Have you actually seen the distribution of servers out there that have PHP4 vs PHP5 on them? The vast majority of servers out there still have PHP4 on them. Less than 5% of LAMP setups run PHP5.
I've tried on two separate projects to play advocate for having people upgrade to PHP5 so that my code could take advantage of the new language features. What happened? On both projects, we ran into a wall where the client was either unable or unwilling to upgrade to PHP5.
I found out that in the real world, there's no expectation that I can get clients to run PHP5. More often than not, they have other software on the machine that breaks under a PHP5 setup. Back when I tried it, CPanel didn't have support for PHP5. NATS didn't have support for PHP5. There's quite a bit of commercial software out there that doesn't have PHP5 support. If you tell your customer to "upgrade to PHP5 or you can't use our software," then more likely or not they'll turn somewhere else. Yes, I'm a programmer, but alienating most of your business over a coding philosophy like that isn't a good idea.
I worked for a web company that hosted, designed and coded websites. I tried to get them to make the jump to PHP5. While they didn't have any commercial code that would interfere with upgrading, the senior programmer, sysadmin and management agreed that it would take at least two weeks of auditing all the sites they have in order to upgrade the machines. My attempt to get them to upgrade failed.
In the business world, I don't always have control of what the clients run.
So yes, I'm complaining about an older version, but at the same time I'm complaining about the version that's most commonly used. I'm complaining about being forced to code for both PHP4 and PHP5. From what I understand, the migration path from PHP5 to PHP6 will be even worse, so then I'll have to code to be compliant to three major versions. Wonderful.
Of all the reasons he lists PHP for being a bad idea, he lists that "code" is mixed with markup. So what, ASP does this too. It's even possible to do this in Perl. Why not attack PHP for some of the things that make it really annoying.
Until PHP 4.2.0, REGISTER_GLOBALS was set to ON, meaning that variables from a GET, POST or COOKIE are automatically defined as variables. Insert rules about how globals are evil here.
Classes in PHP4 are horribly broken. They don't have destructors, for instance. PHP5 is better, but the install base of 5 is so low that writing software means having to appeal to PHP4 and 5. What's PHP4's general solution to not having a destructor? Register_shutdown_function(). Ew.
Using XML / XSL is a great way to use a templating language within PHP. However, the libraries between PHP4 and PHP5 are entirely different, so you have to write a wrapper if you want your PHP code working on PHP4 and PHP5. Or... install an unsupported PECL module. Smarty? No thanks.
On most setups I've seen, MAGIC_QUOTES are turned on. This means if you're writing something for wide use, you'll have to use stripslashes() to get them out of GET or POST. Even worse, some boxes have MAGIC_QUOTES_RUNTIME on, so you'll have to use stripslashes on anything coming back from a database.
Safe mode is one of the most annoying things to work with. I see sysadmins use it as a horrible band-aid for shared hosting (what the hell ever happened to apache and the perchild MPM?). Open_basedir is annoying too.
Try, catch, and throw are PHP5 only, meaning that error handling ends up being done by something stupid like set_error_handler().
Namespaces, namespaces, namespaces!
I understand that the language is getting better with PHP5 and PHP6, but nobody's jumping on board. The majority of LAMP machines out there are running Apache 1 and PHP4 instead of Apache2 and PHP5. At least MySQL 3.23 is finally going out of style and 4.0 is becoming commonplace. But look what's out now: MySQL 5.
I really think PHP is starting to majorly stagnate and fragment. So much so, that given a few years, I can imagine something like Python or Ruby taking away some serious mindshare given a few killer apps using the language.
I figure this is on topic since we're talking about CYOA, but here's some of the more "bastard" choose your own adventure stories online.
New OrleansWorld Trade Center
All that comes to mind right now is that horrible song on Sesame Street or the Electric Company or something where they show chickens and eggs and chickens hatching from eggs and a country singer fiddling away singing "Which came first the Chicken or the Egg? The chicken or the Egg? The Chicken or the Egg? Which came first the Chicken or the Egg?" ad smeging infinitum
You bastard! I spent many years of therapy trying to get that Sesame Street (yes, it was Sesame Street) song out of my head when I used to go to sleep every night. Now, it's going to come back to me, I'm going to go apeshit from lack of sleep, and kill 20 people.
Quite possibly, the second iteration of this site (the one with the actual business plan) will get traffic and notice because of this iteration. Think Napster vs Napster 2.0.
So really, what the venture capitalists are thinking of is spending all this money marketing a name that will eventually do something entirely different from what the site currently does.
Posted by somebody named "Adult Film Producer." I don't know sir. Are any of the "adult" theatres out there part of any collective union? How about the talent?:)
Oh man, what I wouldn't give to hear about a "we won't suck cock" strike on the television.
Based on this article, I'm still not sure whether or not I'd upgrade to anything anytime soon.
Currently I'm running a Leadtek 6800GT on two Dell 2001FP monitors. I noticed that one of the monitors ends up going black for a moment with some screens, and refreshing afterwards.
I did a little bit of looking into it, and believe that the problem is with DVI compliance on one of the video outputs. Tom's had a good article on it:
So my question ultimately becomes: are there any problems running any of these cards on two monitors, at 1600x1200? Are they fully DVI compliant without reduced blanking?
Reads: "hey, who are you? Get out of my house! Let go of me"
"What's that?"
"He must have been dragged away while typing it."
"You don't type, 'Let go of me' while someone is dragging you off, you just say it."
"Perhaps he was dictating."
"Oh shut up..."
I'm sure the vi crowd will bow to the glory of an operating system that is Emacs when some prankster decides to code a version of vi that runs inside emacs.
Slashdot Mirror
Have you actually seen the distribution of servers out there that have PHP4 vs PHP5 on them? The vast majority of servers out there still have PHP4 on them. Less than 5% of LAMP setups run PHP5.
I've tried on two separate projects to play advocate for having people upgrade to PHP5 so that my code could take advantage of the new language features. What happened? On both projects, we ran into a wall where the client was either unable or unwilling to upgrade to PHP5.
I found out that in the real world, there's no expectation that I can get clients to run PHP5. More often than not, they have other software on the machine that breaks under a PHP5 setup. Back when I tried it, CPanel didn't have support for PHP5. NATS didn't have support for PHP5. There's quite a bit of commercial software out there that doesn't have PHP5 support. If you tell your customer to "upgrade to PHP5 or you can't use our software," then more likely or not they'll turn somewhere else. Yes, I'm a programmer, but alienating most of your business over a coding philosophy like that isn't a good idea.
I worked for a web company that hosted, designed and coded websites. I tried to get them to make the jump to PHP5. While they didn't have any commercial code that would interfere with upgrading, the senior programmer, sysadmin and management agreed that it would take at least two weeks of auditing all the sites they have in order to upgrade the machines. My attempt to get them to upgrade failed.
In the business world, I don't always have control of what the clients run.
So yes, I'm complaining about an older version, but at the same time I'm complaining about the version that's most commonly used. I'm complaining about being forced to code for both PHP4 and PHP5. From what I understand, the migration path from PHP5 to PHP6 will be even worse, so then I'll have to code to be compliant to three major versions. Wonderful.
I understand that the language is getting better with PHP5 and PHP6, but nobody's jumping on board. The majority of LAMP machines out there are running Apache 1 and PHP4 instead of Apache2 and PHP5. At least MySQL 3.23 is finally going out of style and 4.0 is becoming commonplace. But look what's out now: MySQL 5.
I really think PHP is starting to majorly stagnate and fragment. So much so, that given a few years, I can imagine something like Python or Ruby taking away some serious mindshare given a few killer apps using the language.
I figure this is on topic since we're talking about CYOA, but here's some of the more "bastard" choose your own adventure stories online. New Orleans World Trade Center
I can't believe nobody posted these already.
Just think though... the trolls would have more variety!
Heh, imagine how many more females we'd have on this site if the "OMG Ponies" theme was actually an option.
With a username of Dr. Beavis, I hope to God you don't work for them :)
You bastard! I spent many years of therapy trying to get that Sesame Street (yes, it was Sesame Street) song out of my head when I used to go to sleep every night. Now, it's going to come back to me, I'm going to go apeshit from lack of sleep, and kill 20 people.
How does that make you feel, punk?
The only kind of people a terrorist would terrorize by taking down the internet temporarily are people on slashdot.
Terrorists are interested in killing people to get their message across, not inconveniencing them.
Firefox is at war with Opera, and allied with IE. Firefox was always at war with Opera and allied with IE.
So really, what the venture capitalists are thinking of is spending all this money marketing a name that will eventually do something entirely different from what the site currently does.
"I think God put you here to test my faith, dude." - Bill Hicks.
It's better than a red ring. That sounds too close to something the goatse man would have.
Yes, but does your Home Theatre Media PC run any sort of BSD too? It may be dead already without you knowing it!
Oh man, what I wouldn't give to hear about a "we won't suck cock" strike on the television.
P.S: This letter comes attached with a GPL license.
I think it's time for slashdot to have a +1 (Bastard) moderation.
Either that, or you watch Chappelle's Show.
Stop quoting me, bastard!
Currently I'm running a Leadtek 6800GT on two Dell 2001FP monitors. I noticed that one of the monitors ends up going black for a moment with some screens, and refreshing afterwards.
I did a little bit of looking into it, and believe that the problem is with DVI compliance on one of the video outputs. Tom's had a good article on it:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2004/11/29/the_tft_con nection/
So my question ultimately becomes: are there any problems running any of these cards on two monitors, at 1600x1200? Are they fully DVI compliant without reduced blanking?
"What's that?"
"He must have been dragged away while typing it."
"You don't type, 'Let go of me' while someone is dragging you off, you just say it."
"Perhaps he was dictating."
"Oh shut up..."
I can't believe He Man didn't make the cut after the Penny Arcade comic about wikipedia.
I want my pine support!
I'm sure the vi crowd will bow to the glory of an operating system that is Emacs when some prankster decides to code a version of vi that runs inside emacs.
I wonder if Emacs supports Global Thermonuclear War.
Kind of like the Bush administration juxtaposting Al Qaeda and Saddam.