When building web sites, ASP and PHP are very popular languages.
Here’s my opinion on whether ASP or PHP is best
ASP v. PHP
Both ASP and PHP are languages used to build Dynamic Web
sites that can interact with Databases and exchange information.
ASP (Active Server Pages) is from Microsoft and is used with
IIS (Internet Information Server) that runs on Microsoft
Servers. PHP (Personal Home Pages) is from Rasmus Lerdorf,
who originally designed this parsing language which was later
modified by different people. It runs on Unix and Linux servers
and it also has an NT server version.
There are a lot of differences between ASP and PHP.
Cost
To run ASP programs one needs IIS installed on a Windows
platform server, which is not free. PHP programs run on Linux,
which is free. Even the connectivity of the database is expensive
in the case of ASP as MS-SQL is a product of Microsoft that
needs to be purchased. PHP generally uses MySQL, which is
freely available.
Speed
If we compare the speed of ASP and PHP then PHP has an upper
hand. PHP code runs faster than ASP. ASP is built on COM
based architecture, which is an overhead for the server whereas
PHP code runs in its own memory space.
Platform Compatibility
PHP programs can run on various platforms like Linux, Unix,
Windows and Solaris whereas ASP is mainly associated with
Windows platforms. However, ASP can run on a Linux platform
with ASP-Apache installed on the server.
Additional Costs
Many of the tools used in PHP are free of cost and since
PHP is open source a lot of code can be found in open source
forums. PHP has inbuilt features like ftp, email from a web
page or even encryption mechanisms but in ASP such features
are not built in and some additional components are required.
Therefore an additional cost is incurred for such components.
Base Language
PHP is based on C++ language and the syntax used in PHP
is quite similar to C/C++. C/C++ is still considered the
best programming language by many programmers and people
who love this language would surely feel more comfortable
with the syntax of PHP. ASP on the other hand has a more
Visual Basic kind of syntax that again is closely related
to only Microsoft products. So, it depends on a person-to-person
which language he or she is comfortable
Database Connectivity
PHP, being extremely flexible, can connect to various databases,
the most popular being MySQL. ASP mainly uses MS-SQL.
Conclusion
Both languages have their advantages specific to users.
Some would argue that both the languages have their own importance
and depending on the user's requirements the language and
the platform can be chosen. If we talk about developing a
discussion board then ASP is equally capable but many feel
the best discussion boards are developed in PHP. If a user
is looking for some e-commerce application development then
many would call ASP the ideal choice. This does not mean
that PHP cannot provide e-commerce solutions, only that many
people choose ASP.
From my perspective, PHP is an all around better choice
than ASP.
Halstatt Pires is with the Internet marketing firm -
http://www.marketingtitan.com -
a San Diego Internet marketing and advertising company offering
automated web site systems through
http://www.businesscreatorpro.com
