JSP vs. PHP
Well, I’m disliking Java more and more as I go along. I think that the
problem is that it isn’t just one programming language. It’s more like
5. Java, Servlets, JSP, JSTL, JSF. The thing is, you can’t just skip
right to JSF, you have to learn the first four first. None of them
stand on their own once you know them, so you can’t just quazi learn
the first four, and really learn the last one. It’s more like a tier.
You have to really know each one before you move onto the next one,
and you use all of them up to the tier you are on pretty intensively
(whether you’re on the highest tier or not). It’s overly complicated,
confusing, and annoying. The annoying thing is that everything after
servlets is just a different, more (supposed to be less) complicated
way of doing a servlet. It’s like randomly rearanging the layout of
your keyboard, trying to make it eisier, while maintaining that you
also have to know how to use the old layout, because the new one
doesn’t quite cut it.
Anyways, I’m seriously considering throwing it all out the window and
switching to PHP. This would put Mike Xue out of work with my company,
but only as long as he refuses to learn PHP (it would only take about
a week). Now, before I make a rash decision like that… I am trying
to gather all of the input I can.
Why stick with Java?
I’m not experienced enough to really make a decision either way. What
I’m looking at is this:
Java is complicated, confusing, difficult to use (to be efficient, you
have to learn another programming language, ANT, just to compile the
darn thing so you can see if your program works!), old, hard to
maintain, hard to learn, and has much less help available online
(since it’s 5 different programming languages, there is less help for
each one).
PHP can be learned in a week if you are really determined to do so
(one of those, learn in a day, master in a lifetime things),
straight-forward, simple, and I already know it (for the most part…)
If my life were a roleplaying game, and Java and PHP where skills that
I could obtain up to level 50 status on each, I’d be about level 23 on
PHP, and level 10 on Java (with Java being made up of 5 subclasses, and me
being between level 1 and 3 in each).
So, sorry for my rambling dissertation on my delima. But the question
still stands. Why stick with Java? Is there something about Java that
just has the smack down on PHP that I just don’t know about (seeing as
I’m a noob)?
What I am doing is creating surveys. When someone takes the survey,
they get “points”. Then they can go to an online catalogue and “spend”
their “points”. I have to store user information (name, address,
phone). However, there are no money transactions or credit cards
involved.
Seems like overkill to do that in Java doesn’t it? The last project
created took 2 years to complete (and no, it really wasn’t much more
complicated than what I’ve stated above). The problem is that they are
trying to do EVERYTHING in java.
I was about to rip my hair out a
month ago, when it took us literally a week to move one simple button
from the far left side of the screen to the far right side. Why?
Because we are using JSF, and JSF basically just writes the HTML for
you. So we couldn’t just go in and edit the HTML, we had to TRICK the
JSF into putting the darn button where we wanted it.
Anyways, let me know what you think, or if you have any advice. At
this point, the decision is entirely in my hands, and I have no
co-workers to speak of that will object. Why stick with Java?
