PHP vs JavaScript - what to choose when entering the world of programming?
Are you confused as to which language to choose for your Programming assignment? Should it be PHP or Javascript? Read our article to know the answer to this question.
There are currently over 600 completely different programming languages on the market. Therefore, it is no wonder that if we want to start learning one of them, we want to choose the one that has a wide range of applications that will be useful in an industry that is in high demand. What are the basic differences between PHP and JavaScript?What is the PHP language?
PHP is a programming language referred to as scripting. It is usually used to create a website. It is characterized by server-side feasibility and consequently, it is not visible to the user. It enables dynamic generation of pages, creating and modifying a file on the server, limiting the availability of subpage data on the site, encrypting data and using cookies.
An example of its use is a form on a website. It enables the handling of databases, however, knowledge of SQL is required. PHP was referred to as a slow language, but its newer version, PHP7, has improved its performance by introducing some important changes. PHP is most often found in content management systems, forums, mailing applications and databases.
PHP is not difficult to learn, thanks to its dynamics it becomes quite flexible while writing code and is not strongly typed. Its syntax is quite simple. Especially the latest version of PHP7, which eliminates many bugs, has become much more suitable for beginners.
Even though PHP is quite an old language, there is no sign that its popularity will start to decline. This is probably because most of the most popular websites use it. Besides, it is constantly being improved, as the latest version of PHP7 proves.What is JavaScript?
JavaScript is a dynamically typed high-level language. It is used to create a website, guaranteeing its interactivity and event handling, form validation, and building navigation elements. Using the language in this way is facilitated by a library such as jQuery. When using JavaScript, TypeScript is also often used, which allows for more static typing and easier object-oriented programming. This language is also used when creating computer games for browsers.
JavaScript is not a complicated language to learn programming, especially since it is characterized by a high level. It can be written with an ordinary notepad or browser. However, the problem may be that the code works differently in different browsers. However, with their development, these differences decrease, mainly due to very dynamic standardization. Moreover, it is a single-threaded language. In practice, this means that only one operation can be performed at a time. This is a problem in the case of large applications because subsequent operations will be blocked by previous ones. As a result, the larger the application, the more problems appear. Learning the language itself is not difficult, but later learning it in practice may be a demanding task.
However, this is a language that you should know if you are interested in programming pages. JavaScript development is extremely dynamic, especially considering the libraries and frameworks, which appear quite often. You can check this informational guide about JavaScript for beginners by BitDegree for more insights about this programming language.What better choice - PHP or JavaScript?
However, each of these languages has its advantages and disadvantages, apart from the fact that it will rather serve us for other activities. So it is best to use both languages at once. Sometimes it happens that for security reasons JavaScript is disabled. This makes every line of code that has been written in JavaScript out of reach for the user. Additionally, the code written in this language is very easily visible. However, the advantage is the speed, which is not affected by the link speed. In the case of PHP, the scripts are interpreted by the server, but this causes quite a long delay. Another disadvantage is the load on the server's computing unit. But PHP is a language invisible to others, so our code is more secure. Only by using both languages, we can create a safe, fully working application.
This is a very informative article and is well presented bringing out the salient differences and similarities between the mostly used two languages today, especially in web environment.
It is true that there are a plethora of programming languages available in the computer arena and for a beginner it becomes difficult to choose as which language to learn and get expertise in it. It is also true that no single language will do all the things with same comforts and ease as some other language can do because the architecture of all the languages is quite different from each other and one language may be better than other in one respect while the other will have an edge over first one in some other respect.
In this situation it would be advisable to learn first some basic language like Java and Javascript and then slowly acquire the variations as available in PHP or Python or Ruby or others in the fray. It is evident that no single language knowledge proficiency is going to help the programmer today. By default one has to lean a few languages. When it comes to integration with databases then there is a need of understanding SQL and other such database related utilities. It is also interesting to note that new languages or updated versions of existing ones are coming for the help of the professionals to choose the best combination for doing their project in the best possible way bringing in a precise and efficient code for a process.
I remember, about 35 years back when we were introduced to computers then we learned the 'Basic' language which was supposed to be the language of that time and people even made games in it with so many little facilities in that language at that time. Then for scientific work we learned Fortran language while for business matters people learned Cobol which if we remember helped immensely at the Y2K crisis. Then came Pascal and there was no end. We went on learning them one by one because what we found was that they were becoming more and more powerful and what we did in Basic for half an hour writing code was done in those advanced ones of their times in one instruction or one library function. Then came C which revolutionised the programming world and it is a language which is being recommended by many experts as a must to be learned by the beginner. So in essence there is no escape from learning a handful of the languages rather sticking to one of them.