Most of my projects in the last 10 years have been PHP based. I still think it has to change. There are much nicer alternatives (like Python). The reason PHP is still so common is the low learning curve. This also attracts bad programmers who create abominations someone else has to work with.
Some changes are more related to the runtime environment, like the whole configuration mess that the article mentions.
I also think the PHP community lacks brilliant developers. There are many okay and even good developers. But most PHP applications nowadays look at Java and the abundance of design patterns that often don't make sense in a web environment where application lifetime is usually a few years not decades. Look at Zend Framework. It can do anything. But you need to write so much boilerplate code that all the flexibility a scripting language offers is lost.
The PHP community needs to figure out what it wants to be. If I want to use something that is very verbose I will use Java. If I want to move fast I will use Ruby or Python. At the moment PHP seems to be somewhere in between.
As long as nothing fundamental changes I will only use PHP when getting paid. For anything I do for fun I will use other languages.
I also think the PHP community lacks brilliant developers.
I had to downvote you for this crap. What's odd is how easily it slips into the comment, as if it's assumed that anyone who uses PHP is "lesser". Here's a tip in life: there are 0 times where you should say any developer community lacks brilliant developers.
Look at Zend Framework. It can do anything. But you need
to write so much boilerplate code that all the flexibility
a scripting language offers is lost.
You list one example of a framework that is "large but cumbersome", and somehow PHP has an identity crisis?
As long as nothing fundamental changes I will only use PHP
when getting paid.
I would love to see something you put together in PHP. I'm seriously questioning whether you have ever written any PHP code at all, or if the sum of your PHP knowledge is just patching Wordpress plugins for side-money.
It's not that the PHP community lacks smart developers, it's that they lack smart developers that really work with the people who have no idea what they're doing to improve everyone's skill.
If there's one thing that I found impressive about the Perl community, typified by Perl Monks, it was that any question, no matter how stupid, was always answered thoroughly and respectfully.
There's no analog in the PHP world. It's too diffused. The people that are making a living writing world-class PHP applications don't talk to those just getting started and doing everything wrong.
I mean, I see what you're saying, but that's got to be speculative at best. I don't know if you can pin that problem down to a particular language. The PHP community is massive and most questions are answered already somewhere online. I have seen PHP developers assume people coming from other languages should just pick up and know PHP's quirks and for that the PHP devs should be faulted.
If your complaint is that there's no PHP-analog to Perl Monks, well then I'd have to say that it does exist, but you need to go to more targeted communities to find it. The CodeIgniter community was immensely helpful. The Laravel community is now large and very helpful. Even the Phalcon community, which is tiny, is great. So while there might not be this one massive PHP Monks community, a similar version does exist in PHP projects' communities.
> I also think the PHP community lacks brilliant developers.
Really? How can you say that with a straight face about a community of that size? I get that maybe you don't think PHP is brilliant, but to say that it lacks brilliant developers seems closed minded and kinda rude.
What I mean by brilliant developer is someone who comes up with new paradigm shifting ideas that influence not just PHP development but other languages as well. I have been part of the PHP community for a very long time and I have read a huge amount of books/articles/blogs on PHP development. And I can't recall something that really impressed me.
Some changes are more related to the runtime environment, like the whole configuration mess that the article mentions.
I also think the PHP community lacks brilliant developers. There are many okay and even good developers. But most PHP applications nowadays look at Java and the abundance of design patterns that often don't make sense in a web environment where application lifetime is usually a few years not decades. Look at Zend Framework. It can do anything. But you need to write so much boilerplate code that all the flexibility a scripting language offers is lost.
The PHP community needs to figure out what it wants to be. If I want to use something that is very verbose I will use Java. If I want to move fast I will use Ruby or Python. At the moment PHP seems to be somewhere in between.
As long as nothing fundamental changes I will only use PHP when getting paid. For anything I do for fun I will use other languages.