I would say that I'm well versed with ASP, meaning that I can pretty much do whatever is is that I need or want to do. My biggest problem is that I can code stuff for all my Linux hosted buddies. So what I'm interested in is learning PHP.

So my question for you is this:
What's the learning curve like for diving into PHP if I already know ASP? And in the long run, which one would you prefer?

Thanks for your help!

. necronom .

do you need to run anything special on your server to run php scripts

hmmm... I've done this trick once already and disagree in any similarities between the two languages.  ASP very clearly is a much more sophisticated scripting language, while PHP offers many programming benefits and the two vastly differ.

My suggestion, if you know ASP, spend your time learning C, C++ or .NET.  Once you know one of these languages it will be much easier to pick up PHP.

One thing nobody has mentioned about PHP is that when using a MySQl database, it's probably the fastest combo available right now. (from what I've experienced and read anyways)

I've priced both PHP and MySQL. Their free. I don't think that ASP or Access is free.

The only thing I don't like about PHP, is their include virtual sucks compaired to ASP. Other then that, I think their fairly equal languages.

Regarding speed and performance, here's an interesting comparison of the PHP and ASP versions of the same search engine script: http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/benchmarks.html - http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/benchmarks.html

It doesn't use a SQL database though, so the functionality involved here would only include stuff like file operations, arrays/data structures, and lots of string comparisons and even regular expressions. It seems that PHP has a huge gain in speed and scales much better too.

Yes, but they're benchmarks of the ASP and PHP version of a website search script - of how long each version takes to produce results given a search query. The operations involved in such a function would include what i mentioned... and shows how PHP and ASP versions of similar code/algorithm can have such a big difference in the overall application performance. Note that its for _this_ application obviously, and you can't judge overall ASP performance based on that. But it's interesting nonetheless.

the benefits of php

- easy to run on a linux server

-php/my sql => killer duo (speed)

-mysql is free (not like ms sql)

-easy to learn

- much more ..

Bliss wrote: I personally like ASP better because it looks better. PHP has too many $'s and ?'s and when I look at it my head just starts to hurt for some reason. ASP just has lots of .'s , ()' and %'s, and they're rounded characters, so I like them better for some reason.

 thats a dumb argument and you it , you need to judge  a language on how good it works or not .. not by the charactars used ..

i used both languages and php is much easier to use .. less code gets more done

cr*piecorn wrote: Bliss wrote: I personally like ASP better because it looks better. PHP has too many $'s and ?'s and when I look at it my head just starts to hurt for some reason. ASP just has lots of .'s , ()' and %'s, and they're rounded characters, so I like them better for some reason.  thats a dumb argument and you it , you need to judge  a language on how good it works or not .. not by the charactars used .. i used both languages and php is much easier to use .. less code gets more done

Its actually quite a legitimate reason.  Code needs to be easily written, understood, and debugged if required.

If users find it difficult to read a certain language then any or all of these may suffer.

I dont like PHP at all! The New ASP.NET is way better and faster, and PHP uses those wicked {}{}{}{}{} etc.

I have a Linux server, wich is connected to my domain, and 2 home servers, wich run Server 2003 Microsoft versions. I just connect the Linux server to the home server (trough a frame, doh), because ASP is just WAY easier, and faster, and nicer, and has better support (>>??<<), and..

I would like to add my bit, Personally I think that PHP is a better choice than ASP. Some of the advantages of PHP is that you can run it on many webservers, like APACHE, IIS and Xitami. Whereas ASP you are pretty limited to IIS.(You can get an addon to other web servers for ASP, but they are costly, and even then , not officially supported), even if you never use anything else but IIS, the option is there is you need it. Also PHP natively supports many database formats, like MySQL, Postgresql and even MSSQL which makes it very fast to connect

The syntax is somewhat different in php, but then once you have mastered it it is easy enough. Believe me , if I can do it then anyone can.

In saying all of this, I think that ASP has its advantages too, I have seen much better, websites developed in ASP than PHP, for some reason the "FINISHED" product always seems better on ASP than PHP

That's true, although ASP.NET support almost ALL the database formats, even the ones you create yourself.

The server's are a bit limited, but who cares? APACHE is free, IIS isn't right? Just get a server with IIS, and you can use both at the same time.

Doesn't ASP allow you to use the MySQL database though? This is what I've heard because essentally, a SQL database is a SQL database, it's just different coding on the programmers part.  But aparently, somebody has connected a ASP 3.0 query to a MySQL database.
Im not tottaly sure seeming as I have a small site that uses Access.

There is a free version of MSSQL available with the Office suite and on the Microsoft site as well.
http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?View=en-us&p=1&s=0&c=1&st=b&qu=SQL&na=30 - http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?View=en-us&a mp;p=1&s=0&c=1&st=b&qu=SQL&na=30
Something round there I think.

If you already know asp, learn vb script, visual basics, .net and c/c++. From what I hear they’re all pretty similar.

If cost is a motivating factor, then pick PHP. Free is always good.

Mmmm, C++ is not really simular to vb script you know

To clarify my last post.

I heard that asp and vb script are the same

visual basica and .net are the same

and visual basics and .net are similar to c/c++

pmormr wrote: oh BTW, ASP is VBScript...

ASP is not VBScript.

ASP is a technology for serving web pages.

VBScript is a cut down language from VB. It is also used in WSH, but is not the same as ASP.

As for C++ and .NET... there is no relevence at all.

C++ is a programming language, while .NET is a framework for languages to work within. .NET is closer to an OS than a programming language (but that is still a stretch).

C++ is similar to C#, which is essentially the .NET version of C/C++.

VB.NET and C# are similar in that they can do similar tasks. Their syntax IS different, but if you know one, you can learn the other one. O'Reilley publishes a number of books which give you a good idea of the differences.

Neither C# nor VB.NET are related to ASP.NET because ASP.NET is a web serving technology that can use either language, as well as several others like J# or some .NET flavor of COBOL, etc...

To understand the differences, look up what web servers do, what languages do, and then compare that against what .NET and the CLR are.

.NET comes out as something similar to Web Objects (now owned by Apple).

PHP sucks because of the following reasons:

 - It just does
 - You have no idea at all what VB.NET allow's you, really, it isn't comparable
 - PHP is not compiled, where an ASP.NET application is compiled and therefore works WAY faster (like an application *.dll)
 - ASP.NET allows you to use custom modules for IIS authentification, or just custom DLL's you created before (in .NET ofcourse)
 - ASP.NET allows you to use multiple languages in 1 (web) application
 - ASP.NET rules

Flamewave wrote: You have obvoiusly never coded in PHP I take it. PHP is actually a really nice language, well layed out and easy to understand if you already know c/c++, java, or any other similar language. It has alot of built in functions that come in very handy, and supports pretty much everything ASP does. It seems that with my experience with PHP whenever I think I need to create a function to do something, I find a built-in function that does it just as well if not better then one I could write myself. ASP doesn't really have that. I havn't worked much with ASP.NET, so I am not going to say anything about the comparison between PHP and ASP.NET.

Yes I did coded in PHP and no I didn't had any programming experience before. Now the weird syntax slow's you down (in the beginning) and it is true that it is somewhat simular to ASP.

But compared with ASP.NET it is totaly nothing

wolfie wrote: Doesn't ASP allow you to use the MySQL database though? This is what I've heard because essentally, a SQL database is a SQL database, it's just different coding on the programmers part.  But aparently, somebody has connected a ASP 3.0 query to a MySQL database. Im not tottaly sure seeming as I have a small site that uses Access.

Yes you can connect to mySQL from ASP, you just the the myODBC driver installed on the server and you can connect to it pretty much the same as you do with access or mssql but some querys syntax is a little different and the methods are also different... but you still can code an application with queries that are access, mssql, and mysql compatible just gotta to change your way of coding...

While it's said that MSSQL is faster than MySQL I've found that PHP and mySQL will beat ASP and MSSQL anytime...

About PHP vs ASP I think PHP is a much faster and powerful scripting language than ASP... you can do a lot more with plain PHP while with ASP you need components for pretty much everything...

Some people find PHP is a little to code than ASP because it uses a lot more characters that you gotta hit SHIFT to produce like $, {}, etc.., but that don't really make it harder cuz something that might take 50 lines of code on ASP can be done with 10 lines of PHP...

One thing I like about ASP is that everytime I download an ASP script it's usually easy to understand and well commented so you can learn a lot from other people's work, but most PHP scripts are 'optimized' when you download it so you can't understand the code cuz in PHP you can compress a 500 lines file into a 10 lines file and it will still run and authors do that to protect their work...

About .NET I haven't learned anything about it yet, the applications I've seen on .NET seems to run very fast but also lack a lot of functionality but I guess that not a fault on .NET but on the app developers.