ASP or PHP?

include_me

Hi there,

I know this may be a bit of a biased question to ask on this forum 😉 BUT! Im going to university next year and they are teaching ASP.NET as a module in there course.

I have been doing PHP for 1 and a half years now and love it to pieces. But Out of oppinion what do you all think will be the best language that will be a big part of the web?

shall I start learning ASP aswell or just stick to PHP?

hmmmm
Chris 🆒

toplay

Learn ASP .NET as well if you care about the job market and what corporate employers usually need. As long as there's Microsoft around, there's going to be a push by employers to use ASP .NET.

I have seen slow changes where some corporations are actually using more open source stuff. However, I think in part that's because they're thinking with their pocket book than actually liking the open source alternative. They just want to save on license costs to lower their budgets.

In my area, there's quite a bit of employers now looking for PHP/MySQL programmers.

Good luck.

laserlight

But Out of oppinion what do you all think will be the best language that will be a big part of the web?

English, or maybe Chinese, or maybe XHTML.
Really, 'best language' depends on the situation, and there are many technologies that are a 'big part of the web'.

shall I start learning ASP aswell or just stick to PHP?

You should start learning ASP.NET, or avoid that module if you dont want to learn it.
As far as I know, ASP and ASP.NET are not the same thing.

LoganK

You're correct, ASP and ASP.NET are not the same thing. However, I'd advise to at least learn one of them, that way you can handle almost 99% of dynamic sites, and you don't have to worry about incompatibilities.

pohopo

I would forget ASP as it is dying very fast. The main use is for legacy systems. I would learn ASP.NET though as it is growing. And in .NET you can pick your languages in which I would go with C# (another flavor of C++).

kakki

if you'll specialize on one language only, you get really upset, if it'll die
( and every computing language will die ........ someday )
.... i had to relearn a full language, 'cause i specialized on turbo-pascal
( in the early days, before delphi ) ....
so i think its better to get along with some languages and focus on general knowledge,
that you can transfer to other languages .....
if you have "to get deeper" into anything, don't try to use any new, hyped
computer-language, because:
- the api may change( beta release ) and your knowledge will be useless
- all the new features don't have to be implemented perfectly, so the api may change .....
( see point above )

try something that is "stable" to the industry-grade, like java, c++, c .....
in web-programming, its all the same( ok not every time but like 90% of the time )
get some parameters, connect to a db, print output .....
you can do that with nearly every computer-language(i tried c,perl,java before i "met" php)
you'll only have to find your best "weapon of choice"

Roger_Ramjet

You need tp be T-shaped to be any use in the long run. That means that you have to have really in-depth knowledge in at least 1 language or technology, and a more general understanding across a broad front of other languages and technologies.

execute

In the peril of the night a few questions crawl to my brain:
How is ASP.NET different from PHP?
What can ASP.NET do that PHP cant? :X
What can PHP do that ASP.NET probably can't.
Is PHP becoming the most used web-language, or is asp still wide-spread?
Why would u name it ASP.NET if its so different from ASP?
what is .NET? i thought it was just for MSN instant messanger.

Just some dumb noob and hard questions that prolly will never be answered 😛

LoganK

execute wrote:
In the peril of the night a few questions crawl to my brain:
How is ASP.NET different from PHP?

ASP.NET is Microsoft-funded, and costs money. PHP is community, open-source, and free.

execute wrote:
What can ASP.NET do that PHP cant? :X

Support for various objects that Visual Basic has; can be programmed using a variety of languages.

execute wrote:
What can PHP do that ASP.NET probably can't.

Be free 😃

execute wrote:
Is PHP becoming the most used web-language, or is asp still wide-spread?

I think so.

execute wrote:
Why would u name it ASP.NET if its so different from ASP?

You answered your own question - it's very different from ASP.

execute wrote:
what is .NET? i thought it was just for MSN instant messanger.

.NET is Microsoft's name for a group of technologies for which they're trying to define standards. Try http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.NET for more info.

execute wrote:
Just some dumb noob

Yup 😃

execute wrote:
and hard questions that prolly will never be answered 😛

Nope.

mrfritz379

Something to take into account is where you are located. In some towns/cities .net rules the world. Meaning if you're looking for a job and you only know PHP, you're screwed. Other places, however, will have more of a diversity in which case you're good.

The best solution, of course is as Ramjet said, be as well rounded as possible.

bbreslauer

PHP is a very beginner-friendly language. It can do some very powerful things (especially since PHP5), but it has a reputation for being for beginners. While this may or may not be true, it means two things: lots of web server companies (that don't exclusively do corporations) have PHP installed, meaning it is much easier for some random person to use PHP than ASP or ASP.NET as their language of choice. However, once you go into the corporate world, you'll find most everything is Microsoft-based, and they'll probably host their own servers, and probably won't use PHP, but instead ASP.NET or JSP. So there are plusses for knowing both.

I'll second kakki: If you only specialize in one language, then you'll have a hard time finding work. The best programmer knows lots of languages, and can do something a few different ways in each language.

pohopo

LoganK,

I first want to say I think you are a cool guy, however I cringed when I read your answers to the .NET questions. From your answers I can only conclude you have never used the language.

.NET is a framework for programming support in a wide variety of thin and thick client applications. It is not limited to the web like PHP. ASP.NET is the support for the web. And with ASP.NET you can code in a number of different full languages like C# (a flavor of C++) and VB.

To develop in ASP.NET using C# (or any of a number of other languages) is completely FREE. You can use notepad to create asp.net pages if you wanted. Microsoft even offers a free IDE tool you can use to create asp.net pages called Web Matrix.

Some nice advantages of ASP.NET is it is pre-compiled (MS provides the free compiler you need to use before you place it on the web), it has a comprehensive list of built in classes which make things like image editing and web services a breeze, and the language forces the seperation of the presentation and functional layer making life easier in the long run. What MS did was take all the best things out of Java and then made the hard things in it easier. MS really does not deserve that much credit for ASP.NET as it is not that original of an idea.

The big downside is that it only runs on Window Servers which is a major drawback for many because of reliability, cost, and hosting tends to cost more.

The advantages of PHP is it will run on almost any platform, many more hosts support it, and it allows you to break a great many good programming practices making it quick and easy to put up a page even if the code looks like a nightmare.

IMHO, if you plan to be a web developer I think you need to understand ASP.NET, PHP, and Java as they seem to be the three biggest ones right now.

LoganK

I know I've gotta reply to this...so without further ado, I give you, my response - to pohopo's response.

Enjoy 😉

pohopo wrote:
LoganK,

I first want to say I think you are a cool guy,

How nice! A compliment! 😃

pohopo wrote:
however I cringed when I read your answers to the .NET questions.

Unfortunate 🙁

pohopo wrote:
From your answers I can only conclude you have never used the language.

Also unfortunate, because completely false. I have used ASP before, and, although my .NET use is more limited than I'd like it to be, it's at the level that I need it to be at for me to be successfull in this dog-eat-dog world of website consulting.

pohopo wrote:
.NET is a framework for programming support in a wide variety of thin and thick client applications.

My answer is still true - .NET may be a framework, which can be considered "a group of technologies". And yes, Microsoft has implemented some of their own standards onto the .NET framework; I've seen many a time wherein something I create in the old Visual Basic 6 (when Microsoft was a semi-good company) will not compile in VB.NET, due to Microsoft's ever-changing standards.

pohopo wrote:
It is not limited to the web like PHP.

I did not say it was.

pohopo wrote:
ASP.NET is the support for the web. And with ASP.NET you can code in a number of different full languages like C# (a flavor of C++) and VB.

I mentioned that.

pohopo wrote:
To develop in ASP.NET using C# (or any of a number of other languages) is completely FREE. You can use notepad to create asp.net pages if you wanted. Microsoft even offers a free IDE tool you can use to create asp.net pages called Web Matrix.

That's all nice and dandy. However, I did not say that it costs money to develop in ASP.NET. It doesn't cost money to develop in ANY programming language in the history of programming. ANY language can be typed, and therefore, its being developed. It's the other components, such as compilers and interpreters, which cost money. In ASP.NET's case, it's IIS. IIS is the only webserver which will run ASP.NET. In addition, IIS is only available on Windows 2000/2003 Server (unless you count the morbidly stripped-down, 10-client-only version included with WinXP Pro), and guess what? Win Server 2000/2003 costs money. Now, leatherback may be on the with logic here, but even I can say that, through the transitive property, it will cost money to be able to utilize ASP.NET web applications.

pohopo wrote:
Some nice advantages of ASP.NET is it is pre-compiled (MS provides the free compiler you need to use before you place it on the web),

It doesn't need to be pre-compiled - you can run the code right from an ASP page.

pohopo wrote:
it has a comprehensive list of built in classes which make things like image editing and web services a breeze,

Which I mentioned

pohopo wrote:
and the language forces the seperation of the presentation and functional layer making life easier in the long run.

I've gotta agree with that.

pohopo wrote:
What MS did was take all the best things out of Java and then made the hard things in it easier.

Eh, I still wouldn't give it that much. I mean, there's a few things I've seen Java has that ASP.NET doesn't have (and also vice-versa, which is more understandable).

pohopo wrote:
MS really does not deserve that much credit for ASP.NET as it is not that original of an idea.

Well, .NET itself is a seemingly-original idea, and since ASP.NET is part of .NET, I give them some credit. But not a lot 😃

pohopo wrote:
The big downside is that it only runs on Window Servers which is a major drawback for many because of reliability, cost, and hosting tends to cost more.

Aha! Now you see my point about cost!

pohopo wrote:
The advantages of PHP is it will run on almost any platform, many more hosts support it, and it allows you to break a great many good programming practices making it quick and easy to put up a page even if the code looks like a nightmare.

It might allow you to break many good programming practices, but those who do so will never survive if they try to take their "skill" into the real-world...personally, I think that since it doesn't force you to make good code, it further separates the experts from the noobs because the experts will write good code whether the language requires it or not, while the noobs will write whatever works and not care about why it works, nor have any inclination to learn how/why it works.

pohopo wrote:
IMHO, if you plan to be a web developer I think you need to understand ASP.NET, PHP, and Java as they seem to be the three biggest ones right now.

A) I'm already a web developer. Do you think I'm 14 or something??
😎 I already understand the first 2 - the third is an obese monster destined to fall sooner or later.

Don't take anything in my post to be belittling/uncaring; it wasn't meant to. But sometimes I can seem that way, even when trying to explain something or defend my POV. 🙂

Shrike

Since we are nitpicking...

C# is not really anything like C++ - it's a rip off of Java
.NET has been ported to *nix (see Mono)

:evilgrin:

LoganK

Since we are nitpicking...

The port to .NET is obviously not Microsoft-endorsed, and no sane company in their right mind would use it to run .NET applications. "Open-source" scares management 😃

Shrike

Novell seems to be backing it.

LoganK

But Microsoft still isn't...and that's what scares management.

"Wait, I thought you said we're running some kind of Microsoft code-thing."
"Yes, we are."
"Then why are we looking at Novell."
"Because it's open-source, free, and better than Microsoft."
"But it's not Microsoft?"
"No."
"Get out."

Well, it didn't go exactly like that, but that's the kind of response you'll get from management. Or at least from the management I've worked with.

Shrike

You said:

no sane company in their right mind would use it to run .NET applications.

Which is clearly untrue. Of course Microsoft aren't going to endorse a rival product, but to say that anything which isn't Microsoft scares managers is naive. My company develops alot of Java apps for UK banks and building societies which run on Tomcat and Apache, use of a Microsoft platform has never been brought up.

Of course there are companies for whom Microsoft is an integral part, and they may be reluctant to change to a different vendor. I still think that is a perfectly sane business decision rather than a fear of open source software.

LoganK

Well, perhaps I ever-exaggerated my hyperbole, but the main point is still there - companies would be reluctant to use non-Microsoft-endorsed products to run Microsoft-code. I'd do it in a heartbeat - but they're just too scared of its possible "incompatibility" issues.

Jason_Batten

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