[BangPypers] [OT] language fanaticism

[Sidu Ponnappa]

> My outlook is that code is liability. If I can get the job done without
> "writing" code, that's probably what I'll do.
Agreed.

Best,
Sidu.
http://c42.in

On Thu, Jul 14, 2011 at 10:03 AM, Noufal Ibrahim <noufal at gmail.com> wrote:
> Sidu Ponnappa <lorddaemon at gmail.com> writes:
>
>>> many bitter experiences - security is a nightmare for php apps. Take a
>>> look at the number of security updates wordpress has per *month* - more
>>> than django has had in 6 *years*.
>> That is based on strong correlation between PHP applications and poor
>> engineering.
>>
>> If we're having a philosophical debate, the question then is 'What if
>> there was a hypothetical, well engineered open source PHP
>> application?'
>>
>> I'm torn. Purely philosophically, I would be fine dealing with it
>> assuming I had the time to spare to learn PHP idioms, and that time
>> was otherwise spent solving real issues and not problems caused by
>> rubbish code. Practically though, PHP as a language makes my teeth
>> ache, and from what I've seen well factored PHP programs spend a lot
>> of time working around the limitations of the language. It's turing
>> complete, but pretty much the only other language that I've used that
>> I like less is XSLT.
>
> It has more than a fair share of rough spots but it also has it's own
> advantages.
>
> I think PHP is like english in the sense, it's easy to speak/write even
> when ones control over the language is minimal. YOu can get a whole web
> site up and running quickly without knowing much. THis has spawned a
> series of poorly engineered apps which (because worse is better) have
> hit the net.
>
> However, there are really large deployments of PHP out there which are
> quite stable. archive.org, facebook, wikipedia and (as I heard from the
> recent PHPCloud conference here), Flipkart. So, given a good team, you
> can get things right.
>
> This whole thing is a digression though.
>
> My basic point is that if there's a tool written already that *does* the
> job you want done, would you stay away from it purely because its not in
> your favourite language?
>
> My outlook is that code is liability. If I can get the job done without
> "writing" code, that's probably what I'll do.
>
> Wordpress is probably the poster boy for poorly engineered PHP apps but
> I'd prefer using it (and applying security patches when they come out)
> rather than writing (and more importantly spending time maintaining) my
> own blogging app in the latest and greatest Python framework.
>
> As for Kenneth's points on the LUG sites, they're simply poorly
> maintained. A lot of high profile secure sites run on PHP so it's a moot
> argument.
>
>
>
> [...]
>
>
> --
> ~noufal
> http://nibrahim.net.in
>
> Our similarities are different. -Dale Berra, son of Yogi
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