Posted by Richard Levasseur on 12/17/50 11:54

Erwin Moller wrote:
> Luca wrote:
>
> > I am not a programmer but I do work in the ICT sector.
> >
> > I read somewhere that J2EE would be "dying" and that PHP would be
> > taking its place soon...
> > Is this complete crap or does it have some real base ?
>
> Hi Luca,
>
> Difficult question.
> I did J2EE for a few years but quited with it about 3-4 years ago.
> In favor of PHP.
>
> But J2EE and PHP are really 2 different beasts.
> In very general words: J2EE is a lot more complex (from an users point of
> view) and a lot harder to master than PHP.
>
> Once you get confortable with PHP you can develop very fast: all functions
> are build in PHP, and extending the language is relative easy (PEAR/PECL).
>
> What I didn't like in J2EE was the fact I needed to browse through many
> pages documentation all the time to get the job done. The number of classes
> you need to master is huge.
>
> Pro-J2EE: Once you know the basics (take a half year study/practice time
> off), you just can do more than with PHP.
> For example: It is easy to let JSP-pages communicate with each other. In PHP
> you'll need sessions or database, while J2EE can share (references to)
> objects that are in-process/memory.
>
> I do miss a few possibilities I had in J2EE in PHP, but in general I am
> happy I made the switch. PHP is language (for me) that I can fold the way I
> think. That is something every proprammer likes. In Java I often had the
> feeling I needed to do a lot of hard difficult work to get simple things
> done.
>
> To put it otherwise: Java/J2EE has a very steep learningcurve, where
> everybody can get started with PHP, and get things done fast.
>
> I don't know if J2EE will die, last year a few headhunters tried to get me
> back into J2EE (which I refused, alltough it pays well).
> That means that (at least in Europe) not enough people have J2EE skills
> these days.
>
> If someone asks me which language they should learn, I always advise PHP
> because it is so easy to start with that most people will get motivated
> fast, which is important. If you start with programming, and you start with
> Java, chances are bigger that you'll quit with a frustrated feeling.
>
>
> just my 2 cent.
>
> Regards,
> Erwin Moller
>

The irony is that, as PHP matures, its growing to resemble Java quite a
bit. Not that that is a bad thing, Java has some very good concepts.
The nice thing is that it doesn't have all the flaming hoops you
normally have to jump through in Java to get things done.

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