Is PHP dying? Should I learn Ruby instead if I want to be a web developer?
 

or maybe I should learn Javascript since JQuery and Node.js are so popular.

An engineer told me PHP is shit now. Is that true or is it still a good thing to learn?

PHP isn't dying. It's probably the most widely used sever side application development language.

just learn to say, "Would you like large fries with that" ? :upsidedow

PHP will not die soon ;)

I think the best one is with the largest community and PHP still has the largest community.

oh nevermind
"PHP is used by 81.6% of all the websites whose server-side programming language we know."

http://w3techs.com/technologies/details/pl-php/all/all

http://w3techs.com/diagram/history_technology/pl-php

php isn't dying.

That engineer is idiot. He should back to school and start again :1orglaugh

language isn't dieing, it's more popular than ever, but that's really a downside... everyone and their dog knows php now a days, so your return on time invested learning php isn't going to be very high...

you can still do well with php, but it will take years to gain experience, build a good rep, etc.... if you are starting from scratch I would look elsewhere for easy $$...

think of it kinda like knowing html, it's good to know, but you are not going to get very far with it...

learn , python
php isnt really for multithreading, and not that really fast,

he said php is really slow and used the old FaceBook as an example

I would recommend you stop listening to this individual. Until you have at least 5 years of experience, you aren't going to be working on any projects where the speed of PHP is an issue.

Learn PHP and Javascript, learn to problem-solve, learn to communicate effectively, learn why testing and documentation are important, then learn to be rock-solid reliable. If you learn these things, you will have more work than you know what to do with.

ok, so PHP is #1 right now.
which language do you think will be #1 in 5 years ?

PHP :thumbsup

PHP + Bootstrap = Winning.

PHP is far from dead...but if you are to learn it... don't just learn PHP... learn OOPHP... learn some OO design patterns.... learn some of the PHP frameworks.. get to know how to use source control... especially Git.... Learn SQL.... learn how to use a PHP ORM... (Doctrine). Learn how to use Linux and run your webservers.

If you don't have a relevant degree then you could gain certification such as Zend PHP certification.. Symfony Framework Certifications... MySQL Developer Certification.... Linux Certification...

Becoming a developer requires a little more than learning the basics of a programming language... you need to understand the whole ecosystem!

Indeed.

Whats up blazin? Good to see you are still around. :thumbsup

I only hate that they deprecate some functions in newer PHP versions - this makes older scripts nonfunctional sometimes...
Why not make these deprecations optional... no full backward compatibility - that sucks a little bit.....

For adult sites? As most others advised, learn PHP + Javascript (HTML5+js+PHP) and you'll be happy. Optimised traffic trading servers are written in C, quite confusing one :)
I can not understand the Ruby mania myself, perhaps I am too old.

Python is cool and I use it to write my evil small scripts, but despite since a few years I always try to have new projects to be started from scratch in Python, in reality my (adult) productions sites are all based on PHP (even if may include also node.js or wowza=java pieces), mostly because they evolve from legacy PHP code pieces (cam sites, tubes or whatever).
I have mainstream services (no adult) with Java server (j2ee subset jsp/servlet), these was setup in late 1990's and early 2000s, and still up, but I would not advise Java on server really now, unless you are a bank or telecom... Java it was not updated in last 10 years - people use JVM more with Scala or such. A former java developer is now into C# and microsoft stuff, guess what.

About the deprecated PHP things - yes had to replace a few things on updates, but Python made even bigger changes! I mean tell me what you can update without issues.

PHP isn't dying.

PHP is getting faster with HHVM thanks to Facebook engineers

best place to learn php online?

that is really great advice, all of it. thanks

sites with tutorials.

With 80+ % of sites using it, perhaps that engineer is shit now...

LOL at 2:40 - 2:55 ;-)

Google wants you to learn Python... it's their language of choice

I like TeamTreehouse videos. theyre more engaging.
Lynda.com is ok but theyre extremely boring.

check https://www.udemy.com

PHP is definitely a winner when it comes to making variety of projects,but so far i never found a reason to go with other language,for example if i needed something what cant be done with php,i simply made it in c++,called it with system command in php,processed output and that's it.When it comes to speed,it is true how other languages are faster,but i believe how php can be same speed or even faster if you pay attention to your coding style plus if you use cache accelerator.And another question is what is your aim to accomplish - for example,if your goal is to increase chances to get a job - then you should go with java,since according to statistic java is most wanted language,plus it is paid 2x more then php jobs.
If you want to make commercial scripts,then php is only choice due it's market share and it is installed by default on every web hosting.
And if you want to make scripts for you own use(to run on your websites)then it totally depend on what kind of sites you run and what kind of data you process.
Also when it comes to javascript,it should be learned as well with php since you could say how javascript is some sort of "visual tasks addon " for php.

Nice wondering can you make money with it.

Many times when i was asking that question i was told how php.net manual is place to learn it,and that was kind a pissing me off since it kind a look poor with presented information.But the good thing there is their comment section,and many time i found proper example of what i tried to accomplish there.Beside php.net ,wc3school php section is good as well.

I think its just a snob thing with that engineer. Php is so common so he's snobby against it.
hey gfy is all done in php and its pretty fast lol.

http://i.imgur.com/19cld.gif

Nice gif :thumbsup

tried it already , not all functions are supported. but they are improving bit by bit

true!
gonna test some scripts'hits made by me this days and see how it works...

and - they say that it works - test wordpress and figure out how it handles with timthumb...

At Mentel we built many web applications, for startup to F500, and here's my observation.

Ruby on Rails
We used it many time, and it's a clean language. We actually used it to develop a program in this business. You can do awesome things with it, but you can also destroy an application, at the end, I don't think this is for beginners. For example, if you're a gem addict, well select them well because the day you need to upgrade your rails version, good luck. Most of the time they are no longer supported by the creator and the time you saved by using them at first, is eat by the time you waste making them to work. Also, choosing RoR as a development language is a thing, finding developers is another one. So if you're not a coder and need to develop an application, make sure you have some resources in your pocket in case you need to change your developer. RoR tend to be very pricy.

PHP
It's a language that has its pros and cons. At time we used it on a porn website doing 1.5Gb/sec and 600k/v a day, and no flaw. You can also use many good framework such like, cakephp, symfony2, CodeIgniter, Slim, Falcon etc. I personally like Slim and Falcon for the simplicity and the fact you don't depend on them. The big advantage of PHP is the amount of developers on the market. You should always have a friend who is very strong and do the code review for you though (if you're not a coder).

Python
Didn't used it very often, in my opinion very strong language, difficult to find senior developer, and not for beginners.

At the end it depend on the project you have. If you build a small website with a small backend and limited interaction with the DB, then RoR and Python are overkill. Most of the time people don't take the time to look at their needs and what the site will be in a year from now. If you look at twitter at first when they were on RoR and got very successful, they had to work with Scala as well, which is very very very solid language.

Anyway I guess you got the point hehe

In Boston area alone there is 350 jobs advertised for PHP developer with salaries from 50k to 130k. 230 of those jobs are 70k+. 55 of them are 110k+ and 22 are 130k+.

That's just one metro area in the US. I'd say PHP is not quite dead yet.. Granted they expect you to know more than just PHP, but obviously it's still wanted.

http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=php+dev...2C+MA&start=10

PHP is a very viable language, and in recent years there has been a major push for standardization of the language.

What's interesting is that if you look for just a javascript developer that number more than quintuples to 1,248 jobs
http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=javascr...l=Boston%2C+MA

and they earn more than a php developer
http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=php+...r&l1=boston+ma
http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=java...r&l1=boston+ma

Agreed...all my sites & CMS for the members area are all php driven.
Never an issue. So, you're most likely right about that!

Probably because javascript is visual language and as such is needed for creating games,and making games is far more profitable then anything else.
And here some useful articles:
https://www.udemy.com/blog/best-programming-language/
http://www.sitepoint.com/best-progra...guage-of-2013/

As others said, PHP is most used language today, with a lot of powerful frameworks, huge community, so definitely it is not waste of time to learn it.

As for frameworks, anyone used Fuel?

php will never die, b/c its basically perl who want to be even lazier programmers and
combine their content, presentation, and behavior all into one.

Learn php b/c you will have to work on other peoples trash code at some point in your life.

clearly 80% of the programming world disagrees with me. I dont care. they are trash devs who make trash apps. (yes, there are a few good php apps, but they shouldnt have been php in the first place)

Learn to write in something else for your server side and switch to
server side / content , presentation,and behavior so you can hand shit off to your developer, your html monkey, and your designer. instead of having all 3 idiots trying to collaborate wasting your time.

the main benefit of php was the ability to embed html into your perl code. thats just a mess. learn perl if you want to write php. content should be separated from your software.

dont like perl? fine whatever write in whatever language you want. just remember php without embed is just shitty perl :)

Learn php + mysql and you'll be golden. :thumbsup

sad, but true.

I don't think it's dying. So far it's been the most widely used web language.

You sure?
If you meant Grand Theft Auto, Call of Duty or FIFA it is profitable, that's true but to develop these it cost several million and it is not you doing these games anyway.
About Minecraft yes cool story bro, but that happens as often as a facebook story: it does not happen to you.
I released several games in past 15 years (home computers, mobile phones), and in most cases I ended in loss, also you need to release new games for new platforms every year - much easier to do $$ in adult, at least cams, after site is up, it runs ok for years.
95% of independent game developers end up in loss. Example, average iphone/android game sales (advertising + in-app purchase) makes $500-$1000 for whole game lifetime (a year or 2) - development time well worth more than $1k. Source code of games is for sale for $100-$300 in auction sites. Top sals games spent lots $$ in advertising, the viral thing it is a legend, check there are affiliate networks for web games much like adult (and they use PHP very often).

Well i got that impression based on people who i know and which work as java programmers - they were all doing on games only.But for right answer it would require deeper analysis/research,as while url's which is posted shows job statistic,they dont show exactly what they need java programmers.
And it's not minecraft only game with such success,but again it is possible how it is just media hype ,since i heard a bit toomuch time how some shitty mobile games was sold in million copies and brought a lot of monies to it's creators.

im pretty sure facebook is still actually written in php and ran through hiphop.

there are lots of tools and lots of jobs, some tools can do many jobs and some can only do a few. and many jobs can be solved with many tools, some only one. anyone who would pigeon hole themselves into only using one language and touting its greatness without deep understanding of the others is a fool cutting them self short. yes, you can hammer a screw like a nail, but its not gonna work right, ya know?

php isnt "just perl", php is improved perl. thats why perl is indeed dying and php is still growing. php is very easy to separate concerns, if you want to.

javascript has a lot of hype around it these days, and it cant really be compared to php at all, as its much more extensible. its also what android apps mainly run on, there is node.js, games can be written in it, its also very easy to embed into a system for other types of operations. so consider that when looking at the job ad counts. php = mostly web. JS, not so much anymore.

i think some RoR developers just like to bash PHP because fewer people know Ruby, and to stroke their own egos. but beware, they are backing you into a corner of being forced to use rare programmers with higher costs. i think the main drawback of ruby for me was mentioned above.

also to consider, finding a superstar php programmer is pretty hard, even with the giant talent pool. imagine finding one on the same level in a language thats used 30x less, with a smaller community and lesser documentation to learn from.

point; right tool right job, do the research. if someone trys to sell you something, ask them to prove it, rather then take their word for it.