On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 7:07 AM, Bill <bill_nos...@whoknows.net> wrote: > Mikhail V wrote: >>>>> >>>>> [...] I'm not here to "cast stones", I like Python. I just think >>>>> that you shouldn't cast stones at C/C++. >>>> >>>> Not while PHP exists. There aren't enough stones in the world... >>>> >>> PHP seems (seemed?) popular for laying out web pages. Are their vastly >>> superior options? >> >> Python? Superior syntax for sure > > > I believe that. What accounts for the popularity of PHP then?
It's popular, therefore people use it. It's purely self-perpetuating. There was a time (a time forever gone) when you could get extremely cheap web hosting with PHP support, but other scripting languages were only available if you paid more. That created a culture of low-grade sites gravitating to PHP and MySQL, which meant that software aimed at them (WordPress, various forum software, MediaWiki) would be written in PHP. And that means that anyone who wants to mod them (WordPress particularly) has to learn PHP. It's an endless cycle. But since it's the lowest-end sites that have traditionally driven that demand for PHP, there's a general tendency for low-grade programmers to gravitate to it, so there's a lot of really REALLY bad code out there. Yes, someone's going to chime in with (a) "You can write good code in PHP" and/or (b) "Big sites like Facebook and Wikipedia use PHP, so it must be fine". I don't care. About either. They're irrelevant to someone who's looking over the job postings... the chances that a PHP job will involve bad code are far higher than, say, Haskell jobs, which will be rarer but much less hit-and-miss. There's basically no reason to use PHP unless you're working in existing PHP code (as mentioned, things like WordPress plugins). Also: http://thedailywtf.com/articles/are-you-down-with-php- ChrisA -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
