Why PHP And Not ASP.net

I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies, but i
dont know where to start from. I've worked with ssi for a bit but i want to
create an end to end powerfull website. I dont know what language too start
from, hosting is no problem. Php sounds like a cool language too use but
i've heard asp.net is all the future and has much more components to use.
They also are two totally different languages. Perl/CGI seem to be too
complicated and ColdFusion looks too expensive and crap. Help Me!

Tom

In article <3f4e5309_2@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>, Tim Matthews
<matthews.tim@tiscali.co.uk> wrote:

> I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies, but i
> dont know where to start from. I've worked with ssi for a bit but i want to
> create an end to end powerfull website. I dont know what language too start
> from, hosting is no problem. Php sounds like a cool language too use but
> i've heard asp.net is all the future and has much more components to use.
> They also are two totally different languages. Perl/CGI seem to be too
> complicated and ColdFusion looks too expensive and crap. Help Me!
>
> Tom
>


You might get a biased opinion asking on alt.php
However, I enjoy using php myself.

Tim Matthews wrote:
> I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies, but i
> dont know where to start from. I've worked with ssi for a bit but i want to
> create an end to end powerfull website. I dont know what language too start
> from, hosting is no problem. Php sounds like a cool language too use but
> i've heard asp.net is all the future and has much more components to use.
> They also are two totally different languages. Perl/CGI seem to be too
> complicated and ColdFusion looks too expensive and crap. Help Me!

Okey, I would say that you never will know on what machine you will run the
server on, it could be a unix box, mac box, pegasos/morphos or even a
microsoft windows box, PHP you can run on all of them and of course Apache
too, so if you write PHP scripts, then you will know that your stuff will work
on most platforms. PHP works kind like C++, and if you know C++, you won't
have that much trouble with classes/objects.

If you hit the ASP train and want to use basic as your main language, then you
are limited to microsoft windows boxes, and as servers, those are getting
fewer for each day.

When it comes to .net, there are projects that are working on a "php.net", but
of course evil bill does do everything to change the specifications for .net,
so that others won't get a really "stable" version. IMHO .net ain't the
future, just a milk cow for microsoft and will prolly be used mostly by quite
novice people.


If thats not enough, then there are two other arguments for PHP, fastness and
stability, neither of them will you get with asp.


//Aho

"Tim Matthews" <matthews.tim@tiscali.co.uk> wrote in message
news:<3f4e5309_2@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>...
>
> I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies,
> but i dont know where to start from.

A good thing to start from would be to state your choice of server
platform. By "platform", I mean the operating system, the Web server,
and the database engine you plan on using (if any). The most common
options today seem to be Win2K/IIS/SQL Server 2000, Linux/Apache/MySQL
and FreeBSD/Apache/MySQL. Needless to say, the first is the most
expensive out of the three. PHP can work on all three platforms, but
it is likely to lag ASP on the Microsoft-only combo. ASP only works
on Win2K/IIS, but it has a chance to give you the best performance on
a site that uses databases heavily. (Note that ASP.net tends to lag
ASP in terms of performance as well.) Conversely, if you are not
planning on using databases, PHP on Linux or BSD will beat ASP on
Windows hands down.

> i want to create an end to end powerfull website.

OK, but can you please define "end to end powerful" quantitatively?

> Php sounds like a cool language too use but i've heard asp.net is
> all the future and has much more components to use.

This is somewhat of an exaggeration. There is little ASP can do that
PHP can't, and vice versa. The question is, which is going to get the
job done faster and how much it will cost to deploy.

> Perl/CGI seem to be too complicated

Which means you are not likely to like JSP, either...

Cheers,
NC

J.O. Aho wrote:
> Tim Matthews wrote:
>
>> I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies,
>> but i
>> dont know where to start from. I've worked with ssi for a bit but i
>> want to
>> create an end to end powerfull website. I dont know what language too
>> start
>> from, hosting is no problem. Php sounds like a cool language too use but
>> i've heard asp.net is all the future and has much more components to use.
>> They also are two totally different languages. Perl/CGI seem to be too
>> complicated and ColdFusion looks too expensive and crap. Help Me!
>
>
> Okey, I would say that you never will know on what machine you will run
> the server on, it could be a unix box, mac box, pegasos/morphos or even
> a microsoft windows box, PHP you can run on all of them and of course
> Apache too, so if you write PHP scripts, then you will know that your
> stuff will work on most platforms. PHP works kind like C++, and if you
> know C++, you won't have that much trouble with classes/objects.
>
> If you hit the ASP train and want to use basic as your main language,
> then you are limited to microsoft windows boxes, and as servers, those
> are getting fewer for each day.
>
> When it comes to .net, there are projects that are working on a
> "php.net", but of course evil bill does do everything to change the
> specifications for .net, so that others won't get a really "stable"
> version. IMHO .net ain't the future, just a milk cow for microsoft and
> will prolly be used mostly by quite novice people.
>
>
> If thats not enough, then there are two other arguments for PHP,
> fastness and stability, neither of them will you get with asp.
>
>
> //Aho
>
Amen.

(Well said Aho)

In article <3f4f13c5_2@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>, Tim Matthews
<matthews.tim@tiscali.co.uk> wrote:

> Yeah i want to build a simple business website with administrators tool so
> that adding content to the website can be done via the inernet, i wouldnt
> mind adding xtra stuff like counters, polls... See what i mean?
> Any of you programm in jsp and if so what do you think about it, I run Red
> Hat Linux 8.0 and win 2000 pro (i have sql as well). And has FreeBSD got a
> graphical interface or is it just used for a small server and is text based?
>
> Thx


JSP may have more to draw from....since you will have many Java classes
to use. PHP is more than capable of doing what you want though.

"Tim Matthews" <matthews.tim@tiscali.co.uk> wrote in message
news:<3f4f13c5_2@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>...
>
> Yeah i want to build a simple business website

Now I'm lost.... In less that 24 hours, you went from wanting
"end to end powerful" to desiring "simple". Am I missing something?

> with administrators tool so that adding content to the website
> can be done via the inernet, i wouldnt mind adding xtra stuff
> like counters, polls... See what i mean?

Yeah... Looks like you can accomplish your goal by installing an
off-the-shelf content management system...

> Any of you programm in jsp and if so what do you think about it,

It's basically Java, only you use it to create Web pages rather than
applets.

> has FreeBSD got a graphical interface

Of course; it's a Unix system and as such comes with X Window.

Cheers,
NC

Tim Matthews wrote:

> I want to start programming web pages with server side technologies, but i
> dont know where to start from. I've worked with ssi for a bit but i want
> to create an end to end powerfull website. I dont know what language too
> start from, hosting is no problem. Php sounds like a cool language too use
> but i've heard asp.net is all the future and has much more components to
> use. They also are two totally different languages. Perl/CGI seem to be
> too complicated and ColdFusion looks too expensive and crap. Help Me!
>
> Tom


I develop in both languages
ASP.NET takes about 2* the time it takes to write PHP scripts

Johan

PS:

PHP & MySQL (free of use)

ASP.NET (free BUT you have to buy WINDOWS SERVER 2000 or 2003) & MS-SQL (buy
it ) AND don't forget to buy licenses to access IIS AND MS-SQL with your
clients