Building Web Applic using PHP or ASP.Net

[radic]

Hi everyone!

I'm planning to create a web application but still couldn't decide on what language to use. Well I just want to ask for your opinion if you think PHP is better than ASP.Net or the other way around. Why?

Thanks in advance!
Radic

[kows]

it depends what you're building and what you're planning on doing it with.

there is not really any "this language is better than that one." some languages are better than others at different things. try to be at least a little specific.

[penagate]

Moved.

[radic]

Oh yah, I'm sorry...I'm speaking in terms several items:

a. Software Price
b. Platform Price
c. Speed
d. Efficiency
e. Security
f. Platform
g. Source Availability
h. Exceptions
i. OOP

[vbNeo]

You really should do your own research.

Anyways, I'd always chose VB.Net over PHP because it enables me to use C#(Which I personally find to be the best high level language to date), but it also has all the advantages of the .Net framework.

Truth be told, I'm not sure you can get an objective answer here, and the language itself isn't really that important. If you need to learn both from scratch, just chose one and go with it!

My 2c

[bgmacaw]

I think it's mostly a matter of what you're most comfortable programming in and what kind of servers, web and DB, your web site is using.

[mendhak]

a. Software Price - PHP
b. Platform Price - PHP
c. Speed - depends on definition and scalability terms. ASP.NET is more scalable and the speed 'advantage' PHP has doesn't stand up exponentially.
d. Efficiency - equal
e. Security - ASP.NET
f. Platform - ASP.NET
g. Source Availability - equal
h. Exceptions - ASP.NET
i. OOP - ASP.NET

[penagate]

a. Software Price - PHP
b. Platform Price - PHP
c. Speed - Don't know
d. Efficiency - Up to you
e. Security - Up to you
f. Platform - PHP (I assume you mean multi platform capabilities)
g. Source Availability - Equal
h. Exceptions - Rubbish and should never be used in any language. Equal
i. OOP - Equal

[Hack]

Duplicate threads merged.

[RobDog888]

c. Speed - depends on definition and scalability terms. ASP.NET is more scalable and the speed 'advantage' PHP has doesn't stand up exponentially.

So would you say vB should have a ASP.NET version for larger sites like VBF and CG?
Looks like you are leaning to ASP.NET.

[dclamp]

I would say, if you are just now starting out, PHP is best if you want to spend as little money as possible. They most you would need it a domain name and host.

asp is for more advanced site (like security wise). These are going to cost a little bit more. Windows servers with SQL server cost a little more then -nix servers.

[Slaine]

a. Software Price

Could I just point out that ASP.NET is just as 'free' as PHP.

[RobDog888]

Its actually Visual Web Developer 2005 and SQL Express 2005 that are free. So price has no influence on the decision here.

I know mendhak and penagate are good web developers so I would go off of their recommendations and then factor in the free price for either and you get ASP.NET as the better "language".

But still it comes down to use the best tool for each individuale job.

[Slaine]

I was refering to the fact that the .net interpreter and framework is just as free as the php one.

The development environment is a totally different thing - and there are good and bad, free and pay-for versions for both environments.

TBH my decision would be based on what you, or your colleagues, know best = it will be cheaper to support in the long run.

[penagate]

OK, I'll concede that both languages are free to run.
However, I've not seen an ASP.NET setup on a free operating system. So to host an ASP.NET site you've got to pay for Windows. And even if you find Windows hosting it's usually more expensive than a Linux variety.

Speed, efficiency, and security don't really have much to do with the language used. They're both interpreted and byte-code cached (if your server setup is decent). Efficiency and security is pretty much all down to application design and good programming techniques.

I'm not sure what point f) is asking.

As for the last three, the only really significant one is OOP (This one always gets people excited. ) If you mean OOP as in everything-is-an-object OOP, then ASP.NET wins on this point. If you mean OOP as in "supports OO principles" then both are equal. PHP 5 supports object-oriented design just as well as the primary .NET languages. So this is more of a subjective point than anything else.

The big point which isn't asked in the original post is libraries/frameworks. ASP.NET, obviosuly, has the backing of the .NET framework, which is a big plus for rapid development. On the other hand, PHP has lots of extensions and code libraries available for it (PEAR, for example, and the SPL [although rather minimal] in PHP 5). Both can make use of platform-specific libraries as well.

So really it's down to which technology you feel would suit your application design the best, which would work best with any existing software frameworks you have in place, and which you feel most comfortable with as a developer. There's never really an outright 'winner' in these battles.

[mendhak]

So would you say vB should have a ASP.NET version for larger sites like VBF and CG?
Looks like you are leaning to ASP.NET.

VBForums and Codeguru are medium-to-small sized applications.

A large application is something like dotnetnuke, phpnuke, community server 2007, etc. etc.

And some of the behemoths and dinosaurs that I'm working on.

[RobDog888]

There are free hosting sites for .NET now tooo.
Everything is free so only need to compare which is technically best for the situation I guess.

[penagate]

Yeah, but no serious enterprise is going to use free hosting whether Linux or Windows.

[RobDog888]

Well since hes starting this on his own then the size will be small to start out and probably for some time as it takes time to get to enerprize levels.