What are the best languages for aspiring programmers in 2014?

Re:What are the best languages for aspiring programmers in 2... by err4nt on Monday September 23, 2013 @04:44PM (#6434004)

Don't get me wrong, I don't think PHP is going anywhere, and it certainly won't decrease in usefulness - but since I first started dealing with PHP around a decade ago I have seen it blossom and grow, but lately it doesn't feel like it's such a good choice to jump onto.

Mind you, I just finally started releasing my own PHP code on Github this year, but I just can't see how diving deep into PHP in 2013/2014 to be the most useful exercise. It seems to me like many of the newer languages are solving problems PHP has to work around, and I'd hate to introduce more headaches to this than necessary.

I've done stuff with CMS's like Wordpress, Joomla, and others, and worked on a variety of PHP-based web apps, but none of those seem to be a great spot to jump on the bandwagon.

I do have a private server, which means I can set my PHP options however I like (full access). If you know more about PHP than me and think it's still a great time to hop on board, what are some resources or things we could do with it that would fit the type of learning we want to achieve?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What are the best languages for aspiring programmers in 2... by jtreminio on Monday September 23, 2013 @04:56PM (#6434092)

Wordpress, Joomla and Drupal are not good examples of "good" PHP code. They work, and are used extensively, but experienced developers who care about code quality blow a gasket when they look at the source code.

To do proper PHP development you should have a local VM. I created something to help in that regard[0]. It's been fairly well received.

There's also websites like PHP The Right Way [1] that act like a collection of best practices. If you're not using Composer[2] you should start doing so. I wish Javascript had a package manager as robust and useful as Composer (I know of Bower, but imo it's not nearly as good!). PHP Developer[3] is a source of good daily blog posts. The ones I read on a regular basis are ircmaxell [4], fabpot[5], lornajane[6], philsturgeon[7], richardmiller[8], and phparch[9]. I also sometimes write some things[10].

[0] https://puphpet.com

[1] http://phptherightway.com

[2] http://getcomposer.org

[3] http://phpdeveloper.org

[4] http://blog.ircmaxell.com

[5] http://fabien.potencier.org

[6] http://lornajane.net

[7] http://philsturgeon.co.uk/blog

[8] http://richardmiller.co.uk

[9] http://phparch.com

[10] https://jtreminio.com

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What are the best languages for aspiring programmers in 2... by err4nt on Monday September 23, 2013 @05:33PM (#6434305)

Oh dear, thank you for these! I've finally moved from the 'I can edit existing code' category to authoring my own simple scripts so these will definitely come in handy. I've got some reading to do!

[ Parent | on HN ]