PHP or ASP?

[generalt]

I got interested in server-side web dev after playing around w/front page, but I'm definitely a PHP person. I have never really tried to learn .asp, but it looks to me like it has no advantages over PHP.

Is there any reason I should re-consider and learn it?

[Mathachew Veteran]

Do you mean ASP or ASP.NET? There's a huge difference.

If it's old ASP, go with PHP.

[azcodemonkey]

Do you mean ASP or ASP.NET? There's a huge difference.

If it's old ASP, go with PHP.

+1

If it's ASP.NET, I'd say learn that with C#. From there, learning php will be a breeze for the most part. My reasoning is simple. The C-style syntax of C# translates well to many other languages. The tools for C# are really nice. There are excellent extensions for the latest framework to enable cleaner design and testability. It's compiled instead of interpreted(fast). Excellent component selection. Excellent caching facilities. Excellent database connectivity. LINQ.

[PJFry]

I agree with above, if you mean 'classic' ASP I'd definitely go with PHP if however you mean ASP.NET I'd choose that over PHP for too many reasons to list. I have nothing against PHP, I used it for several years and still do for small projects occasionally, both are good choices.

[Son of Hook]

Neither. ASP.NET is better than both, imo, for too many reasons to list (and use the search function... this topic has been covered 100+ times).

[Borbus]

PHP. ASP only runs on windows and why would you want to run a windows web server..?

[Colin-uk Veteran]

I prefer PHP, it looks easier to learn and iss quite easyonce you get your head around it :p but then i have looked at much ASP, im just going on first glance..

PHP. ASP only runs on windows and why would you want to run a windows web server..?

you can run ASP on a linux system.

[zeroday]

I prefer PHP myself. I find it much easier.

[n_K]

you can run ASP on a linux system.

You can run a perl version of ASP, most ASP scripts need changing to work.

And ASP is a POS, PHP FTW ! (That is, PHP 4, PHP5 is like asp, a big POS!)

[IceBreakerG]

I agree with what the others have said. If you mean just PHP vs regular ASP, then go with PHP. If you meant ASP.NET, then it's no competition, ASP.NET for sure.

[mildpanda]

wow... the only problem i've had with ASP is, it doesn't have native support for file upload, unlike ASP.NET and PHP

though, my vote is, and will always be for ASP. ASP FTW! :D

[Deathray]

I have to learn both this summer

ASP for work

PHP for clan business

I hope they're easy to learn

[Mathachew Veteran]

I have to learn both this summer

ASP for work

PHP for clan business

I hope they're easy to learn

Classic ASP or ASP.NET?

[Manuroc]

How about PHP 5? How does it compare to ASP.NET?

[+mrbester MVC]

PHP cannot be compared to .NET except in the "it hasn't got this" type way (* 1000).

OT: My opinion of PHP has dropped significantly ever since my server started throwing up "Access Violation" errors (but not on a page refresh) to which there are no fixes whatsoever, only vague suppositions. This coupled with a complete lack of interest in getting the ISAPI module working even halfway decently on Windows Server 2003 (no, I'm NOT going to use the CGI module) leads me to consider the whole thing as unfit for purpose except on Linux box through Apache. Reconfiguring a Windows 2003 server to use Apache proxying to over 50 non-PHP sites in order to get 4 PHP sites working is not worth my time. I'll just have them hosted somewhere else.

[PyX]

Bah, in the end, PHP is free and can be installed on a free server. It's also very easy to install on a local machine... and it is possible to install it even without Windows.

[pip]

I voted PHP only because most of the web servers I have to deal with are configured with PHP.

I write in both ASP and PHP, and I charge at least double for writing ASP, although usually that's because we're building a proper web application as opposed to a website. PHP cannot compare to ASP.NET - as mrbester said, there are a thousand things that PHP hasn't got - and though you can generally do it in PHP, it takes a hundred extra lines of code, or a horrid hack that isn't portable in an easy fashion especially when you come to start to deal with geographically dispersed load balancing or mirroring of data.

My philosophy is simple - if it's a website use PHP, if it's a web application, use ASP. When you start to run into thousands of lines of code, there is no comparison to MSSQL and ASP.NET, it beats PHP hands down - but for simple websites, CMS, etc etc - PHP beats ASP hands down on speed of execution, speed of coding and portability.

[Son of Hook]

Bah, in the end, PHP is free and can be installed on a free server. It's also very easy to install on a local machine... and it is possible to install it even without Windows.

ASP and ASP.NET are just as free as PHP and can be installed on any box that'll run it. The only cost you're going to incur is the cost of the Windows OS license. If it's a business solution, chances are you're buying a Windows server anyways. If it's your own box to serve pages to more than 10 people, yes Linux is cheaper.

Good ASP and ASP.NET hosting can be found at around $15/month, which is right around good Linux/PHP hosting.

[James Rose]

Minor thought, but worth mentioning, choosing a tool is important and while "easy" is nice, it should be lower on the list than, say, abilities. (there were quite a few mentions of "choose x it's easy" so I thought I should mention it.

[Pc_Madness]

In my experience, I find ASP.Net more frustrating. It has a heap of controls to allow to build things rapidly, but if your trying to customize things abit you can get into trouble, or sometimes their solution is just really long winded. I don't particuarlly enjoy them filling my HTML with all their crap. :( With PHP it *can* (although I think I write PHP quicker..) take longer to implement things, but you have more control over it.

Thats just my very random experience, but I'm kinda learning as I go through this huge project so. :p

[Deathray]

Classic ASP or ASP.NET?

Classic ASP... that's for work, so no way are they gonna let me play with the latest stuff. They prefer methods they know they can depend on

Companies are always slow in this stuff, pretty annoying

[sbauer]

Classic ASP... that's for work, so no way are they gonna let me play with the latest stuff. They prefer methods they know they can depend on

Companies are always slow in this stuff, pretty annoying

Over six years slow? ASP.NET really isn't "new stuff" anymore. There's already been four versions of it (1.0, 1.1, 2.0, 3.5).

IMO, it sounds like they're being cheap. Any company that still creates apps using classic ASP is making a mistake.

[+mrbester MVC]

Any company that still creates apps using classic ASP is making a mistake.

Alright then. Whip me up a page with multiple forms, all including WebControls (and therefore are runat="server" and can access ViewState *for that form*), where there is no form processing Factory pattern to deal with the different forms submitted to the one page.

Point deducted for not using <form runat="server"> for all forms (simply posting a HTML <form> to another .aspx and retrieving values doesn't count). Points are also deducted for "solutions" that require JavaScript on the client (for code injection, form redirection / alteration) as that breaks accessibility guidelines. Points further deducted for simply saying "use WilsonWebForms to encapsulate System.Web.UI.Page".

Oh, and I don't want ViewState unnecessarily cluttering up the page. If I wanted to have the client have some record of dynamically entered form values then I'd have used Gears / AIR.

Now whip up a page in Classic ASP (or PHP) that handles multiple forms. Which was easier?

Edit: link edited.

Edited May 22, 2008 by mrbester

[Antaris Veteran]

PHP. ASP only runs on windows and why would you want to run a windows web server..?

Have you never used IIS6? How about the newer IIS7?

Comments like that only show that you don't have the capacity to try out other alternatives, or that you are relishing in your Linux fanboy status.

Yes it's true that Apache powers the largest percentage of web servers, and commands around 50% of the market, but IIS is the second most popular webserver, which currently holds around 35% (and with IIS7, this is increasing). This means directly that Windows is the OS of choice for that 35%. IIS6 (along with Sql Server) is one of the most secure platforms available. In fact, the majority of vulnerabilities over the last couple of years aren't even the fault of IIS, just the platforms built around it.

View: April 2008 Web Server Survey

View: Vulnerability Report: Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 6

PHP is a great platform, it's lighweight, easy to use and is fast. There is a substantial community dedicated to producing extensions, web 2.0 frameworks etc.

ASP was great in it's day, but in todays world, developers want a true OO language, and coupling C# (or VB.NET) with HTML has provided this.

The OP asked what we prefer PHP or ASP (read: not ASP.NET). If this is the case, PHP does win, but not by much. ASP also afforded the developer access to the COM environment which makes integration projects viable.

If ASP.NET was thrown into the mix, then IMHO, ASP.NET would win. But ASP.NET is not a language, it is a platform. It provides the developer with a broad yet robust execution pipeline allowing them to tap into ASP.NET at many different stages. It uses the .NET CLR at it's core, providing strict typing, and full OO, threading, garbage management, IPC and the ability to expose services numerous different ways.

And of course with IIS7, this has improved even more because ASP.NET is integrated right down into the core of IIS, allowing you to do much more, like providing Forms based Authentication on non-ASP.NET websites.

View: A low-level Look at the ASP.NET Architecture

View: ASP.NET Integration with IIS7

What you should really do, is actually spend some time looking into viable alternatives. PHP/Linux isn't the holy grail, and neither is ASP or ASP.NET. Developers want freedom, and they have it. It's just biased opinions like yours that keep this ridiculous Microsoft vs The World debates going, and believe me, they are getting boring.

To everyone else: Sorry for the rant, these comments are strictly my own opinion.

[sbauer]

Alright then. Whip me up a page with multiple forms, all including WebControls (and therefore are runat="server" and can access ViewState *for that form*), where there is no form processing Factory pattern to deal with the different forms submitted to the one page.

You know that having two server-side forms right out of the box on the same page is impossible. Regardless, that's a horrible reason for staying with classic ASP.

However, if you still want a reason, I would say: MonoRail. It's TDD-friendly and helps you get around some of the server control issues.

Now whip up a page in Classic ASP (or PHP) that handles multiple forms. Which was easier?

Oh, so we're taking a simple multiple form example and basing our decision over what was easier? How about an application much larger than that? Would you like to deploy your COM components and then cycle the server every time you have to deploy them? Do you like inventing your own custom session state implementation when you need something better? How about TDD?

My quote said: "Any company that still creates apps using classic ASP is making a mistake." I didn't say creating one or two simple pages. I said creating an app. Maybe I should have specified the size. Either way, I still stand by my point.

[hjf288]

PHP cannot be compared to .NET except in the "it hasn't got this" type way (* 1000).

OT: My opinion of PHP has dropped significantly ever since my server started throwing up "Access Violation" errors (but not on a page refresh) to which there are no fixes whatsoever, only vague suppositions. This coupled with a complete lack of interest in getting the ISAPI module working even halfway decently on Windows Server 2003 (no, I'm NOT going to use the CGI module) leads me to consider the whole thing as unfit for purpose except on Linux box through Apache. Reconfiguring a Windows 2003 server to use Apache proxying to over 50 non-PHP sites in order to get 4 PHP sites working is not worth my time. I'll just have them hosted somewhere else.

Windows 2003 and FastCGI - Not normal CGI is the best solution for PHP on Windows IIS, very fast and stable.