Curia

[Due to the popularity of these posts, I have decided to move all the benchmarking information over to its own dedicated page. Please see the new framework shootout page for the latest information.]

[Note: This post is the continuation of a series. Please read Round 1, Round 2, and Round 3 first if you are just now joining us.]

While I had originally intended for round 4 to showcase how microframeworks are changing the way we do “quick and dirty” web development (and how they make using PHP as “an extension to HTML” old hat), my current programming habits have kept me involved in the more “full-stack” framework solutions. So, rather than spitting out various benchmarks of frameworks that I have little or no interaction with, and since enough time has passed since the last “shootout” that the landscape has changed a bit (with the introduction of Pyramid and the release of Rails 3), I have instead decided to showcase the most recent data on the frameworks that I personally find myself in contact with on a regular basis. (continue reading…)

I’m not sure if anyone else’s world is like mine, but I work, eat, sleep, and breathe in a culture where Apple is king and the iPhone is the only phone. While I love Apple’s computers as much as the next guy (I always suggest that friends buy a Mac), I just don’t understand everyone’s extraordinary love affair with the iPhone. Sure, it’s awfully nice to look at and it has definitely raised the bar for what it means to be a mobile device, but at the end of the day your device is only as valuable as the enhanced productivity it is capable of providing. If there are issues or limitations to a device’s ability to enhance productivity, wouldn’t you be wary of such a device?

Well, I am the black sheep in my culture because I have an Android phone. This sometimes causes a bit of a stir with co-workers and friends (all in good fun though, right?), but every now and then I come across someone who is thinking about upgrading phones and wants to know why I’ve chosen Android over the iPhone. The answer is actually quite simple in my mind, and basically comes down to what I would consider the three “killjoy” facts about the iPhone:

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I recently sat down to coffee with a new acquaintance of mine who spends much of his time implementing F/OSS projects at non-profit organizations, and who had just stepped into a lead web developer position using PHP. After sharing pleasantries we began trading stories and talking about each of our “tools of the trade.” When I mentioned that I used to do most of my web development in PHP, but have spent the past year or so trying to move as completely as possible to Python, his response was: “Huh, I have never really thought of Python as a PHP replacement.”

Now, this guy hasn’t exactly been living under a rock for the past 10 years—his resume was quite impressive and included projects in a number of different programming languages; But as you can imagine, I was rather surprised by his response, and it made me wonder: Has the Python community really been that bad at promoting the strengths of Python for web development? Or, does the nirvana experienced by switching from a language like PHP to Python just make us so at peace with the world that we forget the hordes of developers still stuck with C-style syntax? Either way, it got me thinking about a few of the reasons why I decided to switch from PHP to Python; and why I not only see Python as an excellent PHP replacement, but am surprised it is such a “best-kept secret” for web development.

There are already plenty of pages out there discussing Python vs. PHP as a language, so I probably won’t get too technical here. I also want to try avoid turning this into a “Python is better than PHP because…” rant (for more on that, please see the end of this post), so I will simply share with you a few of the main reasons why I decided to replace PHP with Python as my primary language for web development:

(continue reading…)