PHP vs ASP

[KingOfMAGIC]

Hi every one!In this topic I want to ask what is the best PHP or ASP because I am not pro in this so i want to hear your opinionsand please explain why

[End User]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's pretty well accepted that only terrorists use ASP.

[ShadowMage]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's pretty well accepted that only terrorists use ASP.

Microsoft programmers are terrorists? Well...maybe. :)Anyway, I'd recommend PHP. In my opinion it's far easier to understand. The syntax is so much cleaner and stricter which makes it that much easier to debug and understand. Not to mention that PHP will run on any OS, whereas ASP is restricted to Windows servers.

[wirehopper]

PHP. It's free.

[KingOfMAGIC]

Thanks all for answers but what is the cost for ASP?

[real_illusions]

Thanks all for answers but what is the cost for ASP?

Your soul to Bill Gates

[Synook]

You have to buy licenses for the platform it runs on (i.e. Windows). The software is integrates well with (e.g. SQL Server) usually also costs.Anyway, ASP is outdated, and has been replaced with ASP.NET.

[KingOfMAGIC]

You have to buy licenses for the platform it runs on (i.e. Windows). The software is integrates well with (e.g. SQL Server) usually also costs.Anyway, ASP is outdated, and has been replaced with ASP.NET.

thanks for answer ok is ASP .NET same as ASP in the costs?and i do have windows xp

[KingOfMAGIC]

Your soul to Bill Gates

lol

[boen_robot]

thanks for answer ok is ASP .NET same as ASP in the costs?and i do have windows xp

Considering the fact that newer platforms have ASP classic support for legacy application's sake, I suppose you could say that they're the same in costs.Windows XP Professional comes with IIS and ASP.NET. Disabled by default, but you can enable them from the "Add/Remove Programs" in the control panel, and more precisely - in the "... Windows ..." button on the left (I forgot what it's called exactly... I use Windows 7).Windows XP Home doesn't come with them, and there's no official or supported way to get them. You can google for some hacks, but that's what they are - hacks. Therefore - fragile.Windows Vista and Windows 7 include IIS and ASP.NET in their Business, Professional and Ultimate editions. Again disabled by default, but can be enabled from the "Programs and Components" control panel, and more precisely - the "Turn Windows features On/Off" link from the left.You better not plan on being a host yourself... The costs for the Windows Server OS are much higher than your Profressional (or in the case of Vista and 7 - Ultimate) edition. The cheapest one that can do the trick is ~$400, and the most expensive ones are in four to five digits.Once you have a license for Windows, IIS and ASP(.NET) are all free though. As said, some extras like the SQL server also cost, but again - when you plan to be a host. In the case of SQL Server, there's an express version that can be downloaded and used for free, but with certain limitations of course.

[thescientist]

so does ASP.NET offer anything substantially different than PHP and MySQL? Or are you paying for having someone to be able to call on in the event there are problems?

[boen_robot]

so does ASP.NET offer anything substantially different than PHP and MySQL? Or are you paying for having someone to be able to call on in the event there are problems?

With the OS, yes. With ASP.NET... not really. There are many forums on which MS employees are active, but they're posting there for the same reasons we do - because they like it. They are paid to code, not to assist in forums. Well... in their case, they also post because they like their own creation, but that's just a bonus.As for ASP.NET offering anything different... not really. It's pretty much the same deal. You again have a scripting language that can be extended in various (different) ways, and which can do pretty much anything on the server, including communicating with databases.ASP.NET can be compiled though... that's probably one thing in which it's superior to PHP. However, the compiled code, as it stands currently, runs only on IIS, whereas a plain ASP.NET could run on Apache with MONO. PHP code could be compiled, but with 3rd party compilers which means the resulting code may behave differently in some edge cases (though for the most part, it would be equivalent), and not to mention it would likely lack some of PHP's features.

[thescientist]

so for serious database systems, would the advantage of being able to have the scripting code compiled be a significant performance factor (say if we're talking about amazon or ebay sized systems) that would push them in that direction over PHP? How does Oracle factor into all this? Since it is proprietary, do you get certain advantages similar to using ASP.NET?

[boen_robot]

Compiled code runs much faster than interpreted code, so yes. It's a great performance improvement. It should be noted though, that many ASP.NET programmers tend to overuse and overabstract different objects in their code, which makes the resulting binary run just as good as a non-compiled PHP with similar (but not equivalent; lighter) code would. If you program in ASP.NET, compile it and do not overly abstract your code, you'll see significant performance benefits over a non-compiled PHP code.Oracle is just another database. PHP and ASP.NET can both be clients for Oracle databases, so I don't see what can be said about that. Besides, any RDBMS is "proprietary" by definition. They all use the SQL standard as syntax, but use different protocols, extend the SQL syntax, and support different parts of it... even if using the same base syntax, if many features are lacking, and most of the remaining features are extended, would you still call it a "standard"? I won't...

[thescientist]

thanks for in the info boen_robot.

[End User]

The only area that ASP or ASP.NET have any advantage that I'm aware of is if you want to process things like Word documents. There are some ways to open and process Word docs (and to some extent, Excel spreadsheets) on a Windows system that are either very difficult or just not possible on a Linux box. I've run into this myself a few times when I wanted to extract or manipulate the contents of a Word document- I run all my stuff on Linux servers (Debian, actually) and there's just no practical way to do it that I'm aware of in that environment. That said, I would never switch to a Windows server environment because of this. It's a corner-case that's never really been a a critical issue for me.

so does ASP.NET offer anything substantially different than PHP and MySQL? Or are you paying for having someone to be able to call on in the event there are problems?

[boen_robot]

PHP can do that via COM.BTW, End User, I must say, you're either creating FUD, or are very susceptible to it... I mean, seriously... terrorists? I don't think anyone bought that (thought I must admit it was funny ).Speaking of which, as far as ASP(.NET) usage goes - many banks use it, because it's bundled with their OS of choice Windows. They choose Windows, because they prefer to use stuff with guaranteed support, even if it costs them. With Linux, support exists, but is almost never guaranteed (because it's a free product). Besides, it's easier to train new employees for Windows Server, since it's pretty much like the client version, but with a few additional apps.

[End User]

How does Oracle factor into all this? Since it is proprietary, do you get certain advantages similar to using ASP.NET?

As boen_robot mentioned, PHP will connect to Oracle just fine. Minor Rant: Where most Oracle Pl/SQL programmers go off the rails is that they use PL/SQL to do jobs that should really be handed off to a language running outside the database instead of using PL/SQL to do it. I've had the good fortune to work with some people who really know their Oracle stuff, and almost all of them agree that PL/SQL developers "overuse" the language. One of them was Joe Celko, a pretty sharp guy who helped write the ANSI SQL standards, and his mantra was "let the database do what the database does best and leave the rest to another language". That is, let the DB select and update rows, don't waste its time calculating birthdays or figuring the distance between two points. If anyone's interested, here's his excellent "Thinking In Sets" lecture: Joe Celko: Thinking In Sets (Great stuff that applies to any database, Oracle, mySQL, postgres, whatever)Joe's not stylish (he always dresses like he bought his clothes at Johnny Cash's yard sale), but he knows his stuff. He's forgotten more SQL than I'll ever learn. He's an interesting character. And, if Oracle is your cup of tea, this site has a lot of good stuff on it: http://psoug.org

[End User]

PHP can do that via COM.

On a Linux box? If that's true, I'd be grateful for any links you could point me to. I'd love to have this capability.

BTW, End User, I must say, you're either creating FUD, or are very susceptible to it... I mean, seriously... terrorists? I don't think anyone bought that (thought I must admit it was funny ).

Oh yeah, no question. I mean, you don't think it's a coincidence that "Al Queda" and "ASP" both start with the letter "A", do you?

Speaking of which, as far as ASP(.NET) usage goes - many banks use it, because it's bundled with their OS of choice Windows. They choose Windows, because they prefer to use stuff with guaranteed support, even if it costs them. With Linux, support exists, but is almost never guaranteed (because it's a free product).

This is certainly true in a corporate environment (although Red Hat offers some pretty good support packages). In my usage Linux support comes via my hosting company (and to their credit, they've got some very knowledgeable folks on board.)

[boen_robot]

On a Linux box? If that's true, I'd be grateful for any links you could point me to. I'd love to have this capability.

Um... no. On Windows only. For Linux, I think (based on theory, but I haven't tried it, nor do I have confirmation from someone) that you can use the .NET APIs provided by Office 2007 if you install Office 2007 via WINE, and have MONO to call the .NET APIs. But MONO interprets ASP.NET... for PHP to call the .NET APIs on Linux... I don't think there is a way. Maybe if someone altered the com_dotnet extension to use MONO if available...

Oh yeah, no question. I mean, you don't think it's a coincidence that "Al Queda" and "ASP" both start with the letter "A", do you?

Next you'll say the whole acronym really means "Al quaeda Server Pages" ... or something even more ridiculous .

This is certainly true in a corporate environment (although Red Had offers some pretty good support packages). In my usage Linux support comes via my hosting company (and to their credit, they've got some very knowledgeable folks on board.)

Yes, and they are irreplacable... and I don't think any corporate wants to have an irreplaceable guy at hand, unless there's no other way.

[End User]

...you can use the .NET APIs provided by Office 2007 if you install Office 2007 via WINE, and have MONO to call the .NET APIs. But MONO interprets ASP.NET... for PHP to call the .NET APIs on Linux... Maybe if someone altered the com_dotnet extension to use MONO if available...

Well that sounds pretty straightforward, except for the MONO/WINE/API/ASP.NET part.

Next you'll say the whole acronym really means "Al quaeda Server Pages"

Whoah, not many people know it stands for that. I find that very suspicious, Mr Boen_Robot, if that's even your real name... lol :)I gotta go take my Executive Officer (wife) to work. Cheers.

[KingOfMAGIC]

wow thanks all for your help i appreciate it