When someone brings up haskell as a best choice for server side web development as a replacement for php it makes me think this person is either very new or trying virtual signal that they are smarter and more skilled because they use a more difficult powerful language. That's like saying building a laser from a kit to cut your bread is better than using a knife. Nevermind the cost, time, safety, availability of parts and employee market for each skill would clearly point to a knife as the best tool. Very few companies still in business build a laser when they need a knife.
For example, if you never programmed in any of statically-typed languages, you cannot say if they are better or worse. Similar things go for OOP-oriented stuff, or immutable-by-default languages or languages with well-designed stdlib, etc...
You may still think that PHP is the best language after trying a few other, wildly different ones, and that's fine. But unfortunately, in my experience, a lot of people who really advertise PHP (and some other languages like Pascal), haven't really tried the alternatives.
Who is saying that? I've read through this thread and I have not read anything to that effect.
Please read my comment again. I'm not saying Haskell is the best lang for webdev. I'm just saying that claiming "PHP is probably the best language for server side webdev today" is missing a lot of innovation that is very usable for webdev, and hint at bubble think.
The "best language for server side webdev today" is going to be a matter of taste either way. But when one's saying it is PHP, I immediately wonder what other languages the person has done webdev in: since PHP is not a very nice language IMHO.
> I understand you have invested time in other languages, we all have but lets focus on facts not fears of your choice of language seeming less popular.
So what are the facts that make PHP the best for webdev? I dont think it is often picked for greenfield project by highly skilled teams, when given the choice to pick any language they like. And that would be a fact I'd respect in this context.