PHP
PHP stands for Hypertext Preprocessor, or simply Personal Home Page. It was launched in 1995 by Rasmus Lerdorf. The language was created to integrate HTML code and make server interaction seamless.
PHP is used to create dynamic and interactive web pages. Since the launch, PHP has come a long way in web development. It is the most used scripting language used in web development today.
Python
Python is the high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language developed by Guido Van Rossum in 1991. It is the most popular language among the programming community for its easy syntax and diverse application scope.
The language is marked as highly versatile for its varied application scope from web development to mobile app development, desktop app development, game development, machine learning, IoT, and even scientific calculation.
Which is best: PHP or Python?
Learning curve
Python is much easier to learn than any other language, thanks to its easy syntax and abundance of resources. There are many free resources available on the Internet. You can pick any of them and develop your firm foundation in the language within a few days.
On the other hand, PHP takes a little more time to learn compared to Python. While Python has easy-to-understand syntax, making it effortless to learn, PHP has little hard-to-grasp syntax, but it has a great range of naming conventions.
Documentation
Over the years, PHP has evolved a lot, and so does its documentation. PHP offers extensive documentation for every feature. It has one problem, though. It allows developers to add comments on its documentation, which is fine, but often creates a problem when creators remove certain features and the comment lingers there forever, leaving new learners confused.
However, Python doesn’t have such a problem. It has well-structured documentation that provides every piece of information in a simple, easy-to-grasp language, just like its syntax.
Frameworks
The web development field has experienced a surge of frameworks since the last decade. And here, PHP wins as it holds more frameworks than Python. Currently, there are 40 PHP frameworks, among which, Laravel, CodeIgniter, Zend, and symphony are the most popular ones.
Furthermore, Laravel is extremely popular, and therefore, you can easily find developers offering Laravel web development services.
Python also provides some of the most powerful frameworks like Django and Flask, Web2Py, and CherryPy, which allows developers to build robust, scalable, and feature-rich web applications in less time. But when it comes to frameworks, PHP is unmatchable and thus wins this point.
Community Support
Both PHP and Python share almost the same rank for community support. But PHP, being one of the first and most popular languages for web development, has a larger community of experienced web developers who offer prompt expert support to newbie and experienced programmers alike, just like we offer for hiring a dedicated PHP developer online.
Python, on the other hand, has seen a rapid surge in its users since major tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Netflix adopted it. Its broad community provides extensive support to fellow community members on various forums. Both languages are almost equal in terms of the community, and therefore, both deserve a point.
Versatility
Versatility is a major point for Python, as it has a comprehensive set of libraries that can make your web development process easy and agile. Today, websites feature highly advanced functionalities such as chatbots and AR-based product display, which Python makes seamless to implement using its vast libraries.
Though PHP also has a significant set of libraries, it doesn’t provide much compared to Python. Moreover, PHP does not have strong libraries to incorporate advanced features of AR and AI. So, Python gets this point.
Environment management
Pythons offer the most sophisticated environment handling system – virtualenv, which allows easy installation of multiple versions of the language in parallel and swift switch between them, which makes Python a winner here.
Though PHP has virtPHP – an analogue – in its pockets, it can’t compete with Python’s virtualenv. VirtPHP is now archived and isn’t maintained anymore, so developers use containers with PHP.
Security
Python is a preferred choice for businesses when it comes to the security of their web applications. Django offers many in-built security features that help developers to build apps well-shielded from various security threats like CSRF and SQL injections.
PHP had a terrible history of security breaches, most of which had been solved by its extensive and supportive community. But still, from a security perspective, Python is the more preferred language and therefore wins this one against PHP.
Development time
Django, a famous web development framework written in Python, offers a vast collection of third-party libraries, modules, and packages that speeds up the development process. Moreover, it follows an MVC structure that helps developers write code quickly in a clear and segmented manner.
But PHP is not behind here as the Laravel framework also supports MVC patterns and comes with many pre-built libraries and features such as authentication, routing, templating, and more, which helps developers build things faster.
Debugging
Most modern frameworks feature debuggers, allowing developers to write clear and bug-free applications. Python, too, has an excellent debugging tool called PDB or Python Debugger. PDB offers Python users a great benefit as it supports dynamic typing and allows them to work efficiently without declaring things right at the beginning of the program.
On the Other hand, though PHP also provides a package called XDebug, it is much slower in identifying errors and bugs and therefore experiences many security issues. So Python seems a clear winner here.
Performance
A few years ago, Python was considered the fastest programming language, but there has been little work done on its speed aspect for a long time, and as a result, it does not meet modern industry speed standards.
PHP has awestruck many with its much faster version 7, being the fastest language in the industry. Today, PHP 7 is capable of boosting up the massive data processing at a higher speed, which marks PHP’s speedy language and earns a point here.
Though Python clearly wins here, there are some cons that create doubt about its usefulness. On the other hand, PHP may lack some features, but it has gained years of trust among the web developer community. Yaay!
Choosing the technology for a website highly depends on your requirements and can only be decided by an expert web developer. We are a top web development company providing high-class Python web development and PHP web development services to businesses worldwide.
As the world is rapidly leading to a highly technical environment, organizations nowadays are finding more powerful, efficient, and unique ways to digitize their businesses on the virtual platform – the Internet.
Increasing internet usage is changing customers’ habits and patterns. And to cope with them, businesses are adopting digital solutions such as websites and mobile applications to be in touch with them and offer them services through digital mediums.
Since websites are the medium that your customers use to interact with you on the Internet, choosing the right language for your website is much necessary to ensure its performance, security, and user-friendliness.
If you are looking for hiring a dedicated developer or developer team for your web work, look no further, contact us on 09408382596 or mail us at info@hkinfoway.com, and we will get back to you right away with the best in town web development services.
What are the major advantages of hiring a dedicated developer/development team?
- Dedicated experts work for you
- Your project gets a rapid kick start
- You get full control over your project workflow
- You can leverage the innovative and creative development approach of developers
- You can get quality assurance and reduced risks
- You don’t have to pay for a startup or hidden costs
- Developers works as your in-house team
