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PHP or COLDFUSION

Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!
Jul 17 '05 #1
60 9943

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


I don't know cold fusion and... considering this is a php newsgroup I don't
know how well you'll get an unbiased answer... however PHP is free and I
believe runs on alot more environments... I *think* coldfusion is limited to
a microsoft environment only... so while it (coldfusion) is popular I think
you'll find that PHP is just as popular (if not more so) because of its
cost, the availability of support, the documentation and the environments it
will run on. Before I got my Apache/Linux server running (on a
Pentium400mhz) I had Apache with PHP and MySQL on my Windoze98 266mhz
laptop. Migrating to a linux platform required little change...

I'm not anti-microsoft, but I think one is limiting themselves when they
pick up skillsets like ASP or VB because they are limited on their
platforms... and if you're going to teach yourself, they can be expensive
skills just to get them working in your own not-for-profit environment...

Hope that helps you decide...
laters
randelld
Jul 17 '05 #2
English Teacher <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote:
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?


Depends, but in doubt learn both.

JOn
Jul 17 '05 #3
>I *think* coldfusion is limited to a microsoft environment only.
ColdFusion supports Windows, Linux, Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, and now its on a
Java base you can get it to work on the Mac aswell.
Which is better to learn all depends on what you really hope to get at.
There has been a lot of talk around newsgroups which is the better server
side language with each corner putting up a good fight.

ColdFusion MX is built upon a Java pltform so you can now, with no effort
access Java libararys and you can also host .JSP pages as well as servlets.

If i was you, personally i'd learn both, theres no point being stuck to just
one language, you are just limiting yourself that way. For more info though
check out http://www.macromedia.com/software/coldfusion/ and
http://www.php.net and all the forums as they are littered with this type of
question

Andy Jarrett
www.andyjarrett.co.uk

Jul 17 '05 #4
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION?


Useful--- I don't know.

Cool --- PHP.

I have learnt few web scripting languages including Coldfusion, ASP, PHP...
But, only PHP attracted me well.

But, it seems Coldfusion programmers are paid higher than PHP programmers.

---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #5
My God, I can't believe you people are responding to these posts... LOL...

"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google.c om...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION?


Useful--- I don't know.

Cool --- PHP.

I have learnt few web scripting languages including Coldfusion, ASP,

PHP... But, only PHP attracted me well.

But, it seems Coldfusion programmers are paid higher than PHP programmers.
---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com

Jul 17 '05 #6
In article <gG****************@news.uswest.net>, "Todd L" <cu*****************@yahoo.com> wrote:
My God, I can't believe you people are responding to these posts... LOL...
*I* can't believe none of you guys trim the headers. This was crossposted to
three groups in the rec. heirarchy where it's off-topic. Please watch out for
crossposted troll posts, and trim irrelevant groups before you reply. Thanks.
"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google. com...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message

news:<b0**************************@posting.google .com>...
> Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION?


Useful--- I don't know.

Cool --- PHP.

I have learnt few web scripting languages including Coldfusion, ASP,

PHP...
But, only PHP attracted me well.

But, it seems Coldfusion programmers are paid higher than PHP

programmers.

---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com


Jul 17 '05 #7

"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google.c om...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION?


Useful--- I don't know.

Cool --- PHP.

I have learnt few web scripting languages including Coldfusion, ASP,

PHP... But, only PHP attracted me well.

But, it seems Coldfusion programmers are paid higher than PHP programmers.
---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com


not here
Jul 17 '05 #8
Did the name of the group change? rec.photo.computerlanguage?

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!

Jul 17 '05 #9

"Scott" <Wi*********@nono.com> wrote in message
news:nDelb.605619$cF.272466@rwcrnsc53...
Did the name of the group change? rec.photo.computerlanguage?

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


shhh
Jul 17 '05 #10

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?
Coldfusion is very easy to learn, due to it being tag based. For example to
query a database and display the results

<html>
<body>
<cfquery name="songlist" datasource="mp3">
SELECT title,artist,bitrate,genre,length FROM songs ORDER BY artist
</cfquery>

<table>
<cfoutput query="songlist">
<tr>
<td>title= #songlist.title#</td>
<td>artist = #songlist.artist#</td>
<td>genre = #songlist.genre#</td>
<td> bitrate = #songlist.bitrate#</td>
<td>lenght = #songlist.length#</td>
</tr>
</cfoutput>
</table>
</body>
</html>

the above code would carry out a query on the coldfusion data source mp3,
storing the results in a recordset songlist. It would then loop through the
recordset displaying the title,artist,genre,bitrate and length fields of
each record in the recordset.

This a pretty trivial example, but it illustrates how easy coldfusion is to
use

advantages of coldfusion:
ease of use
very good integrated text search facility (Verity engine)
based on J2EE (coldfusion converts cfm pages into java which are the run
using the J2EE engine)
integrates well with flash
includes a number of built in systems for generating form validation, charts
and graphs automatically

disadvantages:
the first time a cfm page is called, it has to be converted to J2EE, after
that if the page is called again it can be retrieved from the coldfusion
server's cache.
mainly MS based
coldfusion server is quite expensive
CF hosting tends to be rarer and more expensive than for PHP

Thanks!

Jul 17 '05 #11

"Richard Hockey" <ri***********@dsl.pipex.com> wrote in message
news:3f***********************@news.dial.pipex.com ...

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?
Coldfusion is very easy to learn, due to it being tag based. For example

to query a database and display the results

<html>
<body>
<cfquery name="songlist" datasource="mp3">
SELECT title,artist,bitrate,genre,length FROM songs ORDER BY artist
</cfquery>

<table>
<cfoutput query="songlist">
<tr>
<td>title= #songlist.title#</td>
<td>artist = #songlist.artist#</td>
<td>genre = #songlist.genre#</td>
<td> bitrate = #songlist.bitrate#</td>
<td>lenght = #songlist.length#</td>
</tr>
</cfoutput>
</table>
</body>
</html>

the above code would carry out a query on the coldfusion data source mp3,
storing the results in a recordset songlist. It would then loop through the recordset displaying the title,artist,genre,bitrate and length fields of
each record in the recordset.

This a pretty trivial example, but it illustrates how easy coldfusion is to use

advantages of coldfusion:
ease of use
very good integrated text search facility (Verity engine)
based on J2EE (coldfusion converts cfm pages into java which are the run
using the J2EE engine)
integrates well with flash
includes a number of built in systems for generating form validation, charts and graphs automatically

disadvantages:
the first time a cfm page is called, it has to be converted to J2EE, after
that if the page is called again it can be retrieved from the coldfusion
server's cache.
mainly MS based
coldfusion server is quite expensive
CF hosting tends to be rarer and more expensive than for PHP

Thanks!


shhhh
Jul 17 '05 #12
>disadvantages:
the first time a cfm page is called, it has to be converted to J2EE, after
that if the page is called again it can be retrieved from the coldfusion
server's cache.
The "compilation" hit is not so bad on CFMX61 (cf CFMX60, that is).
mainly MS based


I can only speak for our own clients, but they tend to want to go for
Linux (as do we, because - as we all know - Windows is flaky as
buggery).

We started on Windows servers because it's what we know, but now that
we've got a handle on Linux (well... kind of... enough for us to get
by, anyhow), we tend towards that.
I reckon prior to CFMX61, even though I'm a CF programmer, I would
have preferred PHP as a language. Now I'm not so sure.

CFMX60 was a bit immature, but the whole "sits atop of J2EE" was a
really excellent move, and it's pretty stable now on CFMX61 (for the
most part ;-). We do all our basic RAD stuff in CF, and for anything
more complicated, do it in Java. A nice combo.

Adam

Jul 17 '05 #13
ColdFusion runs on Unix/Linux, too. Not just Windows. It works fine with
either Apache or IIS.

It's a much more complete package. It works, right out of the box. It's much
easier to learn.

FWIW, I learned PHP before moving to ColdFusion. PHP has a lot going for it.
Much more useful than, say, Perl in a web environment.

But the differences between PHP and CF are enormous. Many things for which
you'd write mountains of code in PHP (or Java or Perl) are just a few clicks
in Dreamweaver/ColdFusion. The productivity gains outweigh the cost of the
product.

Both have large followings. Both have user-contributed offerings.

I just think that a commercial enterprise is better off with a more complete
package. So I'd go with CF.

"English Teacher" <En************@ModernEnglish.com> wrote in message
news:b0**************************@posting.google.c om...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!

Jul 17 '05 #14
Yeah, I saw that.

I trimmed out three ng's in my earlier reply, leaving only the php and CF
groups.

"Doug Miller" <sp*******@milmac.com> wrote in message
news:DJ********************@newssvr28.news.prodigy .com...
In article <gG****************@news.uswest.net>, "Todd L" <cu*****************@yahoo.com> wrote:
My God, I can't believe you people are responding to these posts... LOL...
*I* can't believe none of you guys trim the headers. This was crossposted to three groups in the rec. heirarchy where it's off-topic. Please watch out for crossposted troll posts, and trim irrelevant groups before you reply.

Thanks.
"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google. com...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message

news:<b0**************************@posting.google .com>...
> Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION?

Useful--- I don't know.

Cool --- PHP.

I have learnt few web scripting languages including Coldfusion,
ASP,PHP...
But, only PHP attracted me well.

But, it seems Coldfusion programmers are paid higher than PHP

programmers.

---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com


Jul 17 '05 #15
On Mon, 20 Oct 2003 23:39:36 -0700, English Teacher wrote:
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know Coldfusion
is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


Whats the deal with the selection of crossposted NGs? rec.woodworking??
--
Jeffrey D. Silverman | jeffrey AT jhu DOT edu
Johns Hopkins University | Baltimore, MD
Website | http://www.wse.jhu.edu/newtnotes/

Jul 17 '05 #16
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.
Jul 17 '05 #17
"Leicaddict" <Le*********@uwphotographer.net> wrote in message
news:71**************************@posting.google.c om...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message

news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


+--------------+
| Please Don't |
| Feed the |
| T R O L L! |
+--------------+
Jul 17 '05 #18
Le*********@uwphotographer.net (Leicaddict) wrote in message news:<71**************************@posting.google. com>...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


hmm, I can't imagine Coldfusion and PHP being rendered useless. Out of
curiosity, why do you say this.?
Jul 17 '05 #19
"remmuh" <Ky**@digitaleyeon.com> wrote in message
news:85**************************@posting.google.c om...
Le*********@uwphotographer.net (Leicaddict) wrote in message

news:<71**************************@posting.google. com>...
En************@ModernEnglish.com (English Teacher) wrote in message news:<b0**************************@posting.google. com>...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


hmm, I can't imagine Coldfusion and PHP being rendered useless. Out of
curiosity, why do you say this.?


Cause he's a troll. Don't feed him and he'll go away. Just look at all the
groups he crossposted to. Typical troll.
Jul 17 '05 #20
>> Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?
They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


I've had quite a bit of trouble getting any of these technologies to
work on my Unix servers. Can someone point me at the relevant docs so
I can read up on how to do it?

Adam

Jul 17 '05 #21

"Adam Cameron" <ad*******@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:9l********************************@4ax.com...
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


I've had quite a bit of trouble getting any of these technologies to
work on my Unix servers. Can someone point me at the relevant docs so
I can read up on how to do it?

Adam


Didn't you get the latest memo? Unix is dead, Microsoft will be the only
thing available...
Jul 17 '05 #22
>> I've had quite a bit of trouble getting any of these technologies to
work on my Unix servers. Can someone point me at the relevant docs so
I can read up on how to do it?
Didn't you get the latest memo? Unix is dead, Microsoft will be the only
thing available...


I remember now! [slaps head, switches of all Unix boxes].

Adam

Jul 17 '05 #23
English Teacher wrote:
Which would be more useful to learn, PHP or COLDFUSION? I know
Coldfusion is popular in the work force. Is PHP?

Thanks!


I've been working with CF since version 3.1 and have been gainfully
employed as a CF developer up to this day. I started learning PHP when
version 4 first came out. My current employer hired me on the basis of
my knowledge for both. Here at the university, we actively use both
technologies. We run them both of them on Solaris with iPlanet. At the
last place I worked, we ran CF5 on Windows with IIS and since I use
windows for my development workstation, I run PHP with Apache on there.
My latest production PHP app runs on a Windows box with Apache.

The answer to your query lies in how you code. The biggest issue is
maintenance. Both languages provide ample opportunity to bugger things
up in a big way, particularly for novices. The end result is always a
nightmare. I have to say, as a language, I think PHP is more
powerful/capable (without having to resort to Java). PHP also allows you
to create spagetti code. But again, it up to you. An OO approach to your
PHP coding can avoid this.

In my experience, the worst code however, has always been from CF
developers. Part of the reason for this is a traditional programming
model is almost NEVER used <says he as he steps into his asbestos suit>.
And no, Fusebox doesn't count, there's no traditional model to compare.
I've seen a few other CF frameworks as well but they are all so
"work-around-ish". Don't get me wrong, they are much, much better than
standard CF code, but they succeed inspite of CF rather than because of
it. There are crappy framework a-plenty for PHP too, but there are also
some good ones -- and they are not work-arounds for the language.

My first choice is always PHP, mainly because it allows me to use a
traditional programming paradigm -- Object Oriented design. While PHP is
not an OO language, it allows you to orient your design as such. Now
that CF has CFC, you can write OO apps in CF too -- but it's "clunky".
The mountains of code argument used earlier is a weak one, it can easily
be the other way around. A 100% OO app in CF would need mountains of
ascii of CFCs. Quite often I have to generate mountains of ascii in CF
to achieve the same thing I could have done with just a few lines in
PHP. As with any programming, the key to avoinding mountains of code is
to promote code re-use -- OO lets you do this. That's why there are
class libraries already avilable such as PEAR, Eclipse (PHP library),
and XAO (for XML/XSLT apps).

Personally, I think CF is good for quick construction of web services
using CFCs, particularly because it has such good database support. For
everything else, there is PHP.

As far as learning curve is concerned, PHP is like a regular programming
language, CF is not (no, the script tag way is too weak). So if you've
ever written another language like say, Javascript, you will already be
familiar with most of the syntax (ie. ie, curly braces etc). If you are
familar with Basic (ie. VB) then you can use the "basic" style syntax
available in PHP too. CF syntax is good for, well, CF.

If you prefer tags to curly braces and you don't plan on doing much
programming, then learn CF. CF is highly functional and really quick for
small apps. Unless you learn some obscure CF framework, it's a pain to
maintain for medium to large apps. Also, lucky for CF users, Macromedia
came along, so now CF has a future.

If you plan on building bigger apps down the road, then PHP will give
you the support you need. You can most cirtainly build big apps in CF as
well, but then you also need tonnes of expertise to do it properly (as
with anything) and tonnes of money to pay for all the licences on your
clusters. MM products are nice, but always expensive.

Also, don't buy into the whole Java/J2EE argument that you need this for
enterprise stuff. Java is nice, but for web apps, PHP can do pretty much
anything and everything without a snippet of Java in sight (even though
it supports Java in at least 2 ways).

And another thing, there are thousands of [free] PHP apps you can just
download and adopt if you are that way inclined. For instance, CF has 10
projects listed at freshmeat.net and PHP has 2118
I'm sure there I sites which better support CF freeware, but there's no
way CF will have the variety that PHP has. And all this without a
marketing department...

references:
http://pear/php.net (PEAR is the official class library)
http://www.students.cs.uu.nl/people/voostind/eclipse/ (unified class
library with strong emphasis on design patterns)
http://xao-php.sourceforge.net/ (Standards compliant, high-level XML
functionality. It's a class library that is also a framework.)
http://dietrich.ganx4.com/nusoap/index.php (nice SOAP class for PHP --
there are lots to choose from)
There are tonnes more, these ones came to mind...

Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.

PHP4's exception handling sucks. While I can makes lots of complaints
about individual features of CF, PHP exception handling blows goats.
Happily, PHP5 beta2 is out so there is light at the end of the tunnel.
Actually, come to think of it, the PHP developers really keep the hammer
down when it comes to supporting the product. We all had to wait
waaaaayyyy too long for that patch from MM which was to fix <CFEXEC/>
and <CHTTP/> issues. Not to mention the fact that as an enterprise,
having access to the source code really reduces the risk of relying on
any given product... For instance, we had an issue with the iPlanet PHP
module, we looked at the source, made some suggestions, and a fix was in
the next patch release -- impressive stuff -- all without money changing
hands. Try that with MS or MM or even Sun, IBM or Oracle :)
wow, you actually read this far :/
get back to work...
;)

Jul 17 '05 #24
On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:
Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.


Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?
--
Karim
http://www.cheapesthosting.com - Affordable hosting since 1998
Jul 17 '05 #25
Karim wrote:
On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:

Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.

Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?


I pointed out _one aspect_ where php "craps all over" ASP.NET
I didn't say that PHP craps all over ASP.NET in every way. That aspect
is functionality.

Did you even take a look at the http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
page?

PHP supports functionality for a whole range of things. It's the range
that is impressive. No other web-based technology currently matches this
range of pre-built, readily-avilable functionality.

In answer to your second query, I've only had the chance to do some
tutorials in ASP.NET (using C#) and read a book on it. I haven't had any
commercial experience unfortunately. At the moment, I'm getting
commercial experience with .NET because I am writing some windows
services in C# (involving databases and Windows Media Encoders). I know
enough about ASP.NET to know that it doesn't have as much functionalty
as PHP :)
Let's not confuse functionality with architecture. I'm not particularly
fond of the ASP framework -- architecturally speaking (Don't even get me
started on it's reliance upon IIS, which alone is enough to cross it off
my shopping list). It's simply one architecture in a world where there
are hundreds and it isn't neccesarily the best. Basically Java Server
Faces (Sun's impending official web apps framework (with it's roots in
Apache Struts)) is almost the same thing -- server-side events, HTML
controls etc. and it's not my cup of tea. I'm not particularly fond of
Apache Struts and front-controllers either.
The best framework I've seen to date is Apache Cocoon. It craps all over
ASP.NET architecture in every way. It's separation of content and
layout (through usage of a W3C standard) is designed brilliantly.
Pipelines are brilliant, the whole sitemap concept is brilliant.
Furthermore, it is extremely mature, it's been out virtually since the
birth of XSLT. It has many mature generators giving brilliant
out-of-the-box functionality for things like database access and PDF
generation. It's a good deal less prescriptive and restrictive about
request handling -- you don't need to worry about "actions" (front
contoller) or "events" (why rely on "control" logic), you could use
directory paths if you felt like it or any ther pattern match to direct
requests. Any serious web developer would be doing themselves a favour
by checking out Cocoon.

Jul 17 '05 #26
Rapid application development. (ColdFusion)
Messing with code. (PHP)
Jul 17 '05 #27
I've embedded my commentary ...

"Terence" <tk******@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:3F**************@fastmail.fm...
English Teacher wrote: The answer to your query lies in how you code. The biggest issue is
maintenance. Both languages provide ample opportunity to bugger things
up in a big way, particularly for novices. The end result is always a
nightmare. I have to say, as a language, I think PHP is more
powerful/capable (without having to resort to Java). PHP also allows you
to create spagetti code. But again, it up to you. An OO approach to your
PHP coding can avoid this. Agreed. PHP is a coding language, with clever web server integration.
Whereas CF is a web development environment, with (previously) weak
programming constructs.
In my experience, the worst code however, has always been from CF
developers. Part of the reason for this is a traditional programming
model is almost NEVER used <says he as he steps into his asbestos suit>. Instead, perhaps it's because the web began as a document
transport/presentation medium, and only later became an application
environment. Therefore, early CF developers were good content-oriented
people, not good software developers. They'd be the first to jump onto the
CF bandwagon ... maybe, he says, as he dons his fiberglass-insulated garment
.... no asbestos for me, thanks.
Personally, I think CF is good for quick construction of web services
using CFCs, particularly because it has such good database support. The beauty of CF is that you can do mountains of work with a quick click
click click. Sure, I was a software developer for 20 years and wrote all
sorts of code. But I appreciate the fact that "click" is faster, cheaper,
easier. And anything that can be reduced to a no-brainer click ought NOT to
be done the old, manual way by someone re-writing code that thousands of
others have already written. Sure, class libraries foster reuse. But "click"
fosters it even better.
As far as learning curve is concerned, PHP is like a regular programming
language, CF is not (no, the script tag way is too weak). So if you've
ever written another language like say, Javascript, you will already be
familiar with most of the syntax (ie. ie, curly braces etc). If you are
familar with Basic (ie. VB) then you can use the "basic" style syntax
available in PHP too. CF syntax is good for, well, CF. Agreed. PHP is a natural. Structurally, it comes from the same mold as
C/C++/VB/JavaScript/etc.
If you plan on building bigger apps down the road, then PHP will give
you the support you need. You can most certainly build big apps in CF as
well, but then you also need tonnes of expertise to do it properly (as
with anything) and tonnes of money to pay for all the licences on your
clusters. MM products are nice, but always expensive. I'm not sure how big your "tons" of money are. But cost should not be a
problem. The difference between free PHP with its publicly-available
add-ons, and the for-a-price products such as ColdFusion comes to, what? A
few thousand dollars?

For "just me" at home, that's a big difference. My labor is free, but bought
software costs real money.

But in the corporate world, labor costs far outweigh the software. CF
licensing is almost in the petty cash range, while labor runs at least $50 a
hour here (Florida), and much higher in some places. The hours saved on a
simple project will pay for CF and DW licenses. So the "free-ness" of
open-source software is not an attraction for me, as a corporate employee.
There's really no savings there.
Also, don't buy into the whole Java/J2EE argument that you need this for
enterprise stuff. Java is nice, but for web apps, PHP can do pretty much
anything and everything without a snippet of Java in sight (even though
it supports Java in at least 2 ways).

Agreed. Java is too big. It's relatively difficult to learn. It changes over
and over again, with every release.

And Java is only one piece of the web development kit.

For that matter, so is PHP. I find that CF/DW is more complete than Java or
especially PHP. Likewise, WebSphere and BEA WebLogic are more complete.
Jul 17 '05 #28
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<yw****************************@40tude.net>.. .
On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:
Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.


Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?


BTW, have you ever used the cool PHP?

---
"If there is a God, he must be a sadist!"
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #29
On Wed, 05 Nov 2003 11:18:19 +1100, Terence wrote:
Karim wrote:
On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:

Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.

Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?


I pointed out _one aspect_ where php "craps all over" ASP.NET
I didn't say that PHP craps all over ASP.NET in every way. That aspect
is functionality.


PHP might have more functionality but .NET is geared towars Windows only as
expected from all MS products. No.. you will not find functions that
support MySQL or Postgres but if you're on Windows, you really don't care
and if you do want to use something like MySQL, there are free drivers out
there that you can use. It's not a dead end.

I haven't used PHP but I am pretty sure it doesn't support server controls
like a datagrid where you can drag and drop a grid, set some properties and
have a grid where you can insert, edit and update values, do validation,
sort and paginate right away. I am sure PHP can do all this but it's not
going to be done in as productive way like asp.net. You will need to a ton
of code where asp.net already has it done for you and if you need to etend
on a server control, the open hooks are there.
.NET is *fully* OO while php 5 is going there. You have visual
inheritance, code behind in a file seperated from the html file...etc.
php has a ton of functions but you're still writing spaghetti code which is
hard to maintain.

When Mono on Linux is fully ready, then the ".NET works only in Windows"
excuse is not going to fly anymore. Besides, when you create a website, it
doesn't matter where it's running on since all you care is that your site
works right under all the common browsers. If it runs in Windows only, you
hire people who know Windows and .NET to maintain it and they are plenty
and more every day. .NET is not some old legacy language/framework where
you worry that it it runs on a certain OS only. To many people and
companies, cross platform compatibility is not an issue, specially in
Windows only shops.

--
Karim
http://www.cheapesthosting.com - Affordable hosting since 1998
Jul 17 '05 #30
On 4 Nov 2003 21:05:12 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<yw****************************@40tude.net>.. .
On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:
Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.


Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?


BTW, have you ever used the cool PHP?


No.. but I used the cool ASP.NET.
Does PHP have a solid integrated IDE like Visual Studio.NET or C# Borland
whith commercial type debugging, profiling, prototyping, collaborative
work, etc? BTW, I am asking because I want to know and I am interested in
learn PHP if there are quality IDE's out there. (Dreamweaver is not one of
them).

Karim
Jul 17 '05 #31
>> BTW, have you ever used the cool PHP?


No.. but I used the cool ASP.NET.
Does PHP have a solid integrated IDE like Visual Studio.NET or C# Borland
whith commercial type debugging, profiling, prototyping, collaborative
work, etc? BTW, I am asking because I want to know and I am interested in
learn PHP if there are quality IDE's out there. (Dreamweaver is not one of
them).


Not wanting to start a flame war, but programming IDE environments are
badly overrated. I use vi for editing code and vi or occasionally
DreamWeaver for HTML. Php applications can be built on an incremental
basis directly on the server using SSH/telnet and tested immediately.
I've found IDEs mainly useful for programming systems with high
dependencies such as C,C++ and Java. You can get a long way with echo
statements.

Bear in mind though that I've been doing this job for 24 years and
started by hand assembling machine code. That taught you to check things
five times before compiling ;-)

Jul 17 '05 #32
> Does PHP have a solid integrated IDE like Visual Studio.NET or C# Borland
whith commercial type debugging, profiling, prototyping, collaborative
work, etc? BTW, I am asking because I want to know and I am interested in
learn PHP if there are quality IDE's out there. (Dreamweaver is not one of
them).


Try Zend Studio. It's a nice IDE, plus you have the option (at least on
windows) to have it configure a local development server for you, and to
install all the current PHP documentation, too. It's a nice package.
http://www.zend.com

Whats New in 3.0
================
New Features
1. Profiler
2. Zend browser toolbar - One click debugging and profiling directly
from your browser
3. Code analyzer
4. Support for PHP 5.0 including syntax highlighting, code completion,
file and project inspectors
5. Dramatic performance improvements
6. Major improvement to code completion including improve speed,
recognized constants, and New functions arguments view
7. Highlight syntax errors and syntax error indicator bar
8. New File Type Mechanism
9. JavaScript support for syntax highlighting and code indentation
10. XML project and program configuration
11. Lots of bug fixes

Feature Enhancements
1. New action that checks the connection with the debug server.
2. Automatic update check
3. Improved code completion appearance
4. Improve ESC usability - first ESC closes peripheral interface windows,
Shift + ESC re-opens them)
5. Improved CVS - new log action.
6. Improved FTP - better support in DOS FTP.

Jul 17 '05 #33
Karim wrote:
On Wed, 05 Nov 2003 11:18:19 +1100, Terence wrote:

Karim wrote:

On Tue, 04 Nov 2003 20:14:39 +1100, Terence wrote:

Furthermore, PHP's function library is far far far superior to any
version of CF. Just check this out...
http://www.php.net/manual/en/funcref.php
unbeatable... this is where PHP craps all over Java and CF and .NET for
web apps.
Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?
I pointed out _one aspect_ where php "craps all over" ASP.NET
I didn't say that PHP craps all over ASP.NET in every way. That aspect
is functionality.

PHP might have more functionality but .NET is geared towars Windows only as
expected from all MS products.


I have no problems with windows, and just because I think PHP is OK
doesn't mean I'm anti-microsoft, it's more IIS that irks me. But that's
just my opinion based on this product's horrific record of exploits.
Havint said that, at least I am willing to give ASP.NET a go anyway.
Have you at least done some tutorials in PHP let alone read a book on it?
No.. you will not find functions that
support MySQL or Postgres but if you're on Windows, you really don't care
and if you do want to use something like MySQL, there are free drivers out
there that you can use. It's not a dead end.

Well as a windows programmer, I thought that would be obvious in light
of ODBC. PHP's database support, while comprehensive, is not remarkable.
It's the some total of all this and all the other functionality that
makes it remarkable.
I haven't used PHP but I am pretty sure it doesn't support server controls
like a datagrid where you can drag and drop a grid, set some properties and
have a grid where you can insert, edit and update values, do validation,
sort and paginate right away. I am sure PHP can do all this but it's not
going to be done in as productive way like asp.net. You will need to a ton
of code where asp.net already has it done for you and if you need to etend
on a server control, the open hooks are there.
.NET is *fully* OO while php 5 is going there. You have visual
inheritance, code behind in a file seperated from the html file...etc.

This is where it is futile trying to debate a language vs a framework.
PHP is a programming language with lots of functionaltiy. It is not
tightly bound to any one framework like ASP.NET. The same goes for CF.
For PHP and CF, frameworks are a separate thing and there are many of
them avilable to choose from, that's why you don't have HTML and web
controls.

It's quite simple really, ASP.NET API simply does not have the same
amound of functionality that PHP has. What it does have is a framework
which comes bundled with some UI elements.

There's nothing wrong with this in principle, but then you have to
address the framework as a separate issue, not as a language issue. I'm
pretty sure I made that perfectly clear in my last post. Let me make
some more comments on why I personally don't like the ASP.NET framework.

ASP.NET framework has it's archicture centrered around Visual Studio.
Now that's not neccesarily a bad thing if authoring environment is
paramount to your web apps development. Visual Studio is an excellent
package, I use it on a daily basis. To make things easy, the bundle a
bunch of layout (HTML markup) components that you can drag and drop.
They provide interfaces to make data-binding easy. The end reasult is
rapid development of functional web pages. That's great.
What I don't like about it is that the components it gives you are in a
dead-end format, they are in HTML. So again, we go back to the bad old
days of having compatability issues with user-agents -- not to mention
the obvious inflexibility of using a dead-end format. I think MS had to
do this in order to keep integration with Visual Studio simple. For a
lot of people (who don't know much about modern web apps and XML/XSLT),
this is fine, it "gets the job done". For these people it is not a
problem because they are usually the type that couldn't be bothered with
user-agent compatability and W3C standards.

If you're trying to deliver flexible non-dead-end solutions, then you
cannot use the bundled HTML and web controls. You will still have to
"roll you own" architecure. Now this is entirely possible, but then you
cannot sing the joys of ASP.NET which is basically "web apps for Visual
Studio" because now you're not really taking full advantage of the
Visual Studio components development methodology(?). You can then go on
to use ASP to develop propper XML/XSLT applications, but then it has no
serious advantages over any other web technology including Java, CF, and
PHP.


php has a ton of functions but you're still writing spaghetti code which is
hard to maintain.

Well the choice is yours. If you feel compelled to write spagetti code,
you can. If you prefer to do object modelling, you can do that in PHP too.

If I chose, to, I could write spagettig code in ASP.NET too (without
trying too hard). At the end of the day, an ASP.NET page is == a single
page object instance which is just a collection of functions and variables.
When Mono on Linux is fully ready, then the ".NET works only in Windows"
excuse is not going to fly anymore. Besides,
excuses? what excuses?
I've been following the Mono project with some interest. It will be
interesting to see if it will provide a strong enough alternative to the
MS version.

MS make all this fuss about how the Common Language Runtime is a
ratified standard and all, but then they don't grow the thing the same
as Sun does. Sun doesn't see the provision of J2EE platforms by other
vendors as a threat -- quite the opposite, they set up frameoworks and
specifications and certification programs to make it happen. That's why
you have IBM, BEA, Oracle as J2EE platform providers. I can't see this
ever happening with Microsoft. I don't see MS actively supporting
commercial companies like Sun does. If I have any complaints about Sun,
it's the lack of support they have given to JBoss but I think there are
other issues there that I am not aware of so I can't be too critical.
when you create a website, it
doesn't matter where it's running on since all you care is that your site
works right under all the common browsers.
In my experience, I haven't found this to be the case in real-life. You
may be able to take this position as an individual developer, but IT
departments are usually given a limited budget so they may not be able
to just rush out and purchase new talent because one of their developers
wants to use Visual Studio to make web apps. IT managers are sometimes
forced to make comprimises based on their given environment which
supports more than just web applications.
If it runs in Windows only, you
hire people who know Windows and .NET to maintain it and they are plenty
and more every day. .NET is not some old legacy language/framework where
you worry that it it runs on a certain OS only. To many people and
companies, cross platform compatibility is not an issue, specially in
Windows only shops.


Anyway, I believe the original question was about CF vs PHP. As such, I
recomend PHP for medium to large apps in concert with a decent framework
(such as XAO). Otherwise, if you're basically a DreamWeaver person with
not much interest other than processing a couple of forms, the CF has
the shortest learning curve.

When it comes to speaking broadly about technology choices, I think the
discussion should be centrered on frameworks, and to that end, the best
one I've seen to date is Cocoon.

Karim, instead of being so religious about defending your favourite
product, do yourself a favour and try writing an app or two in something
else, starting with Cocoon :)

Jul 17 '05 #34
Bryan Buchs wrote:
Does PHP have a solid integrated IDE like Visual Studio.NET or C# Borland
whith commercial type debugging, profiling, prototyping, collaborative
work, etc? BTW, I am asking because I want to know and I am interested in
learn PHP if there are quality IDE's out there. (Dreamweaver is not
one of
them).

Try Zend Studio. It's a nice IDE, plus you have the option (at least on
windows) to have it configure a local development server for you, and to
install all the current PHP documentation, too. It's a nice package.
http://www.zend.com


As long as everyone is recomending IDE's, then I recomend Eclipse using
the phpeclipse.sourceforge.net plugin. It's perfect for those of us who
switch between Java, XML, and PHP all the time and make heavy use of
CVS. It now has (beta) bundled FTP/WebDAV support too. It also has many
more plugins. It's more of an IDE platform then an IDE.

eclipse.org

Jul 17 '05 #35
Lester Horwinkle wrote:
The beauty of CF is that you can do mountains of work with a quick click
click click. Sure, I was a software developer for 20 years and wrote all
sorts of code. But I appreciate the fact that "click" is faster, cheaper,
easier. And anything that can be reduced to a no-brainer click ought NOT to
be done the old, manual way by someone re-writing code that thousands of
others have already written. Sure, class libraries foster reuse. But "click"
fosters it even better.

Agreed. Java is too big. It's relatively difficult to learn. It changes over
and over again, with every release.


You've got me thinking... Cocoon needs an IDE.

you should check out XSPs

for instance, here is an example of a Cocoon eXstensible Server Page
which is using data from the http://exist.sourceforge.net pure-XML database.
<xmldb:collection
xmlns:xmldb="http://exist-db/transformer/1.0"
uri="xmldb:exist:///db">
<!-- iterate through all rdf:Description elements containing the
term "computer" -->
<xmldb:for-each
query="//rdf:Description[dc:title &amp;= 'computer']"
from="0"
to="9"
sort-by="/dc:title">
<!-- output a book element for each entry -->
<book>
<!-- extract the title. There's only one title, so we use
select-node -->
<title><xmldb:select-node query="dc:title/text()"/></title>
<!-- extract the creators. There's probably more than one,
so we use a nested for-each -->
<xmldb:for-each query="dc:creator/text()">
<creator><xmldb:current-node/></creator>
</xmldb:for-each>
</book>
</xmldb:for-each>
</xmldb:collection>

You've got all your tags for your tag-happy CF addicts pleased, but the
whole thing backends on Java (as you can do with CF anyway). Then you've
got modular support from various other "vendors" as shown in this
example snippet. Then you can decide whether you want the web developer
or the web designer to write your XSLT (skins) :)

Now all we need is an Eclipse plugin so your can click and drag your
controls and iterators with a "click click click". Then even the Visual
Studio web developers may have a reason to get weaned.

Jul 17 '05 #36
Sorry, forgot to adress your other three points...

Karim wrote:
.NET is *fully* OO while php 5 is going there. You have visual
inheritance, code behind in a file seperated from the html file...etc.


OO:
"Oriented" the word according to at least one dictionary means:
"Adjusted or located in relation to surroundings or circumstances;
sometimes used in combination"

"Object Oriented" therefore means to me "[programming objects] Adjusted
or located in relation to [other programming objects]". So, if I write
my code using classes and object instances, and I model my objects so
that they relate to each other, then I have writeen object oritented
code. Surely I don't need to be told that my code is object oriented
because the writing on the product packaging tells me that it is "object
oriented". Surely if the programming language allows a non class/object
programming layout, that doesn't mean that the class/object alternative
is now non-existant?

Just what exactly do you mean by "fully" anyway? Maybe you can use a
reference to another language like say, smalltalk, to illustrate your point?

Visual Inheritance:
For me, writing a modern we app neccisarily involves XML and subsequent
XSLT if your want [X]HTML. So you're "visual inheritance" is easily
taken care of inside of <xsl:template/> using <xsl:apply-templates
select="[[condition for inheritance]]" />
Code Behind:
Oh please, give me a break. Even the name "code behind" should
immediately make you suspecious of some marketing person trying to make
a datsun sound like a limmo. A code-behind is nothing but a glorified
"include". They've been around since mod_ssi. All templated scripting
languages ASP, PHP, CF, Virtuflex, iHTML, JSP have this feature, it
really is no biggie. OK, so it's ever so sligtly more than an include --
a "custom tag" definition if your like. This hardy means that you are
separating your code from your layout. As long as you are mixing your
programming tags <asp:*/> inside your HTML, you are not separating the
code from the layout. Same goes for all of them including PHP.
One of the biggest mennaces in the PHP framework landscape is the
proliferation of proprietary templating systems why try to "separate
code from layout". See my rant on why this and your "code behind" thing
is not helping the situation.
http://www.sitepointforums.com/showt...hreadid=123769
(user-name tezza)
Your code should be producing nothing but content. XML is suited to
represent this because it is not only an adequate specification for
complex structured data encapsulation but mainly because it is widely
accepted across all platforms in the industry. Once you have this
content, then your business code is done, finnished, completed, gone!
Then you have a range of options on how you want to channel this content
including multiple ways of reaching dead-end formats such as HTML. And
if it is not too difficult for you, then XSLT is well suited for this.
This is how you write ASP.NET pages properly. Unfortunately, Miscrosoft
are not encouraging this with the stupid HTML and web controls. This is
a bit surprising considdering that they has so much to do with the
development of XSLT. Look in the .NET API, there is decent support for
XML/XSLT. If ASP.NET is your weapon of choice, "Code behind" is not a
solution to business-code/layout-logic separation. It is a valid
solution to something else (modular programming), but not layout separation.

Jul 17 '05 #37
>>They are both useless. Learn MS dotnet. C# or VBnet. That is the
future for at least the next 10 years.


whoever said this (as the original post illudes me) needs to be smacked
over the head with a reality bat.

the reality is that 10 years is a very long time in IT and no one has a
crystal ball that will see past the next two. The reality is that there
will always be multiple technologies avilable for applications
development. The reality is that not every developer is a sheep needing
to be lead by shepherd vendor X. Perhaps a better analogy would be
lemming rather than sheep in the case of .NET

Jul 17 '05 #38
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<in*****************************@40tude.net>. ..
On 4 Nov 2003 21:05:12 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<yw****************************@40tude.net>.. .
Can you be more specific on why you think PHP is better than .NET? Did you
actually use ASP.NET?
BTW, have you ever used the cool PHP?


No.. but I used the cool ASP.NET.


Cool ASP.NET???!!!! You please learn the divine PHP
Does PHP have a solid integrated IDE like Visual Studio.NET or C# Borland
whith commercial type debugging, profiling, prototyping, collaborative
work, etc? BTW, I am asking because I want to know and I am interested in
learn PHP if there are quality IDE's out there. (Dreamweaver is not one of
them).


Zend has many features.

I personally use both PHPEdit ( http://www.phpedit.net/ ) and DW
(for HTMLs). PHPEdit is fast and aesthetically designed. Though it is
not much matured, you can use it without any problem. You may even
"demand" (!!) some new features as the PHPEdit authors are really
cool.

---
"The world is too dangerous to live in—not because of the people who
do evil, but because of the people who sit and let it happen"---Albert
Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #39
On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:
PHP might have more functionality but .NET is geared towars Windows only as
expected from all MS products.
I have no problems with windows, and just because I think PHP is OK
doesn't mean I'm anti-microsoft, it's more IIS that irks me. But that's
just my opinion based on this product's horrific record of exploits.
Havint said that, at least I am willing to give ASP.NET a go anyway.
Have you at least done some tutorials in PHP let alone read a book on it?


These major exploits, maybe 3 of them, happened quite some time ago. So far
I haven't heard of new ones. Apache suffers from them too. We hear about
website defacements, many of them are on Apache/Linux.
PHP doesn't offer anything that I can't do in ASP.NET. No sense in learning
two different languages.

No.. you will not find functions that
support MySQL or Postgres but if you're on Windows, you really don't care
and if you do want to use something like MySQL, there are free drivers out
there that you can use. It's not a dead end.

Well as a windows programmer, I thought that would be obvious in light
of ODBC. PHP's database support, while comprehensive, is not remarkable.
It's the some total of all this and all the other functionality that
makes it remarkable.


It's the productivity that matters.
What are the capabilities of debugging in PHP using the best IDE? Can you
set breakpoints, resume running, view and edit all variables in debug mode,
line by line trace output, try-catch-throw error trapping ..etc?

I haven't used PHP but I am pretty sure it doesn't support server controls
like a datagrid where you can drag and drop a grid, set some properties and
have a grid where you can insert, edit and update values, do validation,
sort and paginate right away. I am sure PHP can do all this but it's not
going to be done in as productive way like asp.net. You will need to a ton
of code where asp.net already has it done for you and if you need to etend
on a server control, the open hooks are there.
.NET is *fully* OO while php 5 is going there. You have visual
inheritance, code behind in a file seperated from the html file...etc.

This is where it is futile trying to debate a language vs a framework.
PHP is a programming language with lots of functionaltiy. It is not
tightly bound to any one framework like ASP.NET. The same goes for CF.
For PHP and CF, frameworks are a separate thing and there are many of
them avilable to choose from, that's why you don't have HTML and web
controls.


The funtionality in PHP is based on available libraries. The .NET framework
is also a set of libraries. Same thing.. different nomenclature. You take
away php libraries and php becomes very weak. In the Windows world, both
are implemented as DLLs.

One advantage of .NET is that you can build web applications, Windows apps
,Windows forms, Web services. Basically anything which means you learn one
language and one framework. PHP is good for web development only.
Web controls in ASP.NET are high productivity tools. If I want a a tree
view or a grid, I plug them in and use them right away. They come with
asp.net and are free.
In php, you have to code them yourself or buy them and if you want to
deploy them, you have to include them with your site.

ASP.NET framework has it's archicture centrered around Visual Studio.
Now that's not neccesarily a bad thing if authoring environment is
paramount to your web apps development. Visual Studio is an excellent
package, I use it on a daily basis. To make things easy, the bundle a
bunch of layout (HTML markup) components that you can drag and drop.
They provide interfaces to make data-binding easy. The end reasult is
rapid development of functional web pages. That's great.
No. Visual Studio is a tool. .NET is not tied around VS. You can write
asp.net apps in NotePad, in Web Matrix, Borland's C# Builder. VS is just an
IDE to increase your producivity. Everything VS does is eventually
converted into html in aspx files and/or code in code behind files. You can
do this manually if you want to. but why.
What I don't like about it is that the components it gives you are in a
dead-end format, they are in HTML. So again, we go back to the bad old
days of having compatability issues with user-agents -- not to mention
the obvious inflexibility of using a dead-end format. I think MS had to
do this in order to keep integration with Visual Studio simple. For a
lot of people (who don't know much about modern web apps and XML/XSLT),
this is fine, it "gets the job done". For these people it is not a
problem because they are usually the type that couldn't be bothered with
user-agent compatability and W3C standards.

Of course they have to be in html. Otherwise how can they be displayed in a
web browser. Everything you do in any scripting language will be converted
into html, Javascript, CSS... etc. If there are compatibility issues (which
I haven't seen) then code in pure hand coded html in asp.net.
asp.net produces html so what does a deadend format mean exactly?

If you're trying to deliver flexible non-dead-end solutions, then you
cannot use the bundled HTML and web controls. You will still have to
"roll you own" architecure. Now this is entirely possible, but then you
cannot sing the joys of ASP.NET which is basically "web apps for Visual
Studio" because now you're not really taking full advantage of the
Visual Studio components development methodology(?). You can then go on
to use ASP to develop propper XML/XSLT applications, but then it has no
serious advantages over any other web technology including Java, CF, and
PHP.
Do you have an example of a web control in VS that produces html that
doesn't display correctly in all browsers?

Some web designers develop for Intranets and specific websites that can use
IE only. VS should be perfectly fine for them.


php has a ton of functions but you're still writing spaghetti code which is
hard to maintain.

Well the choice is yours. If you feel compelled to write spagetti code,
you can. If you prefer to do object modelling, you can do that in PHP too.

If I chose, to, I could write spagettig code in ASP.NET too (without
trying too hard). At the end of the day, an ASP.NET page is == a single
page object instance which is just a collection of functions and variables.


How's that different than php and any scripting langauge? Your final
objective is a web page, regardless of the language and tool you used.

When Mono on Linux is fully ready, then the ".NET works only in Windows"
excuse is not going to fly anymore. Besides,
excuses? what excuses?


The excuse of .NET and ASP.NET works in Windows only. No cross platform
compatibility.
I've been following the Mono project with some interest. It will be
interesting to see if it will provide a strong enough alternative to the
MS version.

MS make all this fuss about how the Common Language Runtime is a
ratified standard and all, but then they don't grow the thing the same
as Sun does. Sun doesn't see the provision of J2EE platforms by other
vendors as a threat -- quite the opposite, they set up frameoworks and
specifications and certification programs to make it happen. That's why
you have IBM, BEA, Oracle as J2EE platform providers. I can't see this
ever happening with Microsoft. I don't see MS actively supporting
commercial companies like Sun does. If I have any complaints about Sun,
it's the lack of support they have given to JBoss but I think there are
other issues there that I am not aware of so I can't be too critical.
ASP.NET 2.0 is coming out soon and yes MS is enhancing it. Java/J2EE is
older and therefore more mature. BTW, I thought we are talking about PHP
and you're diverting into a different topic.

> when you create a website, it
doesn't matter where it's running on since all you care is that your site
works right under all the common browsers.
In my experience, I haven't found this to be the case in real-life. You
may be able to take this position as an individual developer, but IT
departments are usually given a limited budget so they may not be able
to just rush out and purchase new talent because one of their developers
wants to use Visual Studio to make web apps. IT managers are sometimes
forced to make comprimises based on their given environment which
supports more than just web applications.


Many small companies are Windows only. When they want to develop web sites,
they will likely choose a Microsoft product and they do not have to pay
extra for the tools. IIS, ASP, .NET are free in Windows. They do not need
to retrain their developers. A VB developer can easily pick up ASP and use
it.

If it runs in Windows only, you
hire people who know Windows and .NET to maintain it and they are plenty
and more every day. .NET is not some old legacy language/framework where
you worry that it it runs on a certain OS only. To many people and
companies, cross platform compatibility is not an issue, specially in
Windows only shops.


Anyway, I believe the original question was about CF vs PHP. As such, I
recomend PHP for medium to large apps in concert with a decent framework
(such as XAO). Otherwise, if you're basically a DreamWeaver person with
not much interest other than processing a couple of forms, the CF has
the shortest learning curve.

When it comes to speaking broadly about technology choices, I think the
discussion should be centrered on frameworks, and to that end, the best
one I've seen to date is Cocoon.


So what's your gripe about .NET framework if now you're saying one should
concentrate on frameworks? Remember I said that .NET is a framework for
building *any* kind of app for Windows. web, Windows, mobile, web services.
With C#, you learn and use a single language and learn one framework. I
don't see the same advantage with php.

A strong language, a comprehensive framework, a mature productive IDE.
You need to tell me what's so compelling about PHP that I should switch.
You need to provide proof, examples case studies. Otherwise, we can talk
forever.

Karim, instead of being so religious about defending your favourite
product, do yourself a favour and try writing an app or two in something
else, starting with Cocoon :)


If you're debating with me, then you're religious too with your opinions.
I have no interest in learning php. I would rather be a master of one
language and framework than an ok with two. .NET is huge and I learn new
stuff every day. It will be unproductive to add a new language and
technology to my learning capacity.

The point is that if what I am using does everything I need it to do plus
much more and I am very productive with it, why would I look at something
else. You have not convinced me otherwise.

I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.

I gave you an example of a datagrid web control in asp.net. Many people
find it very productive. Now tell me what I can do in php better or faster
than in asp.net. Convince me with an example. Let's assume we both are
using SQL Server and IIS.

Karim
Jul 17 '05 #40
"Lester Horwinkle" <lh**************@NOSPAMusa.com> wrote in message news:<8W*******************@bignews3.bellsouth.net >...
I've embedded my commentary ...

"Terence" <tk******@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:3F**************@fastmail.fm...
English Teacher wrote:
Personally, I think CF is good for quick construction of web services
using CFCs, particularly because it has such good database support.

The beauty of CF is that you can do mountains of work with a quick click
click click. Sure, I was a software developer for 20 years and wrote all
sorts of code. But I appreciate the fact that "click" is faster, cheaper,
easier. And anything that can be reduced to a no-brainer click ought NOT to
be done the old, manual way by someone re-writing code that thousands of
others have already written. Sure, class libraries foster reuse. But "click"
fosters it even better.


Nonsense. We're talking about PHP vs. CF---*not* PHP tools vs CF
tools. In case, if you're not a Programmer but you're a drag-drop
clicker, then number of such tools--even enough DW addons are
available.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #41
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<10*******************************@40tude.net >...
On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:
<snip>
I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.
It's like telling moon is a dangerous place before
witnessing/going there. You first learn a bit of PHP and then make any
judgement. Most of the PHP lovers here are actually moved from (esp.
me) all the nonsense languages including the one you vouch.
I gave you an example of a datagrid web control in asp.net. Many people
find it very productive. Now tell me what I can do in php better or faster
than in asp.net. Convince me with an example. Let's assume we both are
using SQL Server and IIS.


I don't want to waste my time in explaining PHP vs. PHP tools.
But, there are number of better such tools are freely available.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #42
On 6 Nov 2003 21:02:32 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<10*******************************@40tude.net >...
On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:
<snip>
I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.


It's like telling moon is a dangerous place before
witnessing/going there. You first learn a bit of PHP and then make any
judgement. Most of the PHP lovers here are actually moved from (esp.
me) all the nonsense languages including the one you vouch.


I am afraid your idea does not work. You don't look at a different tool or
language unless the one you use doesn't fit your needs.
Your last comment suggests you have a one sided opinion without giving any
solid proof.
I gave you an example of a datagrid web control in asp.net. Many people
find it very productive. Now tell me what I can do in php better or faster
than in asp.net. Convince me with an example. Let's assume we both are
using SQL Server and IIS.


I don't want to waste my time in explaining PHP vs. PHP tools.
But, there are number of better such tools are freely available.


It's a waste of time when someone says something is available and doesn't
mention the name, where it can be had ..etc.

karim
Jul 17 '05 #43

"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google.c om...
Nonsense. We're talking about PHP vs. CF---*not* PHP tools vs CF
tools. In case, if you're not a Programmer but you're a drag-drop
clicker, then number of such tools--even enough DW addons are
available.


This is not about labeling people. Actually, I'm both. But clicking is
cheaper than coding. Business prefers cheaper.

It's clear that not everything can be done by clicking. But when it can,
it's foolish to write code to produce the same results.

Anyway, what tools for PHP can compare with Dreamweaver MX for CF?
Jul 17 '05 #44
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<6k******************************@40tude.net> ...
On 6 Nov 2003 21:02:32 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<10*******************************@40tude.net >...
On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:
<snip>
I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.


It's like telling moon is a dangerous place before
witnessing/going there. You first learn a bit of PHP and then make any
judgement. Most of the PHP lovers here are actually moved from (esp.
me) all the nonsense languages including the one you vouch.


I am afraid your idea does not work. You don't look at a different tool or
language unless the one you use doesn't fit your needs.


Then why you want to know the PHP?? My point is this: don't vouch
anything before you try something.
Your last comment suggests you have a one sided opinion without giving any
solid proof.


Like any language, PHP also came out of disatisfaction over
existing languages. Almost all PHP lovers here are moved from others
out of disatisfaction over existing other languages. The popularity of
PHP is growing---all because of the people who dare to try it and see
the difference. We PHP programmers here are ___not___ marketing
PHP---'cos there is no need to convince the *Programmers*.

I gave you an example of a datagrid web control in asp.net. Many people
find it very productive. Now tell me what I can do in php better or faster
than in asp.net. Convince me with an example. Let's assume we both are
using SQL Server and IIS.


I don't want to waste my time in explaining PHP vs. PHP tools.
But, there are number of better such tools are freely available.


It's a waste of time when someone says something is available and doesn't
mention the name, where it can be had ..etc.


Not necessarily. It is certainly not necessary for the
programmers.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #45
"Lester Horwinkle" <lh**************@NOSPAMusa.com> wrote in message news:<Co******************@bignews5.bellsouth.net> ...
"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google.c om...
Nonsense. We're talking about PHP vs. CF---*not* PHP tools vs CF
tools. In case, if you're not a Programmer but you're a drag-drop
clicker, then number of such tools--even enough DW addons are
available.
This is not about labeling people. Actually, I'm both. But clicking is
cheaper than coding. Business prefers cheaper.


By "clicking" you mean DW not CF. The discussion is not about PHP
vs. DW.
It's clear that not everything can be done by clicking. But when it can,
it's foolish to write code to produce the same results.
Agreed. But, using exising PEAR packages is also fast. Reusing
the codes from free libraries is also fast. There are number of ways
to increase the speed.
Anyway, what tools for PHP can compare with Dreamweaver MX for CF?


IIRC, DW also supports PHP and number of addons for PHP are
available from Dreamweaver Exchange page. Also, php.net's links
section has number of links.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #46
What's the fight all about? You can use BOTH on the same server, can't you?

"R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah" <ng**********@rediffmail.com> wrote in message
news:ab**************************@posting.google.c om...
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message

news:<6k******************************@40tude.net> ...
On 6 Nov 2003 21:02:32 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<10*******************************@40tude.net >...> On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:

<snip>

> I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.
It's like telling moon is a dangerous place before
witnessing/going there. You first learn a bit of PHP and then make any
judgement. Most of the PHP lovers here are actually moved from (esp.
me) all the nonsense languages including the one you vouch.


I am afraid your idea does not work. You don't look at a different tool or
language unless the one you use doesn't fit your needs.


Then why you want to know the PHP?? My point is this: don't vouch
anything before you try something.
Your last comment suggests you have a one sided opinion without giving any solid proof.


Like any language, PHP also came out of disatisfaction over
existing languages. Almost all PHP lovers here are moved from others
out of disatisfaction over existing other languages. The popularity of
PHP is growing---all because of the people who dare to try it and see
the difference. We PHP programmers here are ___not___ marketing
PHP---'cos there is no need to convince the *Programmers*.

I gave you an example of a datagrid web control in asp.net. Many people> find it very productive. Now tell me what I can do in php better or faster> than in asp.net. Convince me with an example. Let's assume we both are> using SQL Server and IIS.

I don't want to waste my time in explaining PHP vs. PHP tools.
But, there are number of better such tools are freely available.


It's a waste of time when someone says something is available and doesn't mention the name, where it can be had ..etc.


Not necessarily. It is certainly not necessary for the
programmers.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com

Jul 17 '05 #47
On 8 Nov 2003 01:24:50 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<6k******************************@40tude.net> ...
On 6 Nov 2003 21:02:32 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Karim <ka*******@yahoo.moc> wrote in message news:<10*******************************@40tude.net >...
On Thu, 06 Nov 2003 11:27:18 +1100, Terence wrote:

<snip>

I will be interested in why something is done better in php than asp.net.

It's like telling moon is a dangerous place before
witnessing/going there. You first learn a bit of PHP and then make any
judgement. Most of the PHP lovers here are actually moved from (esp.
me) all the nonsense languages including the one you vouch.
I am afraid your idea does not work. You don't look at a different tool or
language unless the one you use doesn't fit your needs.


Then why you want to know the PHP?? My point is this: don't vouch
anything before you try something.


I said I might look at it. Out of curiousity, not out of need. I voucef for
ASP.NET because I actually used it.

Your last comment suggests you have a one sided opinion without giving any
solid proof.


Like any language, PHP also came out of disatisfaction over
existing languages. Almost all PHP lovers here are moved from others
out of disatisfaction over existing other languages. The popularity of
PHP is growing---all because of the people who dare to try it and see
the difference. We PHP programmers here are ___not___ marketing
PHP---'cos there is no need to convince the *Programmers*.


First time scripting language coders use PHP because it's free, it's cross
platform and because there are free tutorials and samples. They probably
never tried another langauge to compare. I don't think php came out because
CF was bad. CF is one of the easiest languages to use if not the easiest.

You come out and say PHP is better than anything else is a poor judgement.
Otherwise no one would be using CF which costs alot more than php.
Karim
Jul 17 '05 #48
Karim <karim3411@!!yahoo!!.com> wrote in message news:<j1***************************@40tude.net>...
On 8 Nov 2003 01:24:50 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
Then why you want to know the PHP?? My point is this: don't vouch
anything before you try something.


I said I might look at it. Out of curiousity, not out of need. I voucef for
ASP.NET because I actually used it.


I repeat: don't judge anything before you try it. IMHO, it is
too naive to vouch one language all because you use it and criticize
other languages all because you never tried it.
Your last comment suggests you have a one sided opinion without giving any
solid proof.


Like any language, PHP also came out of disatisfaction over
existing languages. Almost all PHP lovers here are moved from others
out of disatisfaction over existing other languages. The popularity of
PHP is growing---all because of the people who dare to try it and see
the difference. We PHP programmers here are ___not___ marketing
PHP---'cos there is no need to convince the *Programmers*.


First time scripting language coders use PHP because it's free, it's cross
platform and because there are free tutorials and samples. They probably
never tried another langauge to compare. I don't think php came out because
CF was bad. CF is one of the easiest languages to use if not the easiest.


Nonsense. I'm sure almost all PHP programmers know ASP, CF,
etc. But, I'm sure most of the ASP or CF programmers know nothing
about PHP---they just criticize without trying---I guess those guys
are not actually "programmers", but marketing guys.
You come out and say PHP is better than anything else is a poor judgement.
Your judgement about PHP without trying it is stupid.
Otherwise no one would be using CF which costs alot more than php.


So, you use both ASP.NET and CF??? I'm sure, you simply
diverting/trying to divert the people.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #49
Karim <karim3411@!!yahoo!!.com> wrote in message news:<30****************************@40tude.net>.. .
On 9 Nov 2003 02:15:30 -0800, R. Rajesh Jeba Anbiah wrote:
I repeat: don't judge anything before you try it. IMHO, it is
too naive to vouch one language all because you use it and criticize
other languages all because you never tried it.


Why don't you follow your own advice?? You're the one who said all the
other languages including asp.net are nonesense. Did you try all the them?


Re-read what I said.
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm...ing.google.com

First time scripting language coders use PHP because it's free, it's cross
platform and because there are free tutorials and samples. They probably
never tried another langauge to compare. I don't think php came out because
CF was bad. CF is one of the easiest languages to use if not the easiest.


Nonsense. I'm sure almost all PHP programmers know ASP, CF, etc.
But, I'm sure most of the ASP or CF programmers know nothing
about PHP---they just criticize without trying---I guess those
guys are not actually "programmers", but marketing guys.

All php programers know cf, asp, etc?? I think I am wasting my time with
you with your lame generalizations.
I'm sure, I've wasted my time with a person who don't try and
see the difference, and who just interested in diverting people.
Try the other languages, come back with
an objective comparisons and then start talking again.
I've already tried. You don't "rumour-ize" or bluffing
anything without trying.
Goodbye.


Goodbye.

---
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The
important thing is to not stop questioning."---Albert Einstein
Email: rrjanbiah-at-Y!com
Jul 17 '05 #50

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