PHP has only one feature going for it: it already exists. As soon as you introduce a new programming language, you lose what PHP has to offer. Another success is the lack of a library culture -- just copy-and-paste code into your app, and you never have to worry about installing dependencies on your shared host.
If you want a better version of PHP, try Perl / Python / Ruby. If you want a language that can check your code for safety at compile-time, use Haskell. But if you invent your own language, it will have three problem: nobody will know how to use it, it won't be installed on any three-dollars-a-month shared host, and it won't have any libraries.
If you can't solve the "I want to use it for $3 a month" problem, your programming language is a failure compared to PHP. If you can afford more than $3 a month for hosting, then you're not using PHP anyway. Most people learn to program because they want to share something with their friends. They choose PHP because it lets them do that, and they don't have the experience to know that They Are Doing It Wrong. By the time you introduce a PHP "reboot", you're not going to get that "Don't Know That I'm Doing It Wrong" crowd anymore, and then who's your audience?
Writing a new programming language is fun, but don't expect it to replace PHP. That's going to be impossible unless your rewrite is shipped from php.net and replaces what exists now.
The stated goals of this project aren't the ones I would have picked, but I'm sympathetic to the motivation behind it.
I think that a vastly cleaned up PHP (PHP6 or whatever) would attract the millions of loyal developers that PHP already has.
Many people just don't appreciate how much mindshare PHP has in parts of northern / central europe. And for those people it's not about $3 hosting, for them it's a proven workhorse language in which they can get things done on the web.
Not to mention that a business culture has grown up around these localised skill concentrations in which lots of businesses are now run on PHP.
I think when you say, "PHP has only one feature going for it: it already exists", you are vastly over trivializing steamroller-like traction and market penetration.
"for them it's a proven workhorse language in which they can get things done on the web" ... which has a lot to do with its broad adoption (and thus easy hiring), and with certain software packages like Drupal, WordPress, Moodle and so on.
When has the elegance or power of a language ever been a consideration in the general business culture?
It hasn't been the case with Fortran or COBOL, IMO. And both are still used, despite being "dead," to maintain legacy systems that companies can't quite afford to replace yet.
But if he's creating a new, unrelated language and calling it PHP, all he's doing is hijacking that "steamroller-like traction and market penetration" anyway.
Exactly. Most other web languages have this issue: You start from (1)"Here is how to do xyz. Fun huh" and (2)"Here is how you start working on your webapp."
Step 2 involves getting a server somewhere (as opposed to mamp or $3 hosting). Deciding on a framework (or no framework). Probably some command line stuff. etc.
With php, there is no step 2. Some of what you do in step 2 php programmers might want to do anyway (eg install a framework) but it's not necessary for starting out.
Upsides and downsides to that, I guess (I'm not a programmer) but that is core. If you could take that (MAMP-like installation, through your code into html, etc.) and use another language (including an existing one) I think you would have something.
Writing a new programming language is fun, but don't expect it to replace PHP. That's going to be impossible unless your rewrite is shipped from php.net and replaces what exists now.
I wholeheartedly agree. "phpreboot" isn't PHP, it is a new programming language that looks similar to (or shares traits of) PHP.
I'm not sure how this gains traction associating itself with PHP. As a currently PHP developer, I'm certainly not going to hitch my wagon to something that looks to be a forked version of PHP.
- Bigger community, thus more resource documentation out there (Perl has Perl Monks going for it).
- More MVC frameworks (CakePHP, CI, Symfony, Lithium) vs. Catalyst.
- PHP has a cleaner syntax
I'm biased to PHP so of course I think it's better. For someone getting started with web development, I would recommend PHP over Perl. That is not to say that one should never "explore" Perl. Hell, Lawrence Livermore Labs uses a lot of it.
As Perl was developed originally as a scripting language for unix, it is fast, but I don't think it's well suited for the web (my opinion).
Plus, like the troll below me said (who apparently wrote a book on Catalyst, hence his bias), PHP was highly influenced from Perl, so if anything PHP is an alternative to Perl, not the other way around (like the OP mentioned).
I don't suggest Perl because I wrote a book on Catalyst. I wrote a book on Catalyst because I suggest Perl.
Anyway, here's what Perl has going for it:
* a larger group of core contributers
* an order of magnitude more modules (and module authors)
* Moose
* excellent Emacs support
* higher average level of proficiency among core team, and module authors
Ultimately, CPAN is the reason for using Perl. But after doing a lot of work in Python, I do really appreciate the things that Perl has built-in, too, like all-encompassing regexes.
They use it cautiously and reluctantly because they don't have much choice at this point. The Asana and Quora founders ditched it at the earliest opportunity.
Clearly, Facebook is in a different PHP area than your bog-standard $3/month crowd. Facebook has an advanced PHP tool chain that compiles PHP down to C++ (hip-hop)and they reap performance gains from that. They also built PHP repl (phpsh) because `php -a` sucks.
But to be fair, their PHP is a subset of the official PHP, and they probably use all of their own libraries (rather than the ones you have access to outside of Facebook).
So if you want Facebook to be your PHP success story, all you get out of it is "PHP didn't kill their company; they were eventually able to move away", which I suppose is not exactly a swimming endorsement.
If you want a better version of PHP, try Perl / Python / Ruby. If you want a language that can check your code for safety at compile-time, use Haskell. But if you invent your own language, it will have three problem: nobody will know how to use it, it won't be installed on any three-dollars-a-month shared host, and it won't have any libraries.
If you can't solve the "I want to use it for $3 a month" problem, your programming language is a failure compared to PHP. If you can afford more than $3 a month for hosting, then you're not using PHP anyway. Most people learn to program because they want to share something with their friends. They choose PHP because it lets them do that, and they don't have the experience to know that They Are Doing It Wrong. By the time you introduce a PHP "reboot", you're not going to get that "Don't Know That I'm Doing It Wrong" crowd anymore, and then who's your audience?
Writing a new programming language is fun, but don't expect it to replace PHP. That's going to be impossible unless your rewrite is shipped from php.net and replaces what exists now.