php and mysql

PHP is probably one of the more popular fads right now and for a good reason. PHP is a very powerful and flexible language for web development. It's ideal for database integration, dynamic sites, e-commerce, etc. Plus it has the open source backing, which is quite popular because of anti-Microsoft sentiment and for other reasons such as project cost. Personally I prefer UNIX/LINUX as a server environment so PHP and mySQL is a great option.

You'll have no trouble getting positive feedback... So let me try to mention some negatives. hmmm...

hmmm....

I suppose if your comming from a background in ASP, you may miss global.asa and the Application Start and End. Though, this can be crudely replicated using a DB and sessions.

I've talked to some PERL fanatics who miss the inherant regex compatability. You now longer can use regex anywhere, you must inclose it in preg_match() or ereg() functions. Not a biggy, but some make a federal case about it.

Some ASP programmers complain about the ease of use the manual provides. They claim that so much information should not be made so readily available, and so easy to access. I suppose this is from extensive exposure to MSDN.

I've also heard some ASP programmers complain about the fewer lines of code needed to perform certain tasks. They've never seen such a short and simple DB connection.

Perl/CGI fanatics don't like the absence of the shebang line. They feel really lost without the path to perl at the top of every script. And dumbfounded after learning that PHP files don't need to reside in a cgi-bin directory.

Then there is the speed issue. Many Perl programmers claim it's unfair that PHP can perform tasks at a faster rate.

Ya.. if your looking for a newer, faster, more flexible language, PHP is not what your looking for. Try one of the older, more worn languages.

[wow.. post 1492. In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. 8P ]

Yeah, it is a pretty awesome combination. It's free. There are tons of free scripts that are quite easy to configure out there. There are also plenty of tutorials too. Possibly the only negative is security. This is often because PHP is an easy language to learn so people can write scripts but can't secure them properly.

I appreciate all the replies...
I started messing with it yesterday and did a simple database script. Pretty cool stuff