stuff. Plus ASP is slow... any benchmark will show you about a 2-3 times performance gain in PHP. Besides, as mzanimephp noted, ASP will only run on windows... and only in IIS (as far as I know you can't setup apache to use it... although, there are 3rd party ASP solutions, i.e. chilisoft). If you're going to be running any kind of high traffic site, and if you need any kind of security at all, you're going to hurting if you try to do so with windows/IIS/ASP.

As far as coldfusion is concerned, it's good, but not great. It has awesome database abstraction, even better than PHP, but it has limitations elsewhere. Besides, it's also proprietary. We should all know that proprietary is not a good thing. First of all, it's expensive. Second, it's slow to develop. Open source provides for a much better environment for rapid development. It might take the open source community a week to come up with a cool new feature, whereas a development house could take a year to brainstorm, perform a feasability test, study market analysis, develop, and then test that same feature.

I've gotten into this same argument with ASP and coldfusion developers, and it always ends up in a code war... and I always win. Behold the power of PHP.

Here's a good article that compares php and asp: http://php.weblogs.com/php_asp_7_reasons