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Which program should I learn RoR or PHP?

by Nikkki on 6/18/12, 7:28 PM with 23 comments

• by ddorian43 on 6/18/12, 7:40 PM

  php is a language and ror is a framework.

  I myself have in mind python(language). Check out http://learnpythonthehardway.org/ (text book) or http://www.udacity.com/overview/Course/cs101/CourseRev/apr20... (video tutorials) or both. Then learn django(framework).

• by tigertrussell on 6/18/12, 7:58 PM

  PHP is a programming language and is very easy to get started on since every web host in the world has a version of PHP5 running on their servers.

  There are many web frameworks available for PHP, my favorite being CakePHP but other notables being Drupal, Zen Framework, and CodeIgniter.

  You should first learn to program--I'd use JSFiddle.net and some PHP books to teach you that.

  Then, you'll need to learn the frameworks, which all have lots of documentation to get you started.

  As another commented pointed out, RoR (Ruby on Rails) is simply another web framework for the programming language Ruby, and you could choose to learn Ruby first and then move to Ruby on Rails in the same way I described, if you wish.

  I'd say learn PHP - Ruby is like 2 steps from just typing an essay about what you want your app to do.

• by aaronh on 6/20/12, 4:17 AM

  Guh, run, run away from PHP. Try ruby or python. And then a framework of your choice on that such as Rails, or whatever the lead framework in Python is these days (Django?).

• by EnderMB on 6/20/12, 10:38 AM

  I would recommend ASP.NET and C#. The .NET framework is fantastic, Visual Studio is a fantastic IDE and C# is a great language to learn and use.

  If you don't wish to use ASP.NET then I would highly recommend Python and Django as a platform. It can be a huge pain to install if you're a beginner, but it's a fantastic language and framework.

• by nwmcsween on 6/20/12, 8:16 PM

  What do you want to learn this for? Personal development? Employability? Freelancing? For each I would learn: Ruby, C# / Java and PHP respectively. Ruby IMO is a more concise, readable and functional than Python, C# and Java are standard enterprise fodder and PHP is widespread but not really designed but more evolved.

• by Spoom on 6/18/12, 7:41 PM

  I'm familiar with both, but it's a little difficult to make a recommendation with so little context. Why do you want to learn one of these languages? Is there a specific reason / project or do you just want to "learn to code"?

• by woodge on 6/18/12, 10:40 PM

  Has anyone had experience with Grails? It looked pretty neat, but I didn't want to start delving into it just to find out that it is something that is not being used or developed all that much.

• by Executor on 6/22/12, 11:51 PM

  I've personally had success with Django/python framework. Although it took 4 days of hassle to install Django/WSGI on Dreamhost.

• by Navarr on 6/18/12, 8:23 PM

  As PHP is a personal favorite, it bears my recommendation along with the Yii framework for web applications.

• by sonnyhe2002 on 6/18/12, 7:49 PM

  Learn php first. With SQL background it is easier to adjust to php.