[Tutor] Python vs. PHP

[alan.gauld@bt.com]

> Looking around, I find what seem like two different kinds of dynamic
> webpages. Some are written in Perl (Slashcode) or Python 
> ...ASP/PHP. I guess the former are CGI scripts, and the 
> latter are active server pages. 

There are a couple of other types as well of which the best 
known is JSP or Jasva servlets. But  for the sake of 
convenience I'll refer to the two types as CGI and ASP

They all use the CGI interface but execute slightly 
differently.

> What are the relative merits of doing things 
> one way or the other? 

Big religious arguments over this.

In traditional CGI the cost of starting a new process 
for each request is a big performance hit - especially 
on Windows. So ASP was developed coz ASP runs inside the 
Web server engine and avoids the big startup cost.

However CGI hit back with CGI launchers embedded in the 
server, thus mod-perl and mod-python came to be and 
virtually wiped out the startup issue.

So now it comes down to whether embedding code inside 
html(ASP) was better or worse than embedding html in 
code(CGI). Now .NET is taking ASP one step further and 
totally separating the code and HTML(apart from some 
linking statements)...

Personally I use ASP when I have a largely statioc 
HTML web page but want a bit of dynamic content. For 
example a date/time display or web counter.

If the bulk of the page will be generated dynamically 
- like an Amazon book description say - then I use CGI.

Finally, I'm sure somebody else will tell you about Zope...

Alan G.
(Still stuck in the snow :-)