Re: Is RPG dying

On 09/03/12 02:53 AM, John Yeung wrote:

On Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 10:15 PM, Joe Pluta<joepluta@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I'll be happy to make a prediction. PHP is on a steady
decline, has been for the last several years.

You cite TIOBE, which shows PHP's trajectory as basically flat from
sometime in 2004 through 2010, with a more noticeable decline only in
the last couple of years. (Contrast with Java, which has been
declining for at least a decade, even after adjusting for the "Google
revision" in 2004.)

You want to be current, learn C# or Objective-C.

I think what these languages' TIOBE ratings show is that the .NET and
iPhone platforms are enjoying a lot of success right now.

You want to be last year's news, learn PHP or better yet
Python. Scripting languages are sooooo 2006. :)

True. Though it sounds like Hans got his PHP job more recently than
that. At least we don't have to worry about RPG ever having been or
ever becoming a fad. :)

John

Joe seems to put a lot of stock in the TIOBE ratings. I don't. There are just too many problems with the methodology. For example, if there are problems with the documentation, you're going to get a lot more questions posted on-line, skewing the results. PHP and PEAR are notorious for having less than ideal documentation!

(BTW, I got hired as a PHP programmer in January. However, working conditions at that job were very stressful, and I quit last week. Funny me - I consider my health and sanity more important than a pay-cheque.)

As strange as it may sound, I actually enjoy doing PHP programming. It's a gawd-awful ugly language, with inconsistent naming conventions and lots of traps for the unwary. And if you have to work with legacy PHP code, you have old programming styles to work with. PHP isn't the only programming language with that problem!) But there's something natural and organic about PHP. It just works, and seems to work in a natural manner. Couple that with an intelligent source editor (like Komodo Edit), and programming is a breeze.

I still like Python. But it seems much more sterile in comparison. Python has successfully managed to avoid the problems of having to deal with older, obsolete language features. But sometimes I think it's too elegant. It's too easy to bash out code in Python. Sometimes I think a programming language needs a few built-in speed bumps to slow you down, and encourage you to think about what you're doing. And certainly PHP has those speed bumps!

Cheers! Hans