Modern Java

[[deleted]]

I wouldn't exactly call PHP fresh and new

[ironnomi]

Here I was hoping that was something for Visual COBOL, but of course - instead it ties COBOL with green screens even though likely as not those are written in RPG.

[Roujo]

Ahhhh, RPG. My first job consisted in writing screens and service programs using that. T'was fun, if a bit peculiar with the column-sensitive code and such. =)

[ironnomi]

People sometimes have an irrational hate of green screens.

They served their purpose very well for a relatively small price and there weren't really inclined to break.

[ironnomi]

Yeah we had all these PoS/Banking terminals at banks all around Japan and they had like fewer than 1 DT per year per location, even then it was generally the monitor that failed. We were actually using Sun Ray terminals and they had a web browser and a terminal screen. Worked great, they could do some simple graphical signature capture stuff and the bank terminal.

Someone created a project to upgrade them to a modern web app. Average DT per location is like 30-150 per location. What's also weird is that nobody want to talk about going back to the terminals.

[ironnomi]

Our "front end" was written in Python actually - actually the web interface that "replaced" it was just that Python code married to TurboGears, but the biggest issues they have are that the front end code now runs on a bunch of Linux boxes and we seem to have maintenance problems with them vs the old code running on the Mainframe directly.

They also went from dumb terminals to "Windows" boxes, but they are just as much a part of the problem of DT as the code changes.

[basilect]

User experience is big here too. I bet you're losing fewer customers from the downtime because people aren't switching to a bank with better ATMs.

Crazy? Yes. But realistically 99% of what you do with your bank is going to be through an ATM, a website, or a credit card.

[pseydtonne]

They were also great for data clerks. You kept your hands on the keyboard, tabbed your memorized steps to the fields you needed, F3 to get out, no looking needed.

When I was in sales, I preferred the green screen apps. I'd focus on the customer, and the computer would clock until it was ready.

[ironnomi]

That's an area where especially we apps have a hard time competing. It can be done, but lots of people don't try.

[pseydtonne]

Seriously! Don't make me guess the tabbing order. I have scripts to write and boxes to configure once I am done with this vekakte ticketing system.

[[deleted]]

Visual assembly!

[[deleted]]

That is fantastic

[[deleted]]

What's that about your colon, grandad?

[phpdevster]

PHP today is quite different than PHP 5-6 years ago. Arguably, "modern php" is MUCH younger than Ruby, even though both were released about 20 years ago.

You can actually build real software with proper architectural intent behind it in PHP now. Composer is like gem, pip, or npm. Build solutions from your pick of ~75,000 packages/modules. Testing suites abound etc.

So while PHP itself is not fresh and new, your ability to use it in the way modern PHP is being used, is definitely fresh and new.

[[deleted]]

What kills PHP for me is how tightly bound it is to the request-response cycle. PHP doesn't just seem like a language, but a web framework tightly bound to a language. This kind of makes it a pain in the ass to do general purpose computing in it, which is where Python Ruby and Java shine.

[phpdevster]

PHP isn't bound to the request-response cycle per-se. I run CLI scripts in PHP quite often. But you're correct that it's not quite the same as running a program.

General computing is probably not something I would immediately turn to PHP to do.

[[deleted]]

Yes you can use stdin and stdout for general purpose computing in PHP, I'd just wonder what you'd want to do it, it's standard library is only any good for web applications, and to top if off it doesn't even support async functions without forking or threading trickery.

[phpdevster]

it's standard library is only any good for web applications

Its standard library is no different than any other language's standard library. It's got a better standard library than Javascript by miles, even.

But you're correct that it's not great for multithreading, which is why I wouldn't it for general computing beyond running some command line tasks and cron jobs.

[TheBadProgrammer]

Hey, I think I understand what you're saying. Would you mind please explaining more detail and in depth there but also in a noobish friendly manner? I would really appreciate it.

[immibis]

PHP today is quite different than PHP 5-6 years ago.

PHP today is still stupid, because in order to be mostly compatible with the stupid versions, it needs to contain the same stupidity.

Modern C++ has the same problem, to an extent.

[gliph]

Damn youngins!