oo code in PHP5

[Erik Price]

On Monday, June 30, 2003, at 04:16  PM, Greg Rundlett wrote:

> I think so.

Nice.  I don't think it's all that bad to use an array of information 
vs a proper object (it's not that different from using structs in C), 
but if you're moving the language in that direction then why not take 
advantage of what it has to offer.

It'll be especially interesting to see what the performance will be 
like.  I never read anything concrete, but I had heard others' accounts 
of the fact that taking a pure-OO approach to PHP scripting in 4.x 
resulted in overall poor performance, though making moderate use of 
objects where appropriate was fine.  This is one of those cases where 
an application server (like Weblogic or JBoss, or non-J2EE appservers 
like Zope) can really outshine standard webservers -- you have objects 
already instantiated and ready to do work before the request even comes 
down the pipe, whereas in a PHP script the objects are all instantiated 
and then garbage collected within the lifespan of the request.

Given the popularity of PHP, I'm surprised I haven't heard of any 
PHP-language-based appservers -- are you (or anyone else) familiar with 
something like this?  As opposed to using mod_php in Apache?

> I know a lot of the people on the PEAR-DEV list are fond of Java, and I
> had to remember the other day that PHP __is__ an Apache Software
> Foundation project (which has a lot of Java projects), which is to say
> that I think PHP is getting more and more like Java.

I think that Java's popularity with users (programmers) is infecting 
the PHP community, but I am skeptical there is a direct connection 
between the Java Apache projects and the PHP apache project.  In fact, 
I am subscribed to many of the major Jakarta Project mailing lists and, 
at least on the struts mailing list, PHP isn't regarded very highly.  
Which I find interesting, because J2EE (even simple servlet/JSP stuff) 
is way overkill for the majority of dynamic web page development.


Erik